The Stranger (French: L’Étranger [letʁɑ̃ʒe], lit. ’The Foreigner’), also published in English as The Outsider, is a 1942 novella written by French author Albert Camus. The first of Camus’s novels published in his lifetime, the story follows Meursault, an indifferent settler in French Algeria, who, weeks after his mother’s funeral, kills an unnamed Arab man in Algiers. The story is divided into two parts, presenting Meursault’s first-person narrative before and after the killing.
Camus completed the initial manuscript by May 1941, with revisions suggested by André Malraux, Jean Paulhan, and Raymond Queneau that were adopted in the final version. The original French-language first edition of the novella was published on 19 May 1942, by Gallimard, under its original title; it appeared in bookstores from that June but was restricted to an initial 4,400 copies, so few that it could not be a bestseller. Published during the Nazi occupation of France, it went on sale without censorship or omission by the Propaganda-Staffel.
It began being published in English from 1946, first in the United Kingdom, where its title was changed to The Outsider to avoid confusion with the translation of Maria Kuncewiczowa’s novel of the same name; after being published in the United States, the novella retained its original name, and the British-American difference in titles has persisted in subsequent editions. The Stranger gained popularity among anti-Nazi circles following its focus in Jean-Paul Sartre’s 1947 article “Explication de L’Étranger” (“Analysis of The Stranger”).
Considered a classic of 20th-century literature, The Stranger has received critical acclaim for Camus’s philosophical outlook, absurdism, syntactic structure, and existentialism (despite Camus’s rejection of the label), particularly within its final chapter. Le Monde ranked The Stranger as number one on its 100 Books of the 20th Century. The novella has twice been adapted for film: Lo Straniero (1967) and Yazgı (2001), has seen numerous references and homages in television and music (notably “Killing an Arab” by The Cure), and was retold from the perspective of the unnamed Arab man’s brother in Kamel Daoud’s 2013 novel The Meursault Investigation.
Plot
Part I
Meursault learns of the death of his mother, who has been living in an old age home in the country. He takes time off from work to attend her funeral but seems to show no signs of grief or mourning to the people around him. When asked if he wishes to view her body, he declines, and he smokes and drinks regular (white) coffee—not the obligatory black coffee—at the vigil held by the coffin the night before the burial.
Back in Algiers, Meursault encounters Marie, a former secretary of his firm. The two become re-acquainted, swim together, watch a comedy film and begin to have an intimate relationship. All of this happens on the day after his mother’s funeral.
Over the next few days, Meursault helps Raymond Sintès, a neighbor and friend who is rumored to be a pimp, but says he works in a warehouse, to get revenge on a Moorish girlfriend he suspects has been accepting gifts and money from another man. Raymond asks Meursault to write a letter inviting the girl over to Raymond’s apartment solely so that he can have sex with her and then spit in her face and throw her out. While listening to Raymond, Meursault is unfazed by any feelings of empathy, does not express concern that she would be emotionally hurt by this plan and agrees to write the letter.
The girl visits Raymond on a Sunday morning, and the police get involved when he beats her for slapping him after he tries to kick her out. He asks Meursault to testify that the girl had been unfaithful when he is called to the police station, and Meursault agrees. Ultimately, Raymond is let off with a warning.
While this is going on, Meursault’s boss asks him if he would like to work at a branch their firm is thinking about opening in Paris and Marie asks him if he wants to get married. In both cases, Meursault does not have strong feelings about the matter but is willing to move or get married if it will please the other party. Also, Salamano, Meursault and Raymond’s elderly neighbor, loses his abused and diseased dog and, despite outwardly maintaining his usual spiteful and uncaring attitude toward the creature, goes to Meursault for comfort and advice a few times. During one of these conversations, Salamano, who adopted the dog as a companion shortly after his wife’s death, mentions that some neighbors had ‘said nasty things’ about Meursault after he sent his mother to a retirement home. Meursault is surprised to learn about this negative impression of his actions.
One weekend, Raymond invites Meursault and Marie to a friend’s beach cabin. There they see the brother of Raymond’s spurned girlfriend along with another Arab, who Raymond has mentioned have been following him around recently. The Arabs confront Raymond and his friend, and the brother wounds Raymond with a knife before running away. Later, Meursault walks back along the beach alone, armed with a revolver he took from Raymond to prevent him from acting rashly, and encounters the brother of Raymond’s girlfriend. Disoriented and on the edge of heatstroke, Meursault shoots when the Arab flashes his knife at him. It is a fatal shot, but Meursault shoots the man four more times after a pause.
Part II
Meursault is incarcerated. His general detachment and ability to adapt to any external circumstance seem to make living in prison tolerable, especially after he gets used to the idea of being restricted and unable to have sex with Marie, though he does realize at one point that he has been unknowingly talking to himself for a number of days. For almost a year, he sleeps, looks out the small window of his cell, and mentally lists the objects in his old apartment while waiting for his day in court.
Meursault never denies the murder he committed, so, at his trial, the prosecuting attorney focuses more on his inability or unwillingness to cry at his mother’s funeral than on the details of the murder. He portrays Meursault’s quietness and passivity as demonstrating his criminality and lack of remorse and denounces Meursault as a soul-less monster who deserves to die for his crime. Although several of Meursault’s friends testify on his behalf and his attorney tells him the sentence will likely be light, Meursault is sentenced to be publicly decapitated.
Put in a new cell, Meursault obsesses over his impending doom and appeal and tries to imagine some way in which he can escape his fate. He refuses to see the prison chaplain, but one day the chaplain visits him anyway. Meursault says he does not believe in God and is not even interested in the subject, but the chaplain persists in trying to lead Meursault away from atheism (or, perhaps more precisely, apatheism).
The chaplain believes Meursault’s appeal will succeed in getting him released from prison, but says such an outcome will not get rid of his feelings of guilt or fix his relationship with God. Eventually, Meursault accosts the chaplain in a rage. He attacks the chaplain’s worldview and patronizing attitude and asserts that, in confronting the certainty of the nearness of his death, he has had insights about life and death that he feels with a confidence beyond what the chaplain possesses. He says that, although what we say or do or feel can cause our deaths to happen at different times or under different circumstances, none of those things can change the fact that we are all condemned to die one day, so nothing ultimately matters.
After the chaplain leaves, Meursault finds some comfort in thinking about the parallels between his situation and how he thinks his mother must have felt while being surrounded by death and slowly dying at the retirement home. Yelling at the chaplain had emptied him of all hope or thoughts of escape or a successful appeal, so he manages to open his heart ‘to the benign indifference of the universe’ and decides that he has been, and still is, happy. His indifference to the universe makes him feel like he belongs to it. He even hopes there will be a large, hateful crowd at his execution which will bring everything to a consummate end.
Characters
Meursault (pronounced [møʁ.so]) is a French settler in Algeria who learns of his mother’s death by telegram. Meursault’s indifference to his mother’s death demonstrates some emotional detachment from his environment. Other instances are shown. Meursault is also a truthful person, speaking his mind without regard for others. He is estranged from society due to his indifference but shows some affection towards Marie.
Meursault’s mother was sent to an old people’s home three years prior to her death, as noted in the opening lines of the novel. As Meursault nears the time for his execution, he feels a kinship with his mother, thinking she, too, embraced a meaningless universe.
Thomas Pérez was the fiancé of Meursault’s mother while she was in the home. He brings up the rear in the funeral procession for Meursault’s mother, and Meursault describes in a great amount of detail the old man’s struggle to keep up. He is called to testify at Meursault’s trial.
Céleste is the owner of a café that Meursault frequents. He testifies at Meursault’s trial.
Marie Cardona was a typist in the same workplace as Meursault. A day after his mother’s funeral, she meets Meursault at a public pool, and they begin a relationship. She asks Meursault on one occasion if he loves her, and on another if he would like to marry her. To the first he responds with no, the second he seems indifferent to the idea. Marie
