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What are readers saying about The Stranger?
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A Reader posted a review at 2010-05-18 02:49:12.
(Language: English)
  
I just finished this book. Picked it up because I've always been interested in existentialism, but grow more disgusted by this philosophy with each passing year.It is certainly worth reading, however, for the examination on meaning that it covers, particularly that of a condemned man. In the vein of Meursault, on the other hand, is there really much to say for a man who can find no meaning? It must be a terrible state of being - one which I've known personally and from which I've culled much sadness. If nothingness is the ultimate objective, that is just repulsive and nearly without merit. Perhaps I must read it again to find its true value ... 
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A Reader posted a review at 2010-01-24 07:10:08.
(Language: English)
This is an amazing book! I read it in English, and for the first time in my life wished that I knew French. You start the book wondering why one of the world classics is written in a style of 10 year old. Then you become absorbed in this different world, the world of simply truth, which doesn't take sophisticated words and complex sentences. At the end, you are laughing and crying with him, mostly crying of course because there is no place of such honesty in our all-so-intellectual and proper existence.
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A Reader posted a review at 2008-07-31 05:47:08.
(Language: English)
Meursault is a difficult figure to understand, and yet irrespective of what one thinks of his moral attitude, throughout he remains true to himself. Camus writes that “Far from lacking sensibility, he is driven by a tenacious and therefore profound passion, the passion for an absolute and for truth”. In the course of this read, I kept being reminded of Prince Myshkin and Nastasya Filippovna in Dostoevsky’s The Idiot, who were also treated as societal misfits for their uncompromising honesty. Here too, one admires Meursault for his ‘ridiculous fidelity’ in the face of social pretence and premeditation around him. He refuses to partake in duplicitousness, to ‘play the game’, and for that he is condemned by society. In his unyielding candour, Meursault refuses to display emotions that he does not feel, or participate in social conventions calling for dishonesty. Meursault, is judged guilty for his failure to exhibit grief at his mother's funeral in a manner deemed acceptable or ‘normal’ by the rest of society.
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A Reader posted a review at 2010-10-17 05:35:08.
(Language: English)
An exploration of the meaning of existence (if it indeed has any), The Stranger challenges us to take a look at life from a completely different angle than one normally encounters (looking at the "absurdity" of life). It challenges us to confront our definition of meaning and to see if it truly has any merit. For Mersault it doesn't matter, life is meaningless and is lived through sensory perception; the physical world is to be experienced in it's whole without our projections unto it for our projections unto existence do not mean anything. The text challenges everyone from those looking for meaning in a spiritually exhausted and relativistic world to those who wholeheartedly hold on to religions and superstitions. The conclusion of living without objective meaning is at once both frightening and liberating. The former is obvious. Liberation comes from the lack of objective meaning, that idea that instructs you how to live; liberation means to live a life that you determine is one that you wouldn't mind living again.
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A Reader posted a review at 2008-10-22 05:56:19.
(Language: English)
sebuah novel oleh Albert Camus. It is one of the best-known examples of existentialism, and one of the most famous novels of the twentieth century. Ini adalah salah satu contoh paling terkenal dari eksistensialisme, dan salah satu yang paling terkenal dari novel abad kedua puluh. The novel tells the story of an alienated, anomic French man, Meursault, who eventually kills a Middle Eastern man in Algiers . Kalau tetap memberitahu cerita yang menjadikan, anomic Perancis manusia, Meursault, yang akhirnya membunuh seorang pria Timur Tengah di Aljazair. At the trial, the prosecution calls him a remorseless killer, and he is convicted, and waits to be executed. Pada uji coba, penuntutan panggilan dia pembunuh yang kejam, dan ia dihukum, dan menunggu untuk dieksekusi. In the prison cell he assumes a role as a passive individual and realizes this because Aaron the Arab wont share his waffle crisps. Dalam sel penjara dia anggap peran sebagai individu dan pasif menyadari ini karena Harun Arab kebiasaan berbagi itu omongan crisps. The book uses a pre-World War II Algeria in setting drawn from Camus's own upbringing. Buku menggunakan pra-Perang Dunia II di Aljazair pengaturan diambil dari Camus sendiri asuhan.
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A Reader posted a review at 2010-06-03 12:55:00.
(Language: English)
good book , quik read,i love the way camus draws his views on absurdism, which is more evident on the last pages. the character emotional detachment was somehow disturbing and thats what caused him failure in court,not his crime. the ironic and my fav part is when he realise that death is an absolute fact and we r all dying at least he knows how, which is thing that comforted him and made him accept his fate.
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A Reader posted a review at 2011-03-21 09:03:36.
(Language: English)
Lean and tough. The narrator blandly narrates the events of his life in Algiers - he goes to his mother's funeral, has an affair with a secretary at the office, gets involved in his neighbors' domestic dispute. None of these events seem to affect him; through it all he remains neutral and fairly passive - and then, halfway through the book, he murders an Arab, for practically no reason. Camus's influential depiction of modern man, buffeted by forces he can't control, is superbly done, and, thanks to its narrator's honesty and self-awareness, more hopeful than it sounds from this summary.
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Sumeeth posted a review at 2012-06-02 12:41:59.
(Language: English)
L'existentialism.... Je l'adore
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A Reader posted a review at 2012-06-24 10:33:19.
(Language: English)
Is Meursault autistic or a sociopath? Or is he an autistic sociopath? Qui sait, enfin? A bleak book that left me a little cold.
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A Reader posted a review at 2009-11-01 02:04:40.
(Language: French)
La première partie du livre fait penser à du John Steinbeck en plus raffiner, moins rustre (personnellement, John Steinbeck c'est pas mon truc...). La façon dont se place le personnage principal est toutefois appréciable ; en retrait, comme un observateur, notant les petits détails de vie humaine sans pour autant dériver en de longue description. En revanche la seconde partie du livre (c'est-à-dire la deuxième moitié) est géniale. Le lecteur se met sans difficulté à la place du héros et patiente avec lui en prison, assiste à ses côtés au procès et rêvasse avec lui d'une autre issue.
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Melanie posted a review at 2011-11-10 06:47:36.
(Language: English)
A good and necessary read for anyone that wants to be able to discuss contemporary literature, although not my personal favorite. The emotional vacuity of Meursault made this story less moving for me than other, somewhat-similar stories, but on the whole this was an engaging, and far better, work than The Plague.
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petteri posted a review at 2008-08-13 03:17:08.
(Language: English)
I believe I did an essay about this book while in high school. We got a list of books/authors to choose from so I just ended up reading The Stranger. It's been a few years so I won't go into great depths describing the book. In fact I remember little more than the legnth of the book which was somewhat modest. I also found it a little dull and meaningless, but it may be mostly due to it being 'a school thing' and me craving for completely different kind of literature at the time. The themes are however the most important aspect of this book and they really are better suited for older audieence, not for intelligence related reasons but simply life experience. Not much of a review I guess :-)
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Jen posted a review at 2009-07-17 02:22:31.
(Language: English)
Review: An Algerian man named Marceau is arrested for killing an Arab on the beach, but his trial seems to be less about the situation and more about his lack of reaction to his mother's death. The short book, then, seems to be a reflection on the measure of morality in fellow human beings, and whether anything other than the expected reaction can or should be used as a way to pass judgement on another person's intentions or humanity. This is a very short book, but I found that it really engrossed me. As someone who went to Disneyland the week after her father died, I was really intrigued by the arguments presented in the story about how Marceau was inhuman and insensitive and obviously inclined to be a killer because he didn't cry at his mother's funeral. People react and recover from death differently. His refusal to kowtow to his accusers and express a remorse he did not feel made him a very sympathetic character in my eyes, because no one really tried to understand his viewpoint, they just kept trying to change it to theirs. Definitely a good read one for me!
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A Reader posted a review at 2007-12-14 08:26:20.
(Language: English)
I found this to be an almost too spare read until the man goes to jail. It's like the whole book up to that point is character development, even the murder (probably the first and only time I'll ever refer to a murder as 'character development'). It happens from such a distance that until you've read the sentences over twice (and it really takes only a few sentences for a man to suddenly be dead) you aren't even aware a murder has happened. I do understand why Camus did this (I think), and it's just more of what he does throughout: pound the protagonist's detachment from his emotions into our heads. His mother dies, he observes his surroundings and the reactions of other people. A woman loves him, he readily admits to not loving her, but agrees that marrying her would be all right. He murders a man and for the rest of the book we hear nothing about how he feels about it, only about how other people feel about it. This is all very interesting, but nothing special. However, once he gets to jail, once he goes on trial, the experience of just reading becomes extremely intense, just from the utter strangeness of it all. The man never really minds being in jail - he gets used to the routine and even seems to enjoy it a bit - but he finds being on trial 'annoying'. And the trial would be, I admit, from his perspective, extremely annoying, if not torturous. The prosecutor hardly mentions the murder itself but rather spends the entire time attacking the murderer's character. The twists he comes up with, while supposed to be taking place in the 1940's, aren't that different from modern courtrooms in that the truth can fall by the wayside to make room for the best argument. To me, this was the most interesting part.
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A Reader posted a review at 2007-10-15 05:13:57.
(Language: English)
The narrative is delivered in the first person by Meursault, the main character. He rarely shares his feelings or reflections. This makes it possible for him to be a detached observer of his own life events, looking on as an "outsider". There is, however, some poignant musings of the condemned man facing his impending doom. Camus writes, “What interests me at the present is trying to escape from the mechanism, trying to find if there’s any way out of the inevitable. …Willing as I was, I just couldn’t accept such an absolute certaintyâ€. This resonated with me… how we can continue to try to struggle, push against, recast and attempt to change that which awaits us. In Sisyphus, Camus writes, “This heart within me I can feel, and I judge that it exists. This world I can touch, and likewise judge that it exists. There ends all my knowledge, and the rest is construction. For if I try to seize this self of which I feel sure, it is nothing but water slipping through my fingersâ€. In the outsider, he continues in similar vain and highlights the absurdity and pointlessness of existence, “..it doesn’t matter very much whether you die at thirty or seventy since, in either case, other men and women will naturally go on living, for thousands of years evenâ€. I find similar thread being picked up in Milan Kundera’s Unbearable Lightness of Being – which I am currently reading. Meursault is a difficult figure to understand, and yet irrespective of what one thinks of his moral attitude, throughout he remains true to himself. Camus writes that “Far from lacking sensibility, he is driven by a tenacious and therefore profound passion, the passion for an absolute and for truthâ€. In the course of this read, I kept being reminded of Prince Myshkin and Nastasya Filippovna in Dostoevsky’s The Idiot, who were also treated as societal misfits for their uncompromising honesty. Here too, one admires Meursault for his ‘ridiculous fidelity’ in the face of social pretence and premeditation around him. He refuses to partake in duplicitousness, to ‘play the game’, and for that he is condemned by society. In his unyielding candour, Meursault refuses to display emotions that he does not feel, or participate in social conventions calling for dishonesty. Meursault, is judged guilty for his failure to exhibit grief at his mother's funeral in a manner deemed acceptable or ‘normal’ by the rest of society. Ultimately, Camus presents the world as essentially meaningless and therefore, the only way to arrive at any meaning or purpose is to make it oneself. Thus it is the individual, rather than the act itself, that provides meaning to any given context. I find this perspective interesting, particularly as much of it ran counter to my own beliefs and ideas on life. Yet, one can not help be influenced, and in some respects be persuaded, by what is being articulated here. I enjoyed it thoroughly and found it very thought provoking. Enjoy, A
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Neil posted a review at 2011-12-09 08:08:53.
(Language: English)
Simple. Elegant. Thought-provoking. I need to think some more about what I have read, and will most likely return to savor some of the gems of thought that surprisingly turn up at the end of long, apparently mundane passages. Reminded me of the books of Herman Hesse, books I loved so much some time ago. Connected with my atheism, and with my sympathy for certain Buddhist concepts, and with a certain disrespect for authority that I tend towards, or embrace whole-heartedly, depending on my mood at a given moment. I need to read more of Camus.
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A Reader posted a review at 2009-09-18 01:05:38.
(Language: English)
I personally find more meaning in life than Camus apparently did.That being said he does an excellent job in portraying life as one who knows no God must be.everything from the lapsing into a carnal life to a lack of sympathy for others is portrayed here.This character is increasingly governed by his flesh and with no after life to worry about has no fear of consequences nor any guiding moral principle but if it feels good do it.In the end his senses take over & he kills a man for no other reason than he felt like it and he was annoyed by him.too much is made of his period of discovery when the priest asks him to repent.he never believed anything so it only follows that he rejects the priests attempts to reconcile with god. this might be a thrilling passage for an atheist to read but just seems sad to the rest of us.The part that does not ring true is that camus's stranger also seems to have no instinct for self preservation.either that or he just thinks it is pointless and he is depressed about the lack of an afterlife.In the end Camus makes a strong case that we people need a God in that without him the Stranger comes to no good end.
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A Reader posted a review at 2007-06-27 06:39:21.
(Language: English)
Albert Camus’ The Stranger tells the tale of Meursault a detached, emotionless man and his struggle to live an absurd life. Meursault shows no love, hate, remorse or regret for his actions. He has no attachment to other humans, be it his mother or lover. Maman died today. Or yesterday maybe, I don’t know. A minute later she asked me if I loved her. I told her it didn’t mean anything but that I didn’t think so. Throughout the novel Meursualt’s story is told to us by him but he does not appear to be an active participant in many aspects of his life. He relates to us his daily life and interactions with people as though he were an independent observer and not an active participant in his life unless the situation is part of the physical. Meursault seems to only live when he is swimming, having sex, smoking or being scorched by the sun. The mundane parts of Meursault’s life are only made tolerable through routine and necessity. The chaos and lack of structure of Sundays for example leave him with nothing to do but enjoy naps, smoke some cigarettes and observe society; he is truly free. Meursault’s life is an absurd one ruled only by duty and stimulus, this theme is also explored by Camus in his essay The myth of Sisyphus. Meursault is completely nonchalant about death, even as he sits awaiting his execution. He wonders about the methodology and the process but does not fear it. He is free because of his atheism. He knows that death is inevitable and therefore you must live now and not worry about death. Meursault lives and makes meaning in life without the God. He must make it meaningful so as to enjoy what he can out of it. The Stranger is a brilliant piece of Philosophical fiction, the language is clear and the plot is simple but the overall work raises the most profound questions as to the meaning of life, death, love and god
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A Reader posted a review at 2008-03-12 03:27:15.
(Language: English)
L'ETRANGER - ALBERT CAMUS Albert Camus s'explique dans une derniere interview : ?...J'ai resume L'Etranger, il y a longtemps, par une phrase dont je reconnais qu'elle est tres paradoxale : 'Dans notre societe tout homme qui ne pleure pas a l'enterrement de sa mere risque d'etre condamne a mort.' Je voulais dire seulement que le heros du livre est condamne parce qu'il ne joue pas le jeu. En ce sens, il est etranger a la societe ou il vit, il erre, en marge, dans les faubourgs de la vie privee, solitaire, sensuelle. Et c'est pourquoi des lecteurs ont ete tente de le considerer comme une epave. Meursault ne joue pas le jeu. La reponse est simple : il refuse de mentir. [...] ...On ne se tromperait donc pas beaucoup en lisant dans L'Etranger l'histoire d'un homme qui, sans aucune attitude heroique, accepte de mourir pour la verite. Meursault pour moi n'est donc pas une epave, mais un homme pauvre et nu, amoureux du soleil qui ne laisse pas d'ombres. Loin qu'il soit prive de toute sensibilite, une passion profonde, parce que tenance l'anime, la passion de l'absolu et de la verite. Il m'est arrive de dire aussi, et toujours paradoxalement, que j'avais essaye de figurer dans mon personnage le seul christ que nous meritions. On comprendra, apres mes explications, que je l'aie dit sans aucune intention de blaspheme et seulement avec l'affection un peu ironique qu'un artiste a le droit d'eprouver a l'egard des personnages de sa creation.? A. Camus. 1955. Ed. de la Pleiade
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A Reader posted a review at 2007-07-24 04:31:13.
(Language: English)
George, you got it, you are the first person who's comment makes me smile. Who says you are not really supposed to though? Who ever did can go f- themselves for telling you how to think or feel. I am not shocked but disheartened by other people's comments on this book. I had to put it down last night because I started crying... If you don't get it, then you haven't experienced much with people and life and don't know what it is like to be alone and not Co-dependent on others as most of society usually conforms to... I will update my perspective as I continue reading... Everyone's comments are getting better, slightly... as for the update now that I have finished the read... By chance and because I always feel comfortable reading on the train, even though i have no destination... on the last pages of reading this book, there was this homeless guy on the train, he stunk. The man sitting across from me almost vomited as he tucked his face into his shirt... I had no expression and didn't react, I just stared at him wondering... there was something about this that came into place with this book, the world, my life... and now I know what it is -I can relate to the man on the train. People running away from him and reacting to him in disgust. The only thing I could feel is that we are the same. it's the same feeling society has for this"character"
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A Reader posted a review at 2007-12-21 09:39:46.
(Language: English)
The key to getting any sort of satisfaction out of reading this book is to approach it as a theoretical work and not as a novel. Traditionally speaking, if you are expecting a novel you will be greatly disappointed and find it very difficult to immerse yourself in the story in any enjoyable way. Camus' stylistic choices are very deliberate as to make the reader feel as alienated from the work as the main character, Meursault, does from most aspects of his life. The *purposeful* use of uninspired, uneventful, short sentences, all in the present perfect tense, will have you as unenthusiastic to read the next paragraph as Meursault is to return back to work after the funeral of his Mother (Maman). With this approach, especially in Part 1 of the book, it is almost certain that Camus is demanding us to understand the unimportance of our own lives. If read as a theoretical work, "The Stranger" is very enriching and thought provoking. The ruthless, consistent honesty by which the protagonist, Meursault, conducts himself forces the reader to evaluate just what they value and, most importantly, why. From Camus no feeling is safe; even weighty sentiments such as love and guilt are completely stripped of their sensational qualities and are challenged to assert themselves beyond cultural expectation. If Camus can successfully convince you, just for a moment, to engage in the relentless, uninvested pursuit of relevance and immediacy along with Meursault, he will have succeeded in his task - not to entertain but to leave you very uncomfortable with your own thoughts.
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A Reader posted a review at 2009-11-18 03:56:38.
(Language: English)
Albert Camus was 29 when he wrote THE STRANGER, his most famous book. Like almost all existential works, this one leaves me cold. Perhaps I am not brave enough to embrace the emotionally detached world Camus, Sartre, Kierkegaard and others inhabit. THE STRANGER is the story of Meursault, who expresses no emotion at his mother's funeral, expresses no emotion when he enters into a torrid affair with a beautiful woman he used to work with, expresses no emotion when he helps an acquaintance write a cruel break-up letter and expresses no emotion when he kills an Arab man for no particular reason.
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A Reader posted a review at 2010-07-03 03:10:34.
(Language: English)
The book is simply written and a rather quick read, but the depth Camus manages to convey through this simplicity is astounding. I think a problem a lot of people have with this book is that they fail to look beyond the whole "what is the meaning of life" message. While an interesting question, the book raises so many other philosophical questions beyond this. What I found the most interesting of these is "what truly defines humanity or makes someone human?" During Meursault's trial, he is constantly accused of not showing remorse and therefore as being cold and inhuman. He is most definitely human though, just rather detached. This raises the question of whether one should be expected to exhibit certain characteristics in certain situations to "keep their humanity". Also it raises the question of whether much of our emotion is created by ourselves or the expectations of others to exhibit certain emotions in a given sitatuion. The book is also an indictment on people's efforts to dictate other people's lives. We are constantly told what is right and as a means to justify our own sense of "what it means to be human". We often impose these characteristics upon others, expecting them to fulfill similar traits and characteristics, as they have been already imposed on us. It is in a way, a self-justification of our actions as right or "humanly". Constantly, Meursault is being told he must live and/or act a certain way, whether it be by the judge, his lawyer, or the priest. Once he doesn't conform to these measures, he is marginalized and called "inhuman"; this is an attempt on the part of the others to rationalize their own ways of life and understandings. If they manage to declare him "inhuman", it allows them to call themselves human and justify their own means of living. In the end, this book is one that raises many more questions than it answers, but in true philosophical fashion, they are really questions without answers.
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A Reader posted a review at 2008-07-13 12:30:14.
(Language: English)
There are certain books that you are expected to like. Some you really do end up liking. Some you get halfway through and find just want to get to the end so you can say "yeah, I read that". The Stranger was somewhere between. The hardest part I had at the beginning was the style. According to the translator's notes, in the first half Camus was emulating the "American" style, a'la Hemingway. I never finished Farewell to Arms precisely because I don't care for that style: short, blunt sentences that feel like hits to the head. However, later in the book Camus becomes more and more lyrical: "The sea gasped for air with each shallow, stifled little wave that broke on the sand". The psychology and philosophy at the end is interesting, and though I don't usually try to analyze books too closely while reading them (otherwise they feel like a chore), I did wonder several times if Camus wasn't making a comment on these ideas by having them come from a sociopathic character like Meursault. Who is supposed to be empty and indifferent, the Universe or just Meursault? I think I enjoyed The Plague a little more, and The Stranger didn't really rock my world, but still pretty good and worth reading.
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A Reader posted a review at 2007-12-04 10:36:31.
(Language: English)
This book feels extremely awkward, at least the translation that I read, which is the older vintage one, since that is the one that I bought from a thrift store for a quarter. I really enjoyed it because it felt very kafkaesque almost like metamorphosis. This book teaches a lesson using a character that seems to be trapped in an existence that he percieves in a very existential way where every event, tragedy, escapade, seems no different from the next and he is always holding out for whatever is supposed to come in the future. He is barely able to show any emotion at all(kafkaesque) and I need more coffee. The story almost is told in a way that doesn't have much feeling. It is a very regular storyteller/narrator and has a feeling of someone telling the story rather than it actually happening(which I think has kafka qualities also). The ending is very profound and I think that by spending a couple of hours reading about events and hardly any sort of resolutions or insights found in these events then leading up to a final insight is a creative plot line. This book follows that. I don't have a star system of ratings, but I would recommend this book.
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