Product Description

L'Etranger has the force and fascination of myth. The outwardly simple narrative of an office clerk who kills an Arab, 'a cause du soleil', and finds himself condemned to death for moral insensibility becomes, in Camus's hands, a powerful image of modern man's impatience before Christian philosophy and conventional social and sexual values. For this new edition Ray Davison makes use of recent critical analysis of L'Etranger to give a full and concise description of Camus's early philosophy of the Absurd and the ideas and preoccupations from which the novel emerges. Davison also discusses the developing pattern of Camus's notion of the art of the novel, his views on 'classicism', simplicity and ambiguity, his fondness for paradox, and his love of everyday situations which yield to mythical interpretation.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #17836 in Books
• Published on: 1991-03
• Original language: French
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• 185 pages

Customer Reviews

Brilliant!
Book arrived 3 days late but was well worth the wait. Is an amazing book, highly reccomend!

The Outsider is a good book
Meursault is my umost hero because he operates entirely according to hisown considerations. Most discussions of the book on the internet areawful. Meursault is not indifferent to the conventions of his society,and he has certainly made no choice to reject them. He is an impossiblecharacter, the perfect existential consciousness if you like. Theopinions, standards or ideas of anyone but himself are irrelevant to him. He has not reached this position through any thought process: he simplyhappens to be the epitome of philosophical egoism, individualism, moralrelativism. He cannot in fact be a creation in real human society. It ismeaningless to approve or disapprove of him because he is firstlyimpossible in reality, and secondly has not made himself the way he is. He is heroic because he is utterly himself, an unattainable transcendentperfection for anybody who wants to live by their own personal judgements. Analysis of the role of the sun is also poor: the ascent and power of thesun destroy the shadows which everything 'other' casts on Meursault, thatis the impositions of the world on his individualism. When Meursaultshoots, he is overcome only by the dazzling absurdity and meaninglessnessof existence and consciousness, which can be seen if all outsideimpositions are wiped out. PS read Crime And Punishment to seeRaskolnikoff try to reach Meursault-esque individualist morality: and whathappens to someone who does this.

Didn't enjoy it at all
It could be the fact that I was forced to read it for A Level French, but I really disliked this book! I found it had no real story line, there was next to no characterisation, and you didn't feel anything for the main character, Mersault. It seemed to simply be someone moaning about their life, while not being prepared to do anything about it. Mersault is very antagonistic, not willing to make any effort to get along with people, and he was impossible to relate to.

All in all, I'd recommend giving this book a wide berth!