Camus’ exploration of existentialism through Mersault’s views and thoughts on life and death, throughout ‘The Outsider’
The Outsider, written by Albert Camus, revolves around a protagonist - Mersault. The major theme the book explores is existentialism. ‘Existentialism is a philosophical movement that views human existence as having a set of underlying themes and characteristics, such as anxiety, dread, freedom, and awareness of death. It is also an outlook, or a perspective, on life that pursues the question of the meaning of life or the meaning of existence.’ There are a lot of references to death in the book - Mersault’s mother dies in the beginning, later on, Mersault commits murder killing an Arab man, and near the end he is sentenced to death. Mersault is Camus’ symbol for portraying the Absurdity in life, and telling the readers that death is an inevitable part of the life that we are all living. Mersault acts completely irrationally in the book, according to rationality as we know it, at least. He is emotionless and numb. He shows no remorse to his mothers death, nor to the murder he has committed, Camus says, he feels more an annoyance rather than regret, after the Jury asks him to justify his murder. It turns out it was rather a random act of terror. As we read, we too explore the absurd through Camus’ writing. Camus utilizes vivid descriptions - that is, imagery and sensory imagery, he uses strong characterization, and symbolism to teach us about existentialism and the absurd mind.
As Mersault is walking to his mom’s funeral, the character of the nurse says to him, ‘if you go slowly, you risk getting sunstroke. But if you go too fast, you perspire and then in the church you catch a chill.’ He replies, ‘she was right, there is no way out.’ His observation is not over the sun but over what it represents. The sun is society to Meursault, and if you stick with society by walking too slow, you are going to get overwhelmed by it. This contrasts with walking fast, which actually gets you out of the sun sooner, but you will be tired, and, will feel cold from the sudden lack of sun. When you step out of society, you would feel completely alone and isolated. Either way you lose out, yet you cannot avoid both of the outcomes. To stick with the physical world of society and the sun, or to escape through the spiritual world in the church, away from the sun, are the only choices available. Camus used the sun as this symbol for society. The sun oppresses Mersault later on in the novel – When Mersault, Marie, Raymond, and a friend of Raymond‘s are on the beach. Mersault and Raymond confront and fight a few Arabs. Meursault then convinces Raymond that they should go, and as they get back to the house, Meursault decides not to go in. He walks to the spring, in the sun’s heat, and meets the Arab. In the heat, the sunlight reflects off the Arab‘s knife into Mersault’s eyes, blinding him. ‘The Sea swept ashore a great breath of fire. The sky seemed to be splitting from end to end and raining down sheets of rain. My whole being went tense’ All the factors of the sun‘s heat and light affecting Meursault sent him into an uncontrollable frenzy. He could only think to shoot the Arab five times. It can be argued that, since the sun represents society, it was society’s pressure on Mersault at an unconscious level in his mind that made him brutally commit the murder.
