Camus' Outsider and Solzhenitsyn's One Day

The first 200 words of this essay...

World Literature Assignment #1:

ATROCITIES ATTRIBUTED TO UNJUST PUNISHMENT IN CAMUS' OUTSIDER AND

SOLZHENITSYN'S ONE DAY

By Sharon Pao

Word Count: 1,345

K. Lorenz

Friday, February 01, 2008 IB English 12 HL

The two principle questions revolving around punishment are, "What gives us the moral right to punish anyone when we are imperfect ourselves?" and "What do we hope to accomplish when we punish someone?" Punishment is a penalty imposed for wrongdoing. Injustice is the violation of another's rights or of what is right; lack of justice. Together, unjust punishment can be defined as the imposition of a penalty that greatly exceeds the crime that was committed. This act of punishing unjustly and immorally is prominent in both literatures that were examined. Atrocities attributed to unjust punishment in the short novels, The Outsider by existentialist author, Albert Camus, and One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich by early 20th century author, Alexander Solzhenitsyn, critically challenges human dignity. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the display of unjustified punishment manifested throughout the two novels and how the characters, especially Meursault and Shukhov, adapt to the punishments while retaining a sense