“When the bell rang again and the door of
the box opened, it was the silence of the room that rose towards me, the
silence, and this singular sensation that I had when I noticed that the young
journalist had averted his eyes. I did not look towards Mary. I did not have
the time because the president told me in a bizarre way that I would have my
head cut off in a public place in the name of the French people...”
Author: Albert Camus was a French writer and
philosopher born on November 7, 1913 in Mondovi in Algeria. The second child of
a modest family, he never knew his father, who died during the First World War.
His mother, of Spanish origin, was half deaf and almost illiterate. Camus was
marked by the disadvantaged environment in which he lived with his mother and
brother. He discovered a passion for writing which helped him to fill the
emptiness in his life. The Outsider was Albert Camus’s first novel. Camus enjoyed great success as a writer and
was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1957. In January 1960, at the age
of 46, he was killed in a car accident in the company of his editor friend
Michel Gallimard.
My thoughts: Anyone who has read this book
will remember the famous opening lines of Camus’s novel. They set the tone for
what will follow:
“Aujourd'hui, maman est morte. Ou peut-être hier, je ne sais pas.”
Strangely this sentence does not sound extraordinary in English
“My mother died today. Or maybe yesterday,
I don’t know.”
This is the first book that I read this
year, in January. I loved each of its 183 pages. I found it easy to read and
very entertaining and I highly recommend it to you. The main character,
“l'Etranger”, alias Meursault, is a young man who lives in insensitivity and
indifference. He is not very talkative and mixes little with society, so he is
“foreign” to the world which surrounds him.
Meursault (the narrator) receives a
telegram announcing the death of his mother. He immediately takes two days
leave and leaves Algiers in the direction of Marengo (80km away) to attend his
mother’s funeral. She lived in one of the old peoples’ homes in that town. Back
in Algiers, he meets Marie Cardona, a former work colleague, who will become
his mistress. Meursault strikes up a friendship with his next-door neighbour,
Raymond. The latter had been in a fight with the brother of his mistress
because he suspects her of cheating on him. He therefore asks Meursault to help
him to write a letter to avenge himself.
Invited by Raymond to spend a Sunday in
his seaside hut, Meursault goes there with Marie. Two Arabs, one of whom is the
brother of Raymond’s mistress, are looking for a fight on the beach, but
nothing occurs. A little later Meursault sees the Arabs again and he kills one
(by accident) with Raymond’s pistol. He is arrested, tried, and condemned to
death.
The novel is structured in two parts. The
first traces the daily life of Meursault after he learns of the death of his
mother until the he commits the murder on the beach. The second part describes
his life in prison and the phases of his trial until his death sentence.
In this story we meet funny, strange and
endearing characters. Marie Cardona who is the mistress of Meursault. Raymond
Sintès who is the best friend of Meursault and also his next door neighbour.
The elderly Salamano the second neighbour on Meursault’s landing, who has lived
with his dog for eight years. Céleste who is the owner of the restaurant where
Meursault eats. Emmanuel who is the colleague with whom Meursault often eats.
Perez who is the only man who cried upon the death of Meursault’s mother and
who becomes a witness at the trial of the man who had not mourned the death of
his own mother.
