How The Stranger Portrays Emotion (Evan)

     The Stranger by Albert Camus is an unsettling novel. Not blatantly unsettling or horrifying, but hidden behind a veil. The protagonist and narrator, Meursault, has this distant voice that feels more like a spectator rather than a living human. It feels like the disconnected language of a lab report. It's descriptive and well-written, yet it's off somehow.

    It begins with the death of Meursault's mother. At the funeral, her friends from the retirement home all weep in sadness. Mersault, on the other hand, doesn't show any grief, and would rather tell us about how sweltering it is.

    A neighbor, Raymond, asks Meursault to help him take revenge on a woman who Raymond suspects is unfaithful. It ends up with Raymond beating her and getting arrested by the police. Meursault and many others watch it happen. Raymond tells him to testify that the woman was unfaithful, and he agrees.

    Another one of his neighbors, Salamono, is shown to argue with and hit his old, diseased, dog. When the dog dies, Salamano reveals to Meursault he had adopted it after his wife had died. Salamano is visibly grief-stricken as he talks with Meursault.

    Throughout these interactions, the characters all display a range of emotions. From anger to sadness, they all express themselves vividly. Meursault, our titular figure, is indifferent in every conversation he has. He can only be interested, annoyed, or feel nothing about someone. Meursault has no capacity for empathy. There are many sentences dedicated to how uncomfortably hot it is, but few about what Meursault himself feels. It's like an organism trying to look human, giving an uncanny valley effect. The Stranger is an unsettling novel. Not because of the world but because of the lens the world is viewed through.