Existentialism Is a Philosophical Movement That Views Term Paper

Existentialism is a philosophical movement that views human existence as having characteristics, such as anxiety, dread, freedom, awareness of death, and consciousness of existing, that are primary and that cannot be reduced to or explained by a natural-scientific approach or any approach that attempts to detach itself." For existentialism, human beings can be understood only from the inside and it emphasizes action, freedom, and decision as fundamental to human existence and is fundamentally opposed to the rationalist tradition and to positivism (Wikipedia). The Stranger reflects existentialism that our world is a universe that has no place for us, in which our life makes no sense. In the novel, Meursault is portrayed as aloof, detached and unemotional. He does not think about events and the possible consequences. He also fails to express any emotion in his relationship with his friends. Meursault's complete indifference to society and human relationships causes him to appear as the actual stranger. His strange opinions and unexpected remarks put him in this position, without ever really giving him an opportunity to be truly understood.

Meursault's life was full of existentialism, for he believed that life just happened, nothing you could do would change the future, and that everything happened by a chance. He seems to live in his own world, socializing with others, but not caring too deeply about what happens in his life. For example, when his mother died, his thoughts were, "Maman died today. Or yesterday maybe, I don't know (3). He just accepted it and decided that is was what was supposed to happen without any extreme feelings about her death. Also he never cried at her funeral and he refused to look at his mother one last time after she had passed away. The funeral director viewed this as extremely odd.

Meursault's existentialism appears to be casual and indifferent about life events. After he kills an Arab, not once does he show any remorse or guilt feeling for what he did. Nothing seemed to be very significant to him. Based on Camus' definition of existentialism, which is people's freedom in designing their life, the novel The Stranger seems to indicate that Meursault is in the path of Camus' philosophy. In that, he designs his life to be almost oblivious, totally unruffled, and untouched by events and people around him. He didn't even consider his fate early on in his trial.

In part two of chapter 3, it was indicated that,

"People usually didn't pay much attention to me. It took some doing on my part to understand that I was the cause of all the excitement. I said to the policeman, "Some crowd!" he told me it was because of the press and he pointed to a group of men at a table just below the jury box. He said, "That's them" (83-84)."

He doesn't even care about death at this point, only how he is excited to see all these new people and be able to watch the court proceedings.

Before Meursault's incarceration, he lived a life of desire based on his own satisfaction. Another demonstration of how Camus applied to his novel the existentialism principle he believes in. Meursault's life was completely self-centered and focused on his own physical pleasures. His relationship with Marie was totally based on sex rather than love. He wanted to see a comical movie the day after he buried his mother. By letting these physical pleasures dominate his life, he created an attitude and behavior that was unaccepted and seen as wrong to the rest of society. He never asked anything from anyone and never did he expect anything from others. Meursault is passive and his passive nature set himself apart from others and caused him to live extremely independent (Bronner 44). This attitude was proven even further when Meursault refused a promotion based on the fact that he was satisfied with the life he had. When he had proposed a promotion he said,

..It was all the same to me. Then he asked me if I wasn't interested in a change…