I think you can probably tell by now, but I kind of hate Meursault. I find his indifference obnoxious and almost grotesque. It seems almost too easy to hate Meursault. In Part 2 it becomes apparent that this hatred for Meursault is a trap that Camus has set for his readers and that I have fallen willingly into it. I almost started to feel guilty for being grossed out by Meursault when I read the conversation between him and his lawyer after he is taken to prison for killing the Arab man. I'm so rattled as to why he killed the man btw, and the weird shot pattern makes zero sense to me. At this point I'm questioning whether some of these pieces of the puzzle are intentionally not supposed to make sense. But anyways, Meursault's lawyer is disgusted by Meursault's statement that he probably did love his mother but "that didn't mean anything". The lawyer feels that Meursault's insensitivity is barbaric, but Meursault states "I had the urge to reassure the lawyer that I was just like everybody else". This freaks me out because maybe the reason the lawyer feels so disgusted with Meursault is because he represents a part of human consciousness that is unattached from human emotion that we all just push under the surface because it is too uncomfortable to confront. I feel that Camus makes us hate Meursault just to make this point.
For a minute I don't hate Meursault because I understand that the reason he says that his love doesn't make a difference is because his mother still died and she would have no matter how much he loved her. I understood this, but then he just goes back to being super rude and annoying in prison. He literally feels no regret whatsoever for killing an innocent man, in which he shot once and then four more times after that. This murder has signs of overkill which is the magistrate's main concern. As far as I can tell this might represent Meursault's suppressed emotion and how he let it go on an innocent. Yeah so he basically says that all he cares about is cigarettes, sex and swimming, which I basically knew already, but some how reading it coming from him makes it ten times worse. Also it's pretty clear that Meursault is only using Marie for sex and company. He's just an asshole ugh. There also is this strange part where the magistrate waves a crucifix at him because he believes Meursault is the anitchrist (this part was actually pretty funny). This is the first time that Meursault is seen as a threat to a way of life. He is an atheist and doesn't even try to mimic human emotion and his indifference scares the magistrate. This is just another example of the absurdities that Camus seems to love. The ultimate example of absurdity is the newspaper article Meursault. The rich son didn't need to die, but he did and it doesn't matter that his family loved him because they still killed him. Also I guess Meursault starts babbling to himslef in his cell? Which I guess isn't that weird for this dude, but I don't know he never seemed to me as the bat shit crazy kind of guy, just really bizarre. I guess that's kind of the irony of Meursault, the further into the rabbit hole, the more clearly he understands himself and the more vividly I begin to understand him. He understands the full weight of his previous assertion that there truly is no way out. No way out of his cell and no way out of life, but death. Death is just.
For a minute I don't hate Meursault because I understand that the reason he says that his love doesn't make a difference is because his mother still died and she would have no matter how much he loved her. I understood this, but then he just goes back to being super rude and annoying in prison. He literally feels no regret whatsoever for killing an innocent man, in which he shot once and then four more times after that. This murder has signs of overkill which is the magistrate's main concern. As far as I can tell this might represent Meursault's suppressed emotion and how he let it go on an innocent. Yeah so he basically says that all he cares about is cigarettes, sex and swimming, which I basically knew already, but some how reading it coming from him makes it ten times worse. Also it's pretty clear that Meursault is only using Marie for sex and company. He's just an asshole ugh. There also is this strange part where the magistrate waves a crucifix at him because he believes Meursault is the anitchrist (this part was actually pretty funny). This is the first time that Meursault is seen as a threat to a way of life. He is an atheist and doesn't even try to mimic human emotion and his indifference scares the magistrate. This is just another example of the absurdities that Camus seems to love. The ultimate example of absurdity is the newspaper article Meursault. The rich son didn't need to die, but he did and it doesn't matter that his family loved him because they still killed him. Also I guess Meursault starts babbling to himslef in his cell? Which I guess isn't that weird for this dude, but I don't know he never seemed to me as the bat shit crazy kind of guy, just really bizarre. I guess that's kind of the irony of Meursault, the further into the rabbit hole, the more clearly he understands himself and the more vividly I begin to understand him. He understands the full weight of his previous assertion that there truly is no way out. No way out of his cell and no way out of life, but death. Death is just.