Albert Camus gives expression to his philosophy of the absurd in The Outsider through the use of motifs. The first-person account of Meursault’s life is from the time of his mother’s death up to his evident execution for the murder of an Arab. Absurdism is separating oneself from the conventional values and attitudes in society. Meursault’s views on death and how the sun and glares affect him demonstrate how his absurdist views on life lead to his impending execution, and his refusal to belief in a higher power separate him from the rest of the society.
The glares and the heat from the sun present an overpowering problem for Meursault as motifs. During Meursault’s mother’s funeral procession, he claims the heat is “inhospitable and depressing” and he “could hardly think straight anymore” (20). Meursault is strongly influenced by physical feelings instead of emotional ones, and he takes physical senses and personifies them to express how strongly they control his ability to cope with his life Feelings tend to drive one’s actions, but for Meursault his senses drive him, for he feels uncomfortable and upset in the heat, but not because he’s at his mother’s funeral.
As Meursault, Raymond, and Masson take a walk on the beach, “the glare on the water was unbearable” and Meursault was unable to think of anything, because “[he] was half asleep from the sun beating down on [his] bare head” (53). The glare on the water demonstrates the intensity of physical appearance so powerfully it is painful to witness. The heat is a continual distraction from being able to interact with other people who do not seem as deeply affected by it, because they do not share they same views as Meursault. The book opens and closes with death, and the motifs of the glare and the sun, heat, and the color red are repeated as death is repeated.
Meursault’s surroundings of heat, light, and color are so overpowering that he looses sight of his senses, his rationality, and his happiness. As two Arab men approach, Meursault observes, “the sand was so hot it seemed to have turned red” (55). The blood- colored sand foretells violence, and the color red links back to the beginning of the bo0ok during the funeral when Meursault mind was only able to focus on red flowers during the intensely hot procession. Also, the motif red is a symbol of death and distraction; for he sees it when he is the most uncomfortable, where there is (or will be) death, and when he is distracted from the world around him. “There was the same dazzling red glare” on the beach and each flash of the sun’s reflection is described as “a blade of light” (58). The red glare is still overpowering his other senses, for the red color is a repetitive image of confusion and anger, and a relatively harmless glare as a blade of light foreshadows a fatal blade soon to come. Psychologically the sun affects him more than it would a conventional person, due to his “different” look on life, and it makes him do things one would not usually do just because of sunlight. Camus linking the two days together through heat and the color red is his attempt to look at different kinds of death and if the differences really matter. Meursault believes the death of his mother is just as final as the death or a stranger.
The significance of human life is understood highly when facing death, and Meursault is the tool in which Camus demonstrates how facing death affects Meursault’s absurdist perception of life. When he is on the beach with the Arab he begins to realize the insignificance of any one action, because he has a gun and he “could shoot or not shoot. it would come to the same thing” (59). To Meursault, the loss of one life would have no affect on life as a whole; and the universe itself would be completely indifferent. It’s in the moment when he is able to take a life that he comes to the realization of morality. The death of his mother gives him no sadness, and if he finds the entire ordeal “so inevitable and natural” that he couldn’t “remember any more” or the events (22). Although he attends the funeral, he only finds the body interesting in reference to how humidity would affect it, and not that it’s his mother. He feels what’s done is done, and he has never regretted anything because he has always been too absorbed by the present moment or by the immediate future to dwell on the past.
Meursault never reflected on the meaning of death until he faced his own execution. When a death occurs the rest of life moves on for an absurdist, but for those such as the chaplain the one and only God leads those “in [Meursault’s] position [have) turned to Him and received salvation” (112). However, Meursault doubts that another human being could know for sure that God exists and there’s an eternal life, especially because the chaplain borrows from an established belief system with no evidence. Also, the chaplain sees him as Satan for not wanting to beg for forgiveness from a higher power, but Meursault’s believes only in what’s right in front of him, because there’s no reason to not. Death marks all things equal, and equally absurd and Meursault is angered the chaplain’s beliefs, because he was “so certain about everything… and yet none of his certainties was worth one hair on a woman’s head” (124). Meursault is sure about only one thing: his death, which is soon to come, because it is imminent. He does not wish to waste his last minutes talking about God, because for an absurdist, they do not need to create a higher being to fill the void in themselves, and life has no meaning to be fulfilled if it’s not being fulfilled for oneself.
The significance of human life is understood prominently while facing death, and Meursault’s consciousness is the tool in which Camus demonstrates how facing death affects Meursault’s absurdist perception of life. He is condemned not for murder, but for he did not fit into Christian society. His isolation and differences represent Camus’s representation of absurdism and how these traits lead to the death of Meursault.
Bibliography
Camus, A (1942) Translated by Boyd, W (1983) The Outsider. 3rd ed. London: Penguin Group.
