due date: Friday, November 16th, 2:30 p.m.
Grading Criteria: See Open Response
40 points: Quality of Response, Use of Evidence, Analysis of Evidence, & Conventions
Directions: 1. Directly respond to something someone said in class. It helps to start with something like "When Blank was speaking, he (or she) mentioned that (paraphrase or quote extensively from your notes). . ." and then continue the dialogue in writing. Again, I am looking for depth with these posts (and they should probably be 300-500 words). Make sure to include page numbers. SAY SOMETHING NEW!
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21 comments:
When Kristy was speaking she mentioned that Marie’s proposal to Meursault didn’t matter to him. Meursault is careless about everything and just watches as the world passes him by. He says “I said it didn’t make a difference to me and that we could if she wanted.”(pg 41). Meursault was just going with the flow. I don’t think he knows what he really wants with his life yet and Marie just happens to be there for him with open arms. He does not respect her emotions because he is not in love with her. Yet he accepts her proposal making her look like a fool because she is going to marry someone that isn’t in love with her emotionally. Its obvious that Meursault is in love with her physically but that’s all that he is interested in, her physical appearance.
Meursault is a heartless man that doesn’t take anything seriously everything joke to him. “Then she pointed out that marriage was a serious thing. I said ‘No.” (pg 42) Marie has confronted him about the proposal being a serious thing and he completely shut her down. But Meursault isn’t the only one to blame, Marie could have walked away from this and just left him but she decided to stay with him even though he doesn’t care whether he marries her or not. But in a way its almost like Meursault allows himself to be in his own unrealistic world. It kind of reminds me of being in a dream. In a dream a person has no feeling or emotion. They can see what is going on but have no way of controlling their feeling in their dream. When he attended Maman’s funeral he didn’t shed a tear. Most people wouldn’t know how to deal with this kind of situation. It makes me think that he doesn’t find this situation real or he has no specific way of reacting to this situation.
Meursault is a strange man that is doesn’t really care about anything. Even some of the most important people in his life he just seems to look past them and is more concerned with other things. He’s unsure of himself and doesn’t want to admit it.
When someone in the class was talking about Meursault that he was heartless no emotion and doesn’t care what was going on around him. His mother died but for him it means nothing. During the funeral he never show any feelings for his loss and instead of staying in his mother’s funeral he made himself to relax go out with his girlfriend and watch some movies. Meursault is numb and he didn’t know how it feels to loss his mother. Or maybe that’s the way he is he is not aware of what is happening around him. but maybe that’s the way he is we cant blame him.
Except of being emotionless he also has no plans or ambitions for his life, when his boss talked to him about moving to Paris he wasn’t interested. His boss asked him about does he interested in change of life he said “that people never change their lives, and that in any case one life was mine here at all”(Camus, 41). For me meursault is nothing but himself and waiting for something to happen and just let it happen.
In (page 59) when he shot and killed the Arab when he said, “I fired four more times at the motionless body where the bullets lodged without leaving a trace. And it was like knocking four quick times on the door of unhappiness” in this quote he doesn’t care what will happen after what he did. I’m interested in what he said knocking on the door of unhappiness he pull the trigger and shot the Arab without fear of what may happen. As I heard that he doesn’t have an emotion maybe he does have but it will be anger and sadness that’s why killing is nothing for him as his mother died he said “it doesn’t mean anything” so maybe he compare the Arab to his mother that means nothing. Soon he will be executed and he is ready for it and never showing of fear and wants to see the people greeting him with their cries of hate.
Camus create the character monsieur meursault the strange weird man and has no emotion and feckless. The author created the character like meursault to be an example in real life and not to be followed and do what he does.
When Ilens was speaking during the class discussion he mentioned that Salamano and Meursault relate to one another because they both loss something or someone that was close to them, but at the same time they didn’t care about those things until they were gone as said by Christiane. I think that Salamano and Meursault can be put in the same category as far as not caring for something or someone goes.
In this passage, we see Meursault and Salamano start to express some type of feeling towards the dog and the mother, but it’s not fully developed as we all know that Meursault is incapable of showing that he has any feelings at all.
“I told him he could stay and that I was sorry about what had happened to his dog. He thanked me. He told me that Maman was very fond of his dog. He called her “your poor mother.” He said he supposed I must be very sad since Maman died, and I didn’t say anything. Then he said, very quickly and with an embarrassed look in his face that he realized that some people in the neighborhood thought badly of me for having sent Maman to a home, but he knew me and he knew that I loved her very much.” (pg. 45)
I think that in this passage Meursault start to show some emotions but he doesn’t know how to express them. And the reason is that as a child he probably didn’t get as much love as he was supposed to, because his father left him and his mother, And also because his mother taught him not to care for anyone or anything.
I also think that Meursault is to blame for how he is and not his mother. Because he could have changed his ways or at least told his mother that he didn’t agree with what she wanted him to do because it’s not right. And that shutting up all your feelings will only make things worse in the end, and the outcomes aren’t always what you want to be.
The reason I say this is because I think that we shouldn’t always go along with what people say, because when you do a good deed for someone and they don’t appreciate it, they always end up stabbing you in the back. In the book something just like that happens, but it’s not really stabbing in the back per say it’s more like tricking someone into thinking that you’re their friend. It’s when Raymond is being foreshadowed as said by Mike, and he is the reason that caused Meursault’s death. (pg. 28-29).
When Emma was speaking, she mentioned that to Meursault, marriage is not a big deal when normal people see it as most important thing in their lifes.
Meursault is an emotionless person, it seems that he just physically exists in this dimension but nothing happening around would ever matters him, even if the one who is closest to him passed away. He is rather sensible to his surroundings than what is happening to him. When everyone considers funerals and marriages as important Meursault just doesn’t care and takes them easily.
Meursault is also ridiculously honest in expressing his thoughs, which can also be an act of he doesn’t care about others’ feelings, in the passage “Then she pointed out that marriage was a serious thing. I said, ‘No.’ (pg 42)”, which is too straight forward and direct.
While reading through the book I also concerned one thing that he doesn’t even care about his life. When Meursault is in prison he doesn’t seemed to be nervous or afraid, days has been hard just because he hasn’t get used to it and he find himself got nothing to do. “When I was first imprisoned, the hardest thing was that my thoughts were still those of a free man (pg 76)”, this sentence sounds like it is a very little thing to be imprisoned, the tone is so plain that as if he is not talking about himself but someone not related to him.
Heads back to the part when Marie offer him to marry her, Meursault’s reaction is “I said it didn’t make any difference to me and that we could if she wanted to. Then she wanted to know if I love her. I answered the same way I had the last time, that it didn’t mean anything but that I probably didn’t love her. (pg 41)” We can see that Meursault can even marry a woman that he “probably didn’t love”.
Relating this to the author, Camus’s childhood, that he probably lacks love from his mother because she may be busy working for money, I think that Meursault is created to show how Camus feel about this world. He needs to be loved, but he doesn’t know how to give out love. Also the tough times may have made him feel that life is meaningless as what Meursault thinks, that nothing could bother him because they are meaningless so they don’t worth to be cared.
When Kristy was speaking, she read a passage where Marie asks Meursault if he loved her, “that evening Marie came by to see me and asked me if I wanted to marry her. I said it didn’t make any difference to me and that we could if she wanted to. Then she wanted to know if I loved her. I answered the same way I had last time that it didn’t mean anything but that I probably didn’t love her” (41). I believe that Meursault does not want to marry her because he doesn’t want the commitment. He does not want to be attached to her because he might fall in love with her as well. I also believe Meursault is scared of being attached to someone because he seems to be an independent person, and if Marie happened to leave his side he would probably be lost.
I believe that he began to think like this because of something he got attached to, he soon began to realize that it wasn’t worth his time. Furthermore on the quote, “looking back on it, I wasn’t unhappy. When I was a student, I had lots of ambitions like that. But when I had to give up my studies I learned very quickly that none of it really mattered” (41). Meursault seemed to have had lots of ambitions and goals to accomplish before, but he quickly realizes that “none of it really mattered“ (41). He seems to become careless about things that won’t last long such as life. So instead, he focuses more on the things he has in the present and lets life pass him by, by going along with the flow until his time is up. It’ll last until his time is up because he believes that everyone has the same ending, death. Meursault feels like it doesn’t matter what he has done throughout his life because either way he is going to die just like everyone else regardless of who they were, or the things they have done.
Meursault also shows lack of caring about Maman’s death. This is very interesting because during the funeral he does not show any emotions and when asked if Maman was old, he answered “’Fairly’ because I didn’t know the exact number” (16). This proves that Meursault and Maman did not have a close relationship. When a family member dies, one would mourn and let emotions leak out but Meursault shows himself as an outcast and stands out from society’s belief. I also think that Maman’s death didn’t matter to him because he knew that someday she would have to die anyways, and their relationship not being good made it easier for him to not care at all.
During a discussion about the novel The Stranger, Kristy brought up an important and reoccurring symbol, the sun and its light. The sun rises not only with its powerful light but also with heat, truth, and a new side of Monsieur Meursault. During his mother's funeral, Meursault was more affected by the intense heat than the death of his own mother. Deeper into the novel, Meursault murders a man known as “The Arab” and once again is more affected by the sun than about what had just occured. These are two very important events that occur in the novel inwhich he acts emotionless toward and I think Camus places the sun there for a reason. The sun is a symbol for people around the world as a source of life, goodness, reason, hope, enlightment, and truth. Camus creates the sun as a spotlight for the reader to spot Meursault, observe him, and there learn how not to be. The author did not create this protaganst for the reader to like him but to learn from him. When the sun hits Meursaul, it is when we can truely see his tradgic flaw. It is seen when he says “The sun was the same as it had been the day I’d buried Maman, and like then, my forhead especially was hurting me, all the viens throbbing under the skin (58-59)”. I think the sun provokes him to see the truth and he cannnot handle it and that is why his head throbs with so much pain. He just does not know how to handle his emotions and thoughts in the way he can when he talks about the physical of the world. The sun was enlighting him and he just cant take it. Another way this can be looked at is by looking at it by mythology. When it was a persons time to die they were going to head to the after world and be reborn. In both scenes, there is a dead person. The sun was a sign of rebirth once a person died.
The sun showed us how Meursault was in the novel. By having the author brighten those parts of the novel the reader was able to capture some lessons from him which was basically the whole point of mythology, to tell a story for a society to learn lessons.
When Juliana was speaking she said, “Meursault doesn’t care about his life or his fate.” “I had read descriptions of scenes like this in books and it all seemed like a game to me.” (pages 63-64) He killed someone else and is now in jail for it and could spend the rest of his life in jail, yet he refers to it as a game. “On my way out I was even going to shake his hand, but just in time, I remembered that I had killed a man.” (page 64) Unless he doesn’t have a conscience or a heart, I find it very difficult to forget even for a moment that you took someone else’s life. “I probably did love Maman, but that didn’t mean anything. At one time or another all normal people have wished their loved ones were dead.” (Page 65) The way he points out that her death doesn’t mean anything shows he just doesn’t care about life or death.
Maybe after His Maman died, Meursault lost all hope. Anthony said, “Maman’s dead, maybe because of that he gave up on his own life.” He took someone else’s life that’s the worst thing you could do, and it didn’t even phase him. He finds it all amusing, almost enjoying every step of the way.
It’s as if the more Meursault acts as if he doesn’t care about life the more I want prove him wrong by opening his eyes to the good things in life, the things worth living for. Yet I find myself thinking, “It’s not all that bad, is it?” It’s easier to live in a state of numbness than to feel all the emotions of life. I think that Camus’ purpose of writing like this is to make us, the readers, think more in depth about life. There’s more to life than just the pleasant things and the miserable things, some of the events that go on aren’t able to be put into those categories. Camus may have created the character Meursault so he could say the things he was feeling without the judgment. It’s a lot easier to express yourself through someone else and if people didn’t appreciate his ideas he could simply say Meursault was just a random character he came up with and that’s all.
During the in class discussion, Marcos and Ilens kept on mentioning the Meursalt does have emotions and that Meursalt expresses it in an “indirect and abstract way” I would like to point out something that could be considered a possibility and that would be that Meursalt is a sociopath. Sociopaths are usually brought by social conflicts, this could be the cause for Albert Camus way of writing a character such as Meursalt, Camus is trying to reflect the way he sees the world, being brought up by a single parent and in all of this being in a middle of a world war. Having no remorse and believing that there is no point in trying to turn to god while in prison because Meursalt knows his fate and it cannot be undone, “He wanted to talk to me about God again, but I went up to him and made one last attempt to explain to him that I had only a little time left and I didn’t want to waste it on God.”(pg 120) God cannot save him now his ways have led him here, his sociopathic ways have led him in prison, his indifference towards the world have caused this to him.
Meursalt’s attitude towards Mamans funeral shows his relationship he had with her, he was distant with her, and since they was never close to start with then why would he care about her death. His objective point-of-view was probably caused by his environment as a child, and like Susan had mentioned about that Salamano and Maman and their relationship, they were similar, Salamano suffering and Meursalt just watching all this play out, his reaction towards Maman’s death is like when he heard Salamano whimpering “All I could hear was the blood pounding in my ears. I stood there, motionless. And in old Salamanos room, the dog whimpered softly.”(pg33) Meursalt is not doing all this only towards women specifically but to everyone in general.
When Jacob was speaking he mentioned how Meursalt acted and felt during his mother’s funeral. Jacob mentioned the fact that Meursalt was irritated by the old people gathered at the funeral. Meursalt was particularly irritated with one old woman who was crying softly over the loss of his mother. Meursalt says, “The women kept on crying. It surprised me, because I didn’t even know who she was. I wished I didn’t have to hear her anymore.” (Pg 10) This shows how cold Meursalt is. To be irritated at a woman for crying over the death of a friend is completely insensitive. To be irritated at a woman for crying over the death of your own mother is almost disgusting. Meursalt soon finds out from the caretaker that the woman’s only friend was his mother and now that she’s gone the women has nobody. Knowing this Meursalt still doesn’t say anything to her or tries to comfort her in anyway. Soon Meursalt starts to notice this smacking noise coming from the old folks that “gets on his nerves”. Meursalt is more concerned with what is going on around him than the fact that his mother is dead. He does not even shed a tear instead he is more worried about how hot it is and how tired he is. He also complains to himself about how bad his back hurts. This shows how selfish and self-centered Meursalt is. I think Camus portrays Meursalt likes this so early in the book so the reader gets the real impression of Meursalt. A person would probably be the most vulnerable at or around the time of their mother’s death. Camus probably wrote the death of Meursalt mom so early in the book so the reader knows how Meursalt will respond to certain situations, almost always not caring and never showing emotion.
I liked when Cristiane made the comment that “people give value once they lose it”, based on page 38. On this page, the speaker, Mersault, talks about his neighbor Salamano, who had an old, sick dog which he took everywhere with him, but in this passage he finds out that Salamano lost his dog in a fair that he attended earlier that day, and was desperate to find the dog. I think that in this part of the book, when Mersault is looking at Salamano’s situation, and seeing his sadness and suffering for losing something important, he thinks of himself when he lost his ‘Maman’ how he didn’t give much importance to his mother’s death, then he realizes that he should be feeling the same as Salamano, sad desperate and depresses, but instead of that, he just doesn’t care, as if nothing had happened. However, Marcus, trying to convince all the students that Mersault has feelings, but doesn’t know how to express his emotion, - based on another discussion lead by Kristy, on page 41, that Mersault has no feelings at all, not even for Marie who seems to care about him- says that this is an evidence of what he claimed to be true about Mersault’s personality.
On another passage, on page 64, when he had already killed the Arab, had been arrested and now is in prison, a lawyer comes in his cell to meet him and talk to him about his case, so then they could come in an agreement, on what to say and expose on court, on the day of his trial. “He sat down on my bed and explained to me that there had been some investigation into my private life. It had been learned that my mother had died recently at the home. Inquiries had then been made in Merengo. The investigators had learned tat in had “shown insensitivity” the day of Maman’s funeral.” (…) In this passage he realizes, I think, that his insensitivity to his mother’s death, which for a normal person would be a major event of sadness and depression, is now being used against him. Perhaps some of my classmates will disagree with me, but he does not have any emotion, because his emotionless being has brought him to jail, and now it is going to be used greatly against him in his prosecution; if he does have any kind of emotion, but doesn’t know how to show it, now, at this point of his life, would be the best time to show some feelings, emotion or sensitivity for something at least.
When Jacob was speaking in class he mentioned that throughout the novel Camus used explicit imagery to describe the sun. Then Cristiane mentioned that the sun was brought up during the most important times. Like the day of his mother’s funeral “The sky was already filled with light. The sun was beginning to bear down on the earth and it was getting hotter by the minute,”(pg15) also the day he killed the Arab “ The sun was starting to burn my cheeks, and I could feel drops of sweat gathering in my eyebrows. The sun was the same as it had been the day I’d buried Maman, and like then, my forehead especially was hurting me, all the veins in it throbbing under the skin.”(pg58) I totally agree with both of them. The sun means a lot more than meets the eye in this novel. Like Mr. Gallagher said Camus uses allusion to put deeper meanings into the story. The sun in Greek Mythology was a source of life (it kind of still is) but it meant a lot more to them since it was some of there gods Apollo and Helios. Apollo was known as a bringer of death-dealing plague. Which in comparison to the story it’s very true since the sun was brought up during 2 scenes where death was involved. In the novel when 2 of the most major events occur Meursault is more focus on the sun and it’s heat more than anything. While walking his mother’s casket to be buried all he kept mentioning was how hot the sun was and how much he was sweating and hurting because of it. He didn’t even once mention memories of his mother and him together or showed feeling of sadness but only showed that he was frustrated with the sun. When he shot the Arab the sun was deeply involved. Again he showed that the sun was powerful and it blurred his vision. Even after he killed the Arab he was more concentrated on how hot it was than what had just happened. The sun is often thought of as a source of light, but in the novel it is used mostly to show death, like the sun god Apollo.
When Mr. Ryan Gallagher was speaking he mentioned that Meursault was in search for a mother like figure because his mother had past away. He also said that the author, Mr. Albert Camus, is trying to compare Meursault in the water lying on Marie stomach to a baby in their mother’s womb. Also the author knew this because Meursault meets Marie the day after his mother funeral and Marie is another form of name for Mary and Mary is the mother of Jesus Christ. Mary is one of the most important, famous mothers in history. This all makes sense since Meursault wasn’t grieving so much over his mother’s death. To him it was like whatever it happened it happened. When Meusault meets Marie Cardona he is swimming in the water. They are flirting back and forth and they know each other from before when they use to work together. “I hoisted myself up next to her. It was nice, and, sort of joking around, I let my head fall back and rest on her stomach. She didn’t say anything so I left it there. I had the whole sky in my eyes and it was blue and good. On the back of my neck I could feel Marie’s heart beating softly. We lay on the float for a long time, half asleep. When the sun got too hot, she dove off and I followed her.” I can tell how Mr. Ryan Gallagher compared a mothers womb too Meursault lying on Marie stomach. Meursault is a very selfish man because throughout his mother’s funereal, he just wants it to get through with it and move on with his life. Instead of being home mourning he is out making a date with a woman. Meursault is moving on with his life like nothing tragic has happened. I think that Meursault can be compared to a baby because babies are very selfish and they need a lot of attention. Babies are spoiled by their mothers because mothers cater to their babies. When someone important in your life, like your mother dies usually people are sad for days. But Meursault on the other hand really doesn’t care that the woman that gave birth to him has just passed away. By all this information you can tell that Meusault is trying to replace his mother with Marie because he is taking her out places and invite her to do things with him. He is basically using Marie so that he doesn’t breakdown about what has happened to his mother. Part of life is to go through sad moments but to learn from them and to rise from them. It shows that Meursault has a lot of growing up to do.
When Emma was speaking she referred to page 30 and discussed how Raymond being cheated on by his wife caused him to beat her. Then, Susan came in to say how he also treated the dog badly on page 28. This got me thinking on how much Mersault and Raymond are alike and how because they are alike they get along so well. Both these characters feel detachment in relationships. Mersault deals with his mother’s death with no remorse, he could care less, he also pays no mind to the fact that Marie wants to marry him and that he would in fact marry any women who wanted to marry him. Raymond on the other hand beats his wife and dog. They get pleasure out of causing others violence. Mersault kills and Arab and doesn’t have second thoughts on weather he shouldn’t have done it. I think they both want power. Mersault has the power to kill a man and Raymond showing power in manhood by beating others. How can two men have power and not clash when there both shooting for the same thing. Mersault was emotionally unstable he had control over his feelings, but did things and felt emotions his own way, where as Raymond knows what he’s feeling and takes it out on his wife and dog. On page 35, Mersualt and Marie are together and they hear Raymond and his wife arguing, Mersualt paid more attention to the fact that someone was getting beating then the decent thing to do and get help. “She asked me to go find a policeman, but I told her I didn’t like cops.” (page 36) I honestly think that he gets enjoyment out of people getting and feeling hurt.
On the first day of S.L.D, when Edlin was speaking, she introduced the topic of how Mersault disrespects women, I agree with her on that and so did many people in the class. In the quote, “Marie said it was terrible and I didn’t say anything. She asked me to go find a policeman, but I told her I didn’t like cops.”(36), it shows that Mersault doesn’t respect woman because there was a women getting beat and he didn’t care. He didn’t want to get the cops because he doesn’t like them. It shows how careless Mersault really is and how the environment around him doesn’t affect his behavior, towards anything. I think even if you don’t like cops you should at least help out in some way. I think all of his behavior towards anything with women comes from how he was brought up by his mother. Mersault probably didn’t have much respect for his mother throughout his life and from that he didn’t care that she died. Another idea would be that he thought his mother wasn’t special in his life and he sees her as everyone else in life. She is just another person who gave birth to a human and that is a part of life. He makes everything seem so simple.
Maybe that could be the reason he doesn’t think of life as others do, he is just living for nothing. It seems like he is waiting to die. For example, when he was in the courtroom he was calm and didn’t say anything, like he knew he was going to die anyways so there was not point to. When the magistrate was talking to him about god, he didn’t care. Also, when the Chaplin came to his cell, he did not want to turn to god because he felt that god can’t do anything for him. I guess he knows the consequences of his actions and accepts them. His personality throughout the book did not change from when he found out his mother died to when he is going to die. My opinion is that he was brought up like that and nobody in the world understands him.
When Cris was speaking during the first class discussion on chapters two and three, she mentioned that Meursault is self-centered and care free. She mentions page 38, 39 comparing the Salamao dog with Maman and how bad things need to happen so you can realize how much they mean to you. On the middle of the page Salamao said that his dog can die and he will not care" pay money for that bastard—ha! He can damn well die!"(pg39)Salamao does care about the dog because on the book he mentions that he gets the dog because his wife die, he almost replace his wife after her death because he was so lonely and didn't have no body to be with so he just both a dog. But he never realizes that if he doesn't treat the dog good one day he will go away. Just like he did but inside his really sad but outside he is just trying to hide with anger. That the opposite of what Meursault wanted to do when his mother die he just didn't care and didn't show any feels at all. In my opinion Camus purpose was make a self centered person so many things that are around him doesn't make him fall and just crash in the ground. Like when Camus, mentions that his mother was the one who raise him to fearless and have no emotions towards any thing. He also created an ambitions man who care a lot about his job, we notice this when he went back to his job in the next day" I work hard in the office today. The boss was nice. He asked me if I wasn't too tired …" (page25) even when he got new promotions he was about to throw everything out and just go to Paris. Camus uses techniques to demonstrate that not everyone will always see things like when Meursault said that Paris wasn't that beautiful and is not a great place to go "its dirty lots of pigeons and dark courtyards. Everybody's pale."(Page 42)Paris is a beautiful place where everyone wants to go and that is like dream and Meursault just goes and trash the whole city like it was nothing. He does have emotion on him but for some reason Camus just made his character not care about anything and that to me it seems like Meursault had a bad experience on his childhood it seems to me his mother didn't treat him good and that she hurt him a lot on his childhood by teaching him to be a strong kid and have such a dark side and no feels.
As Christiane pointed, people only care about things when they lose it. On page 38, old Salamano was disturbed by the fact that he couldn’t find his dog, but that wouldn’t mean anything if it wasn’t for the fact that he treated the dog like people treat unanimated objects.
But before that, Susan had already said that every time the subject in the book is the old guy’s dog, Maman is mentioned. She said that this might be for the fact that Meursault didn’t think of his mother more than he thinks of a dog, but what really intrigues me is that we can se a little of Meursault in Salamano. The protagonist was seen by the neighborhood as a guy who treated his mother badly, and the old guy, was seen as someone who treats his dog badly, but after losing his dog it’s clear that he is disturbed by that and then goes to Meursault for help, who says: “the pound kept dogs for three days so that the owners could come and claim and that after that they did with them as they saw fit.” (pg 39). After hearing this, Salamano cries and the narrative says “For some reason I though of Maman.” (pg 39) This leads me to think that even if Meursault didn’t care for his mother at all before she died, he thought of her at least once after she died, what shows that he wasn’t completely empty of feelings or emotions.
When Jacob was speaking, he refers to page 11 and describes Mersaults
mothers funereal along with the aftermath. His opinion was that
Mersault wasn’t normal; if he was he would be in grief or shock watching
his mother lie dead. Mersault was also described to be unfocused, not
expressing remorse for his mother’s death or even acknowledging it. I
do not think that Mersault was oblivious to his mothers death , he
acknowledges her death in several ways. If Mersault had no emotion toward
his mothers demise then he would not have taken a day of work off when it
seems to him that his job is one of the most important things in his
life, maybe something that he actually cares about. He also brings up
Mamam throughout several situations in the novel, though they’re not so
much sympathetic thoughts he still acknowledges her. Emma added that
“you can’t judge him by how he is acting.” I also agree with her
statement, it was previously stated that Mersault was brought up “not
care,
raised to not be hurt by anything.” Being as he was brought up like
this, Mersault most likely did not get emotionally involoved with
people that he came into contact with. This reason can serve as the reason for his reaction Mamamss death. Mersault's emotions do become ovid when he is describingMaries figure, and how he wants her. Therfore i do not believer that Mersault just in general does not have any emotions, but that he is just unaware of how to express them.
When Suzan talked about the scene when we are introduced to Salamano with his dog and how he treats it cruelly and Raymond say to Mersault about the treatment of dog that “if that isn’t pitiful” pg 28 and asked Mersault if he thought it was disgusting and Mersault said no. Suzan stated that when Mersault so how the dog was being treated, he did not care at all or even feel sorry for it. Then Suzan went on to say that at his mother’s burial, Mersault did not care that she was dead or feel sorry because of the way he was acting. I agreed with her because at the burial he is more focused on other things than is mother and Camus uses imagery to show this, for example when Mersault was walking with the nurse, care taker, and Perez, he said the “countryside flooded with sunlight, the sky unbearable, and the road had just been repaved. The tar had burst open in the sun. Our feet sank in it, leaving its shiny pulp exposed.” This is imagery because I can picture the sun, the sky and their feet prints in the tar, this how Camus uses imagery by showing that Mersault doesn’t care for his mother who is dead right in his presence but just to have his mind wander over his surroundings. The effect of all these events when he does not care about what happens was are foreshadowing techniques by Camus and how he creates his meaning which is “your actions can lead to your down fall” and it is proved, because in the later pages of the book during his trail of murdering the Arab, the judge and other prosecutors use Mersault way of not caring about his mother’s death as evidence against him, he is questioned if he felt any sorrow when his mother died and he said no. thus shows that Mersault is also a tragic hero because he causes his own down fall.
During the student lead discussion about the book The Stranger when Susan was speaking she mentioned that when measult was talking about what is going on in his life after he came back from his mother’s funeral how is life is still the same “It occurred to me that anyway one more Sunday was over, that Maman was buried now, that I was going back to work, and that, really, nothing had changed’’pg.24 I think he doesn’t care about his mother because if he really cared for his mother something should have change he would have gotten into less trouble especially the next day after his mother’s funeral and the other reason I think he doesn’t care about his mother his because when he was growing up his mother wasn’t there for him to tell him what he was doing wrong he has to decide for himself to find out what was wrong. His mother didn’t take part in his success so when she died it was like there was nothing missing .in the passenger’’ he was talking about “the street lamps were making the pavement glisten, and the light from the streetcars would glint off someone’s shiny hair, or off a smile or a silver or a silver bracelet.’’ Meassult was tiring to say that if the environment is not changing why should he. If anyone’s mother died they wouldn’t be thinking of food they would be crying. But not measult he was thinking of how to make himself feel comfortable “I went downstairs to buy some bread and spaghetti, did my cooking, and ate standing up. That shows that he has no heart at all he just care about him self.
When you have a phone call from a long distance and there tell you that your mother die you wouldn’t feel anything because she is not their with you but when you see her than you would believe that she is dead that is when you feel it and get depress but not mearsult he still feel the same way.
In our student led discussion that we’ve had the past couple of days, Kristy Mentioned Meursault and his insecurity. Kristy stated how it’s absolutely absurd that when Marie, Meursault’s girlfriend asks Meursault to marry her, he shows no emotions at all. “That evening Marie came by to see me and asked if I would marry her. I said it didn’t make a difference to me” (Camus 41). I think this shows Meursault’s insensitivity towards the people around him. Meursault could care less. If he didn’t want to marry Marie he could have been honest with her and told her what he felt, or at least he could have shown that he cares for her, but instead he makes Marie look stupid because he tells her that even though he does not love her, he will marry her because the fact that he does not love her, does not matter at all. This shows the readers that Meursault does not know what he wants in life. Meursault seems to just go with everything; he never seems to have his proper opinion on the things life offers him. Another passage that also shows how Meursault is a murky character is the how he says that he does not like Paris because there are lots of pigeons (Camus 42). In the other hand Marie is crazy to go Paris. I think that if Meursault was a sensible person he would have taken in consideration that his girlfriend’s dream is to go to Paris, and gone with her, but instead his so worried about the pigeons. I though this was very awkward, because Paris is supposed to be a beautiful place.
On the other hand as it was argued in class by Illens and Marcos, sometimes I get the feeling that Meursault does have some emotions, but he just does not know how to express them, and analyze them. For example, on chapter six in the incident with the Arab guy, he uses the sun as an excuse for killing the man. He often describes the sun as a scorching blade stabbing his eyes (Camus 59). When I read this passage I got the feeling that at this point in the story, Meursault’s emotions was striking all at once at him, and he just didn’t know how to analyze and control them, therefore he commits murder. I also connected this to what Mike mentioned about pages 28 and 29, when Raymond and Meursault had the stupid fight. I agree with mike when he said that this sort of foreshadowed Meursault’s reaction toward the Arab guy. I think that Camus purpose here was to show the readers Meursault’s emotions through racism, because why would Meursault kill this man that he didn’t know. Why would he do that for no reason? This is why once again I say that Meursault didn’t know how to control his emotions. He was never thought how to express himself in the first place, so when the strongly stroked him he did killed the man.
When Susan was speaking about Mersault in our class discussion about the novel The Stranger, she mentioned how the respect and love that he has towards woman is very abnormal. She mentions how hen Maria in Chapter 5 asks Mersault to marry her and his response was simply “I don’t care”, giving reason of his lack to emotions. The reason why I believe he acts this way because he basically is living life just to live it thinking that it’s a big game when reality it is not. We notice this in the first chapter when Maman died and him not showing any emotions towards his mother’s death. The fact that he just went about his life made him look to be a pitiful character. His actions of him not caring led to his downfall and his actual death. Why he acts like this we don’t know but what we do know is that he gives more detail while describing the sun. During Maman’s death along with him shooting that Arab he mentions how the sun was beaming down on his forehead causing him to have a terrible headache. Only the sun is mentioned at these times. A lot of imagery is examined when at the beach with Maria he sends out signals of attraction towards her physically not mentally and that can be another reason why he didn’t respond to her proposal of marriage. In Chapter 6 of part one Mersault says after killing the Arab, “And it was like knocking four quick times on the door of unhappiness". I believe that that quote really stands out not because he said it seconds after killing the Arab but showing how he knew what the outcome was going to be like. When he shot the Arab he shot him with a total of 5 times not even hesitating between each one so firing four more times can show us readers that he has no pity or emotion in his heart. Knocking on the door of unhappiness meaning going to jail or even dying which ended up as the result. I think he said knocking on the door of unhappiness four times instead of five times because when he first shot the Arab he still had a pretty good chance of living but then the lack of emotions he has made him fire four more times ending in a result of the Arab being dead on the scene.
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