Essay Stranger

CARLOS ACEVEDO
MS. ROBIN REYES
11TH GRADE
9/20/2011

The stranger
The book is simply written and a rather quick read, but the depth Camus manages to convey through this simplicity isastounding. I think a problem a lot of people have with this book is that they fail to look beyond the whole "what is the meaning of life" message.
While an interesting question, the book raises so manyother philosophical questions beyond this. What I found the most interesting of these is "what truly defines humanity or makes someone human?" During Meursault's trial, he is constantly accused of notshowing remorse and therefore as being cold and inhuman.
He is most definitely human though, just rather detached. This raises the question of whether one should be expected to exhibit certaincharacteristics in certain situations to "keep their humanity".

Also it raises the question of whether much of our emotion is created by ourselves or the expectations of others to exhibit certainemotions in a given situation, the book is also an indictment on people's efforts to dictate other people's lives
We are constantly told what is right and as a means to justify our own sense of "what itmeans to be human” often impose these characteristics upon others, expecting them to fulfill similar traits and characteristics, as they have been already imposed on us. It is in a way, aself-justification of our actions as right or "humanly", he is not inhuman; he is just not following the same way of the life.
Constantly, Meursault is being told he must live and/or act a certain way, whether itbe by the judge, his lawyer, or the priest. Once he doesn't conform to these measures, he is marginalized and called "inhuman"; this is an attempt on the part of the others to rationalize their ownways of life and understandings.
If they manage to declare him "inhuman", it allows them to call themselves human and justify their own means of living, so basically we can say “everybody try to be a...