Camus was influenced by a diverse collection of foreign authors and philosophies in the 1930s. The mood of nihilism was high. Nietzsche and Dostoyevsky had remained significant in thought since the turn of the century. German phenomenology was flowing into France. Sartre was struggling against the shallow rationalism of Cartesian thought.
Mersault is indeed amoral, but he has a brain and it appears to be working. He is not brain dead, he simply lacks the ethical knowledge of a common human being (maybe he has the knowledge and chooses to disregard it).
Mersault is indeed amoral, but he has a brain and it appears to be working. He is not brain dead, he simply lacks the ethical knowledge of a common human being (maybe he has the knowledge and chooses to disregard it).
However, a close reading of these first lines makes clear that Meursault is not expressing indifference to his mother's death; he is exasperatedly alluding to the vagueness of the telegram (whose wording itself is callous)
Contrary to the majority of the class' beliefs, Mersault is not expressing any indifference to his mother in the first page. It was simply assumed that because he wasn't aware of the exact time of his mother's death, he didn't care.
Alice Strange has recently expounded this view of Meursault, arguing that he "permits others to define his reactions and to create a social identity for him."
This is definitely true. In the novel, Raymond asks Mersualt to help him beat his woman who he thinks is cheating on him. Mersault has no problem helping him by writing the letter. Mersault had no personal emotions/afflictions about this action.
Meursault an irrational, unintelligent child, a "juvenile delinquent" (531) who kills a man because he wants attention from society