Chris's review
The Stranger
by Albert Camus
I think you are suffering from post avant-canon disillusionment syndrome, the ony cure for which is probably something like just climbing a tree in your best suit.
I think one needs to take into consideration the time in which the novel was written and the fact that Camus broke ground with it in terms of theme & style. I don't know the translation you read; maybe it wasn't as good as it might have been. I read the book years ago (high school) and the alienation expressed spoke to me, gave me solace somehow. Reading the plot summed up like that, it does sound pretty shitty, pretty meaningless, but the effect created is--I still believe--a tour de force. True, I should revisit it to see its effect on me now. Perhaps I will.
I have yet to read this book... maybe I won't?
your review is fantastic.
Well. I loved it.
Although, maybe now I wouldn't.
Existence has caught up with me.
BRMB, you should read it. It's short & not taxing. Besides, we want you to weigh in on it.
Spoiler alert: his mom dies.
We all die. (See, I got it.)
Jessica, just went to read your review. It was a short bus ride and worth it for the first line. Can I copy it here?
Aways think about this book when I can't mourn.
So I think it is an important book. The writing doesn't
grab us to take us someplace. It represents that place,
like a parable without a moral. (That should be something, maybe a koan? I don't know. I'm a little koan happy.)
It isn't a pleasurable read, but it gave me the pleasure of thought, even if it's about something as quixotic (or bothersome) as the inability to feel the way a situation demands.
Come to think of it Sarah, you should definitely read this.
After that book on the Khmer Rouge, I need something "light".
no more death for a bit.
Who the hell writes like that?
Um, well, for starters, Albert Camus did, and he kicked ass.
And Camus sort of based the book on the writing style of James Cain, who wrote "The Postman Always Rings Twice."
And isn't Hemingway known for his simple, terse style?
Absolutely. Of course Hemingway learned much from Getrude Stein, who was above all a stylist, and desreves credit.
Heh. I actually like "The Stranger" but I like your review more. Nice work.
I feel about this book much what the main character feels about life and his circumstances.
meh.
It's a peronsal taste thing, I guess, but I think it's very fitting that a book about ennui should be terse, simplistic in vocabulary, and somewhat uninvolving (in the traditional, plot-driven sense). It's supposed to evoke that mood, after all. Maybe the detractors here have just never experienced ennui. In that sense, they are lucky or unlucky, depending upon one's perspective. I vote for unlucky.
It's true that critics, academics, readers often put too much weight on a book for the work to bear. I feel that way about OLD MAN AND THE SEA--a good book but no classic and certainly not the Hemingway to put on school reading lists.
But for me THE STRANGER, like certain childhood trauamas, will always be there in my emotional life. It captured in a profound and unsettling way something central about daily life, and living in the world. Its formal austerity is that of a world stripped of value. And while identifying with a numb narrator like Mersault presents its difficulties, I think anyone who's felt like an alien in their own culture or time, forced to participate in rituals that are meaningless to them, can make the leap.
But, hey, if you didn't like it, you didn't like it.
Now a question on the translation: Which one did you read? I loved the old one by Stuart Gilbert (now out of print but easy to find). The new one by Matthew Ward sucks. For instance, he fucks up the book's great first line by using "Maman" instead of mother, which may be more accurate, but confuses 95% of English readers who don't understand French pronunciation; they're left scratching their heads wondering what a "muh-man" is instead of being seduced into the narrative. Worse still, using the French severs the primal emotional connection the word "mother" (or even "mom" or "mama") has with English speakers. For many of us, it was our first word! And it's a word that immediately chafes against the nonchalant tone of the second line... Agh!
I agree with you by the way about "The Old Man and The Sea." A good story, but not a great one. and too freighted with symbolism...give me his shorts stories instead.
I also agree about translation. I had this experience w/ "Death in Venice." The translation makes all the difference in the world when it comes to that novella. They vary widely. It's a terrific novel w/ some shoddy, distorting translations...
Hey Robert,
I might have to check out the Gilbert translation, and why not, i've already read this several times, once more won't kill me.
The copy i've always had is the sucky Matthew Ward translation.
It's possible that his translation is what makes it lame, but the 'Maman'-thing didn't bother me.
Agh! You ruined it!
I just read The Stranger. I liked it, but I also had an inkling what to expect and may have made allowances for it in advance. Still, it was a unique experience, and being a short read, little time was invested one way or other.
Regardless, Chris's review is superb. Even my favorite author has weaknesses, and it's helpful to point them out. Despite the popularity of 20th-century literary genres, they have vulnerabilities, too, and the truncated sentences and vocabularies are among them.
I loved the book because it was the first time a character in a book actually thought like I do. I also liked the short sentences. Most book have to much adjectives i shit that just bore me.
Chris's review
The Stranger by Albert Camus
Chris's review
rating:
If every few words of praise I’ve seen for “The Stranger” over my lifetime materialized into small chunks of rock in space, there’d be enough sh!t to conjure up the Oort Cloud. Much like this distant collection of debris bordering the outer solar system, I can’t really comprehend the acclaim heaped on this story, but luckily, like the Cloud, it’s usually out of sight, out of mind, and has absolutely no discernable current influence on my life. And just like the Oort can occasionally spit a chunk of sh!t at the earth and devastate all life upon it, so too can I hear/read some lip service paid to “The Stranger” resulting in my transition to Freak-Out Mode, resulting in me slapping someone in the face, usually someone I have to deal with again at some point in time (if only in court).
Personally, I don’t see what the big deal is. Armed with a 100-word vocabulary, a meager 123 pages to bore one with, and a character who simply doesn’t seem to give much of a damn, ...more
Personally, I don’t see what the big deal is. Armed with a 100-word vocabulary, a meager 123 pages to bore one with, and a character who simply doesn’t seem to give much of a damn, ...more
I think you are suffering from post avant-canon disillusionment syndrome, the ony cure for which is probably something like just climbing a tree in your best suit.
I think one needs to take into consideration the time in which the novel was written and the fact that Camus broke ground with it in terms of theme & style. I don't know the translation you read; maybe it wasn't as good as it might have been. I read the book years ago (high school) and the alienation expressed spoke to me, gave me solace somehow. Reading the plot summed up like that, it does sound pretty shitty, pretty meaningless, but the effect created is--I still believe--a tour de force. True, I should revisit it to see its effect on me now. Perhaps I will.
I have yet to read this book... maybe I won't?
your review is fantastic.
Well. I loved it.
Although, maybe now I wouldn't.Existence has caught up with me.
BRMB, you should read it. It's short & not taxing. Besides, we want you to weigh in on it.
Spoiler alert: his mom dies.
We all die. (See, I got it.)Jessica, just went to read your review. It was a short bus ride and worth it for the first line. Can I copy it here?
Aways think about this book when I can't mourn.
So I think it is an important book. The writing doesn't
grab us to take us someplace. It represents that place,
like a parable without a moral. (That should be something, maybe a koan? I don't know. I'm a little koan happy.)
It isn't a pleasurable read, but it gave me the pleasure of thought, even if it's about something as quixotic (or bothersome) as the inability to feel the way a situation demands.
Come to think of it Sarah, you should definitely read this.
After that book on the Khmer Rouge, I need something "light".
no more death for a bit.
Who the hell writes like that?
Um, well, for starters, Albert Camus did, and he kicked ass.
And Camus sort of based the book on the writing style of James Cain, who wrote "The Postman Always Rings Twice."
And isn't Hemingway known for his simple, terse style?
Absolutely. Of course Hemingway learned much from Getrude Stein, who was above all a stylist, and desreves credit.
Heh. I actually like "The Stranger" but I like your review more. Nice work.
I feel about this book much what the main character feels about life and his circumstances.
meh.
It's a peronsal taste thing, I guess, but I think it's very fitting that a book about ennui should be terse, simplistic in vocabulary, and somewhat uninvolving (in the traditional, plot-driven sense). It's supposed to evoke that mood, after all. Maybe the detractors here have just never experienced ennui. In that sense, they are lucky or unlucky, depending upon one's perspective. I vote for unlucky.
It's true that critics, academics, readers often put too much weight on a book for the work to bear. I feel that way about OLD MAN AND THE SEA--a good book but no classic and certainly not the Hemingway to put on school reading lists.
But for me THE STRANGER, like certain childhood trauamas, will always be there in my emotional life. It captured in a profound and unsettling way something central about daily life, and living in the world. Its formal austerity is that of a world stripped of value. And while identifying with a numb narrator like Mersault presents its difficulties, I think anyone who's felt like an alien in their own culture or time, forced to participate in rituals that are meaningless to them, can make the leap.
But, hey, if you didn't like it, you didn't like it.
Now a question on the translation: Which one did you read? I loved the old one by Stuart Gilbert (now out of print but easy to find). The new one by Matthew Ward sucks. For instance, he fucks up the book's great first line by using "Maman" instead of mother, which may be more accurate, but confuses 95% of English readers who don't understand French pronunciation; they're left scratching their heads wondering what a "muh-man" is instead of being seduced into the narrative. Worse still, using the French severs the primal emotional connection the word "mother" (or even "mom" or "mama") has with English speakers. For many of us, it was our first word! And it's a word that immediately chafes against the nonchalant tone of the second line... Agh!
I agree with you by the way about "The Old Man and The Sea." A good story, but not a great one. and too freighted with symbolism...give me his shorts stories instead. I also agree about translation. I had this experience w/ "Death in Venice." The translation makes all the difference in the world when it comes to that novella. They vary widely. It's a terrific novel w/ some shoddy, distorting translations...
Hey Robert,
I might have to check out the Gilbert translation, and why not, i've already read this several times, once more won't kill me.
The copy i've always had is the sucky Matthew Ward translation.
It's possible that his translation is what makes it lame, but the 'Maman'-thing didn't bother me.
Agh! You ruined it!
I just read The Stranger. I liked it, but I also had an inkling what to expect and may have made allowances for it in advance. Still, it was a unique experience, and being a short read, little time was invested one way or other.
Regardless, Chris's review is superb. Even my favorite author has weaknesses, and it's helpful to point them out. Despite the popularity of 20th-century literary genres, they have vulnerabilities, too, and the truncated sentences and vocabularies are among them.
I loved the book because it was the first time a character in a book actually thought like I do. I also liked the short sentences. Most book have to much adjectives i shit that just bore me.