The Stranger in Reading 1001

May 04, 2016 Bryn Lerud rated it it was amazing

This book and its little world fascinates the hell out of me. Meursault goes to work, goes to his mother's funeral, gets involved with a girl, has friends, and finally kills a man with complete detachment. Life is meaningless. There is no truth; there is no beauty; there is no joy. His lawyer says at his trial, "Everything is true and nothing is true!" The narrator says later, "Everyone knows that life isn't worth living." Don't worry - I haven't become an existentialist. :) It just is really in ...more

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Mar 23, 2012 Mekki rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: g1000, 1001-books-read, french-literature, 100-must-read-books-the-essential, 1001-book, g1000-fam-self

An outstanding first novel.

Camus questions life, religion, death and a person's relationship with world. Another book to reflect on. ...more

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Jan 29, 2018 Rosemary rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: ultimate-teen-guide, 1001-books

A strange book but one that leaves a deep impression. Meursault is the outsider, the stranger, the foreigner - the alien. He's gone along from day to day getting by in society pretty much by chance and because people are willing to mould themselves around his -what is it? Intransigence? But then he commits a crime for no better reason than he does anything else, and the world turns against him. It doesn't alter him, but it alters his circumstances. ...more

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Jul 25, 2011 Jamie Barringer (Ravenmount) rated it really liked it

Shelves: my-1001-list, 1001-books-challenge

I reread this book so that I could remember what happened before reading The Meursault Investigation, by Daoud. I still don't find this book particularly fantastic. The main character is ok, just a dude who is not particularly emotional and who is matter-of-fact about everything. But he is also really clueless about how people react to him, and he and everyone around him seem to like overreacting to stuff, beyond what I found realistic. The nonchalant way the main character goes about murdering ...more

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