Looking for The Outsider

by Alice Kaplan

The Outsider is a rite of passage for readers around the world. Since its publication in France in 1942, Camus's novel has been translated into sixty languages and sold more than six million copies. It's the rare novel that's as at likely to be found in a teen's backpack as in a graduate philosophy seminar. If the twentieth century produced a novel that could be called ubiquitous, The Outsider is it. How did a young man in his twenties who had never written a novel turn out a masterpiece that still grips readers more than seventy years later? With Looking for "The Outsider", Alice Kaplan tells that story. In the process, she reveals Camus's achievement to have been even more impressive and more unlikely than even his most devoted readers knew. Born in poverty in colonial Algeria, Camus started out as a journalist covering the criminal courts. The murder trials he attended, Kaplan shows, would be a major influence on the development and themes of The Outsider.She follows Camus to France, and, making deft use of his diaries and letters, re-creates his lonely struggle with the novel in Montmartre, where he finally hit upon the unforgettable first-person voice that enabled him to break through and complete The Outsider. Even then, the book's publication was far from certain. France was straining under German occupation, Camus's closest mentor was unsure of the book's merit, and Camus himself was suffering from near-fatal tuberculosis. Yet the book did appear, thanks in part to a resourceful publisher, Gaston Gallimard, who was undeterred by paper shortages and Nazi censorship. The initial critical reception of The Outsider was mixed, and it wasn't until after liberation that The Outsider began its meteoric rise. As France and the rest of the world began to move out of the shadow of war, Kaplan shows, Camus's book with the help of an aggressive marketing campaign by Knopf for their 1946 publication of the first English translation became a critical and commercial success, and Camus found himself one of the most famous writers in the world.Suddenly, his seemingly modest tale of alienation was being seen for what it really was: a powerful parable of the absurd, an existentialist masterpiece. Few books inspire devotion and excitement the way The Outsider does. And it couldn't have a better biographer than Alice Kaplan, whose books about twentieth-century French culture and history have won her legions of fans. No reader of Camus will want to miss this brilliant exploration.

Genres: Nonfiction, Biography, Philosophy, History, France, Literary Criticism, Books About Books

289 pages, Hardcover

First published September 16, 2016

Reviews

[Keith Herrell · Rating 3 out of 5]

I finished this book today. Or maybe yesterday; I can't be sure.

[Dr. Lloyd E. Campbell · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book so much I found myself reading it increasingly more slowly because I didn't want it to end. I love the way the author wove together the history of the book The Stranger with Camus' life as it relates to the book. I read the Gilbert translation about fifty years ago while in college and the Ward translation three years ago. Although I loved the book years ago, the Ward translation is much better. This book explains why. It's all about word choice, the quality which makes Camus such a great writer. I wish I could read French. Nuances are difficult to translate.
I hadn't realized how sick Camus was. I know nothing of treatments, but eating red meat is hard for me to imagine as having any validity in the treatment of tuberculosis
I still have trouble understanding how Mersault is an honest man. I believe honesty is more than not lying and more than not following conventions that you don't value. Being honest, I believe, involves empathy since we are social animals. For me, Mersault shows no empathy. I don't see how he can be viewed as heroic as some seem to think.
A silly thing I got a kick out of: when Camus autographed the book he often wrote something like: To avoid being executed be sure to cry at your mother's funeral.

[Kyle C · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have read and taught The Stranger many times. I read it in high school, and I read it again before my French exam, and I have taught it a few times since. I still struggle with it; I have never left satisfied that I had a good grip on it. The Myth of Sisyphus, which Camus wrote at the same time as The Stranger, almost feels like a distraction—it is hard to reconcile the heroic figure of Sisyphus happily accepting his ineluctable fate with the troubling enigma of Meursault, a murderer who never seems to understand his own motives and commits inexplicable violence without a conscience. Sisyphus finds purpose in his misfortune, constantly pushing a boulder up a mountain, but Meursault, sitting in prison after murdering an Arab man, just accepts the "tender indifference of the world". It almost feels like a trap, as if Camus is misdirecting readers to search for some metaphysical lesson in The Stranger, blinding us to the racial violence at the core of the text. There are obvious parallels: Sisyphus and Meursault both live in an absurd world; Sisyphus and Meursault are punished (rightly or wrongly) by an absurd theocratic judicial system. But Meursault is so contemptibly amoral—not a paragon of humanistic values in the face of an indifferent cosmos. I would much prefer to teach The Plague, which offers a clear portrait of humanitarian virtue (a doctor who thinks rationally and rallies the community when a senseless epidemic wipes through the town); I could teach The Fall as a satire of existentialist nihilism. The Stranger is intractably weird. Am I meant to condemn Meursault, or sympathize with him, or both?

Biographical criticism is generally a disfavored way of entering into a novel—read the text closely, don't look for clues in the author's life—but Alice Kaplan's book opens up many insightful ways into the novel. I didn't know, for example, that Camus wrote his masters thesis on Saint Augustine; I didn't know that the courthouse, where he listened to and reported on murder trials, stood behind the Église Saint-Augustin; I didn't know that, much like Meursault in The Stranger, St Augustine also didn't cry at his mother's funeral and that, shortly after praying at her vigil, he went to the baths to ease his grief (importantly, Augustine believes that a faithful, rational Christian shouldn't cry, knowing that the deceased will enjoy eternal salvation). This opened up for me a totally new way into Camus' novel: it's an inversion of St Augustine's Confessions. Whereas St Augustine wrote, in fervent and hymnic prayer, about his story of conversion, lamenting his foolish youth and foolhardy adulthood, Meursault's own first-person account is a kind of anti-confession; he never seems to feel anything (except briefly when he remembers his mother for a brief moment); he never seeks refuge; he feels none of the great angst that Augustine felt; there's little introspection. Augustine celebrates the discovery of faith; The Stranger mocks the priest and the judge who desperately plead with Meursault to find God.

I also didn't know that, before writing The Stranger, Camus wrote a primordial version of the story: A Happy Death, a novel about a man named Patrice Mersault (note only one u) who murders a wealthy paraplegic man, steals his money, and dies happy by the sea. His teacher and mentor, Jean Grenier, so firmly excoriated the novel that Camus abandoned it—but he obviously reworked much of it. He kept many details from A Happy Death, its protagonist, an indifferent, passionless killer who, also like Meursault, understands neither love nor remorse. But what Camus learned is that such a cut-throat amoralist could not be written with any sentimental writing or philosophical self-justification; the novelist has to pare back and say less. Out of nowhere, some time later, Camus wrote in his journal one day: "Maman died today. Or yesterday maybe, I don't know. I got a telegram from the home: "Mother deceased. Funeral tomorrow. Faithfully yours." That doesn't mean anything. Maybe it was yesterday." Years before finishing the novel, he had found the exact words to open it: those grimly sparse sentences, the confused chronology (was it today? was it yesterday?), the non-sequitur that raises more questions ("that doesn't mean anything"—what doesn't mean what?). But it's not just Meusault who is perplexing. The language of the telegram (a textual medium that, like the novel itself, cuts and condenses words and grammar) is callously curt. In those first sentences, Camus invented a whole new style of writing.

Camus' Stranger is sometimes derided as "Hemingway writing Kafka" but I also didn't know that Camus was deeply influenced by The Postman Always Rings Twice—the story of a hireling at a gas station in Hollywood who has an affair with his boss's wife. He simply calls his boss "the Greek" (much like Meursault only refers to his victim as "the Arab") and he and his adulterous mistress soon plot to kill their Greek third-wheel. Camus' novel has none of the same salacious scandal (there's nothing raunchy about Meursault—he describes Marie as a good lay and fantasizes about women in prison but he's not motivated by romantic passion). Nothing about Meursault is premeditated. What Camus learned from American fiction was to write his absurdism in familiar language—to test high-minded theory in down-and-out desperados. The Stranger is so startling because its language has nothing in common with Camus' essay The Myth of Sisyphus. There's no erudition, no pyrotechnics, no grand pronouncements. It's a slack-jawed confession.

I think I will continue to struggle to come up with a thesis for The Stranger but Kaplan's literary history of the novel offers some way to make sense of all its most puzzling elements. Well-researched and accessible.

[Andrew]

I was hoping for a deeper appreciation of and insight into The Stranger, a book that has become better-known in the decades since as baby’s first French novel. Did I get any such appreciation or insight? Nope, not really. This is one of those books that need not exist – it wasn’t bad, per se, but I got zero from reading it.

[Linda · Rating 4 out of 5]

With the advent of the Meursault Investigation, the novel published by an Algerian writer concerning the identity and life of the Arab that Camus's "Stranger" kills, I've had a new interest in the story. So when I read that this book had been published, I had to have it. It didn't disappoint.

Kaplan was intrigued by the actual birth of the book. What "caused" Camus to create this book? What influences did he have? Were things in the book taken from actual happenings?

And she tracks down what she can. She does NOT try to interpret the book or say that certain events directly influenced scenes in the novel. But sometimes you have to believe that is what happened from what she finds.

Camus himself admitted that he got his overall idea of the first-person narrator waiting for execution from the American noir book, The Postman Always Rings Twice. But his experiences as a police reporter turned that influence into something extra. The scene where the judge waves a crucifix at Meursault was real. A friend of his and his brother were actually in a fight with an Arab on the beach and the brother was injured. They retreated and shortly came back to restart the fight.

I can't begin to go into all the fascinating things that Kaplan uncovered or I'd have to write the entire book here. But the most fascinating for me was

she found the actual Arab in the beach incident. He had a name.

[Joe Cummings · Rating 5 out of 5]

Like Everybody Behaves Badly: The True Story Behind Hemingway’s Masterpiece by Lesley M. M. Blum, Alice Kaplan's 2016 Looking for The Stranger: Albert Camus and the life of a Literary Classic is a biography of the publication a novel that was a watershed event in modern literature. Along with millions of others, I first read The Stranger in first year French class at university. Since then I reread it numerous times as a hallmark to see where my mind was at. It's a great book, and this biography gives it the justice that it deserves. I heartily recommend it to anyone who has has been moved by Meursault and how he comes to accept his fate. Enjoy.

[Christina · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loved the history surrounding the initial manuscripts, writing and publishing of The Stranger. Felt that the analysis was a little too subjective at times.

[r · Rating 5 out of 5]

In the spirit of ‘The Lost City of Z’ but for a work of literature instead of the mythical city of El Dorado. Every bit as propulsive and fascinating, right down to the big reveal ending of the author in present day.

[Marlowe Brennan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'd say this is really a must read book for anyone who finds Camus' work worth their time. Kaplan does a masterful job of telling a compelling story about Camus the Author and the many facets of The Stranger. Most significantly she contextualizes Camus' world for us so we can understand the birth of this short but impactful novel and recognize it for the snapshot it is of Camus' philosophical and literary life.

[Sally Anne · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting if you are a literary nerd. It's a bit dry and academic, but there is good information and history in here. The last couple of chapters, about Kaplan's search for the real unnamed Arab is extra cool.

[Patrick McCoy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I went through an "Existentialist" phase while in college that led to the reading of Kafka, Dostoevsky, Sarte, and of course Albert Camus. I'm sure I read The Stranger twice, once on my own and later in a class on Modern European Literature. I had also read several other books by Camus. As an alternative rock fan I was also a fan of The Cure's hit song, "Killing An Arab," (which to my chagrin has been scrubbed from the band's catalogue-due to Robert Smith's worry that the song might be taken the wrong way), which was inspired by the book. Furthermore, I also recently saw Luchino Visconti's 1967 film version of the novel. So I was primed to read Alice Kaplan's Looking for The Stranger: Albert Camus and the Life of a Literary Classic (2016). Kaplan did a great job of giving background details about Camus' life and the birth of the book as well as the reception and long tail of the book. That is to say there is not an insignificant amount of research that was involved in the writing of this seemingly slim volume. I was surprised to learn that James M. Cain's The Postman Always Rings Twice was inspiration for the novel. (Additionally, I did not know that Sarte rewrote Nausea after reading Dashiell Hammett-these Existentialists were cooler than I thought) Kaplan even addresses Edward Said's criticism of having a nameless Arab as the victim as well as a response novel written by an Algerian Arab that tells the story of the murdered Arab's brother and his similar crime of killing an European. I was also happy to see that she addressed The Cure's song version and it's history as well as Visconti's film. It was an informative and entertaining look back at an undisputed classic.

[R. Allain · Rating 5 out of 5]

At first blush perhaps, perusing a literary critic's meticulous search into the origins and birth of Albert Camus' enigmatic novel The Stranger seems dry as burnt toast. But beware of mistaken first blushes. Why? Because Camus' journey just to write The Stranger was penned by Alice Kaplan - one who exhibits an uncanny gift recasting extensive research and erudition into a literary page turner. Ah, dear reader, methinks you may suspect some exaggeration. But no, mon amie (my friend), cast off such thoughts! It helps, of course, that Camus is one of our age's most consequential writers. And one whose courage writing and in the French Resistance - calling out totalitarianism's menace - assumes fresh relevance in our current political moment. When revered Western institutions, law, voting, civil rights and democracy itself are at extreme risk. But I digress. Instead, why does Kaplan's masterwork so astound us? Partly because one often thinks of literary classics (like The Stranger) as some unique grand alchemy formed by a writer's experience and consummate writing skill. But Kaplan's genius is, in part, to recast such a belief. Drawing on many biographical tidbits, she shows how specific social and political events from Camus' own history catalyzed his own writing and thinking - especially as The Stranger was being written. Indeed, her grasp his felt experience -with episodes ranging from Camus' failed first marriage, bouts with tuberculosis and the Nazi occupation - even exile in Algeria and smuggling the book's manuscript back to France, keep the reader enthralled. And sprinkled are trysts, betrayals and several literary skeptics and backers. Kaplan's gift, finally, is demonstrating that sleuths inhabit more than Agatha Christie novels. For Kaplan's a literary Poirot and making literature itself - and one of its more enigmatic authors, more enticing and relevant than ever.

[Paul Rizzuto · Rating 4 out of 5]

A scholarly and extensively researched book on the second best-selling international classic. Albert Camus' novel is itself strange in that its portrayal of a killer, Meursault, seems shallow, leaving the reader wanting to know more about him, yet makes the deep impression that each human individual is a question mark. Why, why, why, a reader wants to know why Meursault killed the Arab. Was it just because of the sunlight and scorching sand having their effect on him, on the beach that day? What is the political background of European and African Arab living together in Algeria in the twentieth century? This book will answer such questions and provide insight into the writer, Camus, as he was writing amidst WWII and all the social tensions of the time. Camus the novelist was also a newspaper reporter, a journalist recording his observations and reflections . 'The Stranger' crystallizes his view of man with a shrug of the shoulders - yes, I killed an Arab male, so what? The French occupants and native Algerians don't like each other, so what? That judge is corrupt, so what? Is there any escape from the absurd? Camus said and says no, there is no escape from the absurd, as Sartre said there is 'no way out' of this world (🌎) that satisfies. Alice Kaplan relates the facts of the matter helpful to understanding. She uncovers many details of Camus' relationships and associations.

[superawesomekt · Rating 4 out of 5]

I recently read The Stranger with a book club. I had read a graphic novel version of it last year (without any knowledge of the plot, etc.) and had been somewhat baffled by it—unlikeable protagonist, strange narration, somewhat nihilistic plot.... Reading the novel itself confirmed that I didn't understand it or how to approach it. Enter this book.

I think if you are already well versed in The Stranger then this book may not be very interesting except as a book-driven biography of Camus. For someone who, like me, did not read it as part of a class or in the context of absurdism, this was a very helpful guide to understanding Camus's philosophy, his influences, the culture he came from, etc. I found it fascinating and while I still don't particularly enjoy The Stranger, I can appreciate its art and influence. It also gave me great supplemental reading ideas (more Kafka, Myth of Sisyphus, etc.).

If you want to understand The Stranger better, I highly recommend reading this book as part of your study.

[Edd Simmons · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wasn’t expecting so much of a biography. I wanted something something more literary from Kaplan. I did not even notice I previously read one her books in this short year. But. Yet that’s quite the contradiction I’m making for myself while Camus book The Stranger was lunged at me through its extensive history.
It’s funny how an author can go through manuscript and manuscript. Camus wrote in his journal a lot it seems. Writing takes practice, and he went through trial and era as he published through Western Europe. One thing I like about Camus is Algeria. Paris and Oran are only separated by the MediterraneanSea.
In the book there was a slight mention of someone who was on the run from Nazis who wrote about , The Stranger, and Camus indirectly. She was a stranger herself, and compared Camus to being a Stranger to Europe because of Northern Africa, without the mentioning of the main character in the novels name, because she never read it.
If I could have focused more with this book I would give it 4⭐️/but it can get a Letter Grade of B+. It was written well, and informative. You just can’t expect everything.

[Elliot Ratzman · Rating 3 out of 5]

Biographies of books end up also being foreshortened biographies of authors and this neat book is no exception. Kaplan does a great job introducing us to Camus’s Algeria and the conditions under which his early writings formed. This book should be required reading for every teacher who assigns The Stranger, as it gives some much-needed context to the book’s construction and reception. For example, Camus was influenced by “The Postman Always Rings Twice” including reducing an ethnic character to “the Greek” which seems to be the model for rendering the “Arab” killed by Meursault nameless (we find out the real name by the end). Camus’s life as resistance editor is briskly discussed, but we learn less about his stances on the Algerian independence movement, which he opposed. What Kaplan gives us a taste of the critical early reception we don’t have here a sustained reception history: how various schools of literary criticism, and/or major theorists, interpreted the novel over the decades.

[Michelle Hogmire · Rating 4 out of 5]

What do James M. Cain's American crime novel The Postman Always Rings Twice and the French comedy film Le Schpountz have in common? They, along with investigative reporting experience and a hatred of executions, were both early influences on Camus' The Stranger. In this entertaining book bio, Alice Kaplan traces the history of Camus' novel in conjunction with his complicated life--from the difficulty of transporting his manuscript across the occupied zone during WWII to his begrudging acceptance of the title "existentialist" in New York (despite his stark divergence from Sartre's philosophy). Although Kaplan's work drags a bit in its excessive recounting of both the publishing process and the early critical reception of The Stranger, the book ends beautifully; through her research, the author uncovers the true story on which Camus' famous murder on the beach is based, finally giving a name to the nameless Arab who has been a stranger for so long: Kaddour Touil.

[Peter Sidell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Insights into Camus’ Stranger

Insights into Camus’ Stranger. An English professor investigates the background and history of Camus’ The Stranger - which won the Nobel prize and was often used as an example of exploring existentialist philosophy - although Camus denied that. It follows Camus throughout his life until his death and examines his struggles with writing the Stranger - as well as his indebtedness to other writers. I certainly ended with a deeper appreciation of the book.
I just recently read the book and as a 78 year old retired surgeon perhaps have a different perspective on the concept of life as ‘absurd.’ I saw too many people undergo potentially life threatening procedures and struggle to stay alive and recover to be able to identify with the idea of life as ‘absurd’ and that suicide is a legitimate choice. Nonetheless I find the book and its examination fascinating.

[Mary Byrne · Rating 5 out of 5]

Exploration of Camus' life and what led to his writing The Stranger, a wonderful read for anyone interested in Camus, France, the colonisation of Algeria, the absurd, alienation, and much, much more.
My favourite anecdote from the book, which happens during the war when Camus & other staff are driving to new offices in Clermont-Ferrand, another editor at the paper recounts: "I can still picture Camus on the place de Jaude, exiting a car that had run out of gas, oil and water, its engine smoking. He turned pale, ran back to the trunk and took out his treasure, a manuscript he shoved in his pocket."

[Linda · Rating 2 out of 5]

I picked this up at BEA in 2014 and I thought it was about time to get it read. (Nowadays, I probably wouldn't even have picked it up, but, hey! It was a free book.)\
Sometimes complicated life and look at Albert Camus's life and that of his book The Stranger. Neither had an easy life. The politics of the 1940s were very disrupting to both.

[Jamie McDermid · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book provides lots of context and biographical information about Albert Camus before during and after he wrote The Stranger. I especially enjoyed the real life events that Camus used in The Stranger and the historical context of WW2 and how the German occupation of France affected the community of writers that Camus was part of especially in France.

[Ben Raterman · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'll give almost any book written about Camus 4 stars. Almost is the key word. Kaplan's book gets the full five. "The Stranger" is both a strange book and a masterpiece. It's inner working, as explained by Kaplan, are worth important consideration.

[Adagiobear · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not much new here, but I did enjoy reading about the critical reaction, in France and America, to The Stranger.

[Louis Mateo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Background

Provides a detailed background surrounding Camus’ literary beginnings and his development of ‘The Stranger’. Very readable and provides details about Camus’ encounter with various characters

[Elisa · Rating 3 out of 5]

This has some interesting tidbits, but too much historical context that I, personally, wasn't looking for. I wanted more on The Stranger. It was still illuminating.

[deanie chen · Rating 4 out of 5]

captivating and brilliantly researched

[Elaine Fowler · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a "biography" of Camus' L'Etranger, delving into its origins and development and placing it in the context of the author's life and the times he lived in. A must read for Camus fans.

[Eleni Papada · Rating 5 out of 5]

Φανταστικό βιβλίο με λεπτομέρειες για το πως γράφτηκε ο Ξένος. Για όλους τους φανσ του Καμύ και του Ξένου(δεν είναι λίγοι)!

[Jerrie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Although a bit dry at times, this books gives a fascinating look behind the scenes of the writing and publication of The Stranger. It recounts how Camus may have been inspired by a friend's fight with an Algerian local on the beach and his time as a court reporter. Also described are the multiple hurtles to getting the book published in occupied Paris, from Camus's continued battles with TB, to the Nazi censors, to paper shortages. A solid 3.5⭐️.

[Pascale · Rating 2 out of 5]

A rather redundant book. The story of how Camus shot to fame with his first novel and became a star by the end of WWII is well documented and I can't see what fresh angle Kaplan brings to bear on it. Her account of the novel's reception makes for rather dull reading. As she solemnly warns you when discussing the discrepancy of spelling in the protagonist's name between the first draft and the published version: "The fact that the 'u' is missing from the only existing manuscript of the novel is a useful reminder to literary critics that much is unknowable about the art of fiction." So unknowable that we are no nearer understanding Camus or his creation at the end of this. Kaplan's coup appears to be that she managed to track down and interview the surviving relatives of an Arab named Kaddour who once got into fisticuffs with a couple of Camus's pals. The brawl was reported, complete with the Arab's name, in L'Echo d'Oran, and there is every reason to believe that Camus either heard about the incident or read about it. Kaddour, however, wasn't seriously injured, let alone killed, and went on to do time for rape later on. Given the macho Mediterranean culture of Algeria, I expect that minor brawls like the one involving Kaddour happened on a regular basis, and I can't see any compelling reason to identify this Arab as THE Arab. Kaplan wants to see read a symbol into the fact that Kaddour contracted tuberculosis in prison and, like Camus, then had to travel to France for treatment. Why this biographical detail should be mentioned at all is beyond me. I love it when academics turn into sleuths for a purpose, but here I fail to see what new insights Kaplan's painstaking research into Kaddour's family has yielded.