Judging Meursault

The first way fifth hour characterized Meursault was through his indifference. His jarringly unjudgmental manner was made clear from the outset of the novel – many of us looked at his emotionally disconnected narration, while others cited his apathetic response to socially emotional events (such as his mother’s death). This sense of indifference grew to be problematic when it became clear that it also applied to much more horrific, morally-charged events, such as Raymond’s abuse of his girlfriend and (most importantly) Meursault’s shooting of the Arab. In order to try and assuage our discomfort with Meursault’s apparent soullessness, we quickly justified his unemotional amorality as a symptom of some internal turmoil, attributing his feelings (or lack thereof) to influences like depression and grief. These mental explanations perhaps made Meursault’s extreme apathy more digestible to us - we were able to justify his socially unredeemable acts through socially sympathetic explanations. Many literary criticisms of the novel do the same, attributing his disconnected, irrational actions to socially redeemable explanations (such as alexithymia) and trying to make him more sympathetic and understandable through our social lens. However, I think such neat, socially adherent explanation of Meursault is not what Camus intended for his character. Is it right of us to try to explain Meursault comfortably at all, given the second section of the novel? Is the character of Meursault not meant to make us uncomfortable through his defiance of society?

In his last scene, Meursault reflects that he relates to and is relieved by the “gentle indifference of the world”. This implies that that the true world is as indifferent and amoral as he is – “nothing, nothing mattered”. There is therefore no inherent “morality", and morals become just another social construct that have no real importance (and another social construct that Meursault does not understand). If there are no morals, then, there are no true value judgements, and everyone is worth the same (“the little robot woman was just as guilty as the Parisian woman Masson married, or as Marie”). This life-view perhaps allows for Meursault’s emotionally disconnected, “absurd” actions, as every action is the same as any other  – “I had lived my life one way and I could just as well have lived it another. I had done this and I hadn’t done that…and so?...Nothing, nothing mattered.” As he holds no value judgements, Meursault does not need to have any introspective explanation for his actions – again, his physical reaction is disconnected from inner motivation. He can therefore act in socially horrific ways without compromising his "soul" and experiencing the same discomfort with himself that the readers do. 

The court system also experiences discomfort when exposed to Meursault's disconnect – they try to do the same thing we do and analyze Meursault’s actions through the lens of his soul. They are made uncomfortable by the lack of cause-and-effect in the same way that we are, as we define ourselves as mostly radical beings who follow a logical and emotional rhyme and rhythm. The lawyers, magistrates, and jury react in much the same way we did – the prosecutor responds with hatred and revulsion towards Meursault’s supposed soullessness, while his own lawyer tries to find some sort of repressed grief to explain the murder in a way that is socially understandable and acceptable. When he does not, he reverts to affirming Meursault’s sympathetic inner character in a way that seems far-fetched, making untrue leaps and bounds in order to try and make his actions socially acceptable.

          In the end, Meursault is punished not simply because of his crime, but because of his lack of harmony with society, which makes him a danger to the “French people”. The dishonest, caricaturist nature of this scene indicates that we are not meant to judge Meursault the way they do, stuffing him into socially acceptable boxes and connecting his actions with some far-fetched insight into the tormented soul. Meursault himself sees little connection between his soul and the murder - his thought process does not fit the “internal cause” to “external effect” way of reacting, as he feels inner motivation (such as emotion) is unrelated to outer action. As readers, we try to justify Meursault’s actions through internal motivation, but Camus perhaps reveals through this example that we cannot utilize social norms or the idea of emotional cause-and-effect (or really, anything else we analyze characters through) to view Meursault, as he himself demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding of both societal boundaries and inner justification. There is therefore no true rational, socially acceptable explanation that explains his behavior. We are supposed to take Meursault simply as he is, without emotionally charged judgement, without social justification - we are not meant to stuff him into our own socially explainable boxes. Perhaps we are not meant to judge Meursault at all, then, as morals are simply another social construct - we are merely meant to objectively accept him, with all accompanying discomfort. Meursault's impact and strength is in the fact that he defies social boundaries - he is made to make us uncomfortable, and through him we can start reevaluating our own way of operating, which is perhaps closer to what Camus originally intended. 

What do you guys think of this encouraged lack of judgement? Do you still feel inclined to judge Meursault, even though Camus discourages it?