The Stranger/Recap

The narrator is one M. Meursault (we never get his first name), a man who lives in French-colonized Algeria sometime between the two World Wars. The book opens with the news of his mother's death. He visits her nursing home, muses on the life she led there, then attends her funeral, most of which he finds quite boring. He goes on about his daily life: working in a nondescript office, spending time with his girlfriend, observing his neighbors. One of those neighbors, Raymond, enlists Meursault's help in getting revenge on his girlfriend, an Arab woman, who he thinks was cheating on him. Later on, Meursault and Raymond encounter the brother of Raymond's ex. Meursault, somewhat drunk and dazzled by the sunlight, ends up shooting the man with Raymond's revolver, for no particular reason. Thus ends Part One.

Part Two details Meursault's time in prison, and gets much more abstract. The judge who talks to Meursault doesn't seem to care much about the murder of the Arab, but takes offense at Meursault's atheism. Meursault sits in his cell, wishes he had cigarettes, and ponders the meaninglessness of life. The prosecution at his trial uses his lack of grief at his mother's death as evidence against him; he doesn't deny anything. A priest visits Meursault and is, like the judge, appalled at his atheism; Meursault ends up assaulting him. The book ends with Meursault about to be executed, hoping people will watch.