´My mother died today. Or maybe yesterday, I don´t know.´
Sandra Smith´s new translation, based on close listening to a recording of Camus reading his work aloud on French radio in 1954, sensitively renders the subtleties and dream-like atmosphere of L´Étranger.
In The Outsider (1942), his classic existentialist novel, Camus explores the alienation of an individual who refuses to conform to social norms. Meursault, his anti-hero, will not lie. When his mother dies, he refuses to show his emotions simply to satisfy the expectations of others. And when he commits a random act of violence on a sun-drenched beach near Algiers, his lack of remorse compounds his guilt in the eyes of society and the law. Yet he is as much a victim as a criminal.
Albert Camus´ portrayal of a man confronting the absurd, and revolting against the injustice of society, depicts the paradox of man´s joy in life when faced with the ´tender indifference´ of the world.