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The Stranger: Line Analysis

 “He hasn't said anything yet. It'd be pretty lousy to shoot him like that." 

This is said by Meursault to Raymond talking about the Arab. For Meursault to realize this and say it to Raymond but then go and shoot the Arab not much later says a lot about Meursault. Meursault shoots the Arab for seemingly no good reason. The Arab didn’t say anything, Meursault was just annoyed by the heat and the light reflecting off the Arab’s knife. To shoot him for this shows that Meursault might not value the consequences of his actions and doesn’t recognize the magnitude of what he had just done, at first. But, this quote shows that he does recognize the power of shooting someone. Maybe that’s because he wasn’t hot and annoyed at that point, so whenever something inconveniences Meursault he doesn’t hold the same values. Meursault seems to be a character who doesn’t care about much or have opinions about anything, but he did have an opinion about shooting him before saying anything. However, the inconvenience and annoyance of having to survive through the heat and the sun take away Meursault’s values and he does whatever he feels. This shows that Meursault acts based on his feelings during the specific instance and is easily influenced by his surroundings. This also leads into the next chapters when he is saying that his case is very simple. He thinks he killed a man and that's the end of it. From Meursault's point of view the killing just happened and there wasn't much thought behind it. I think the kill might be similar to the story that was expressed in the book. The man was killed by his mother and sister and they eventually committed suicide. What was the moral of that story? Well, nothing really. The absurdity of that event and Meursault's matter-of-fact attitude towards the killing could be just an instance of his view on the world. Things happen and that's about it.

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