The writer of The Stranger is Albert Camus. His tone, and I do believe the tone of the narrator Mersault, could be argued to be that of acceptance and satisfaction. The Myth of Sisyphus shows Camus believes that regardless of the events in our lives, we have a choice and we must accept our choices with a conscious understanding of our situation.
Sisyphus had as he following the stone down the hill knowing he will roll it back again says we can be happy in the middle of our often absurd lives. Taken from The Myth of Sisyphus by Camus:
"That hour like a breathing-space which returns as surely as his suffering, that is the hour of consciousness. At each of those moments . . . he is superior to his fate. He is stronger than his rock. "
In The Stranger, Mersault almost always accepts everything and everyone around him and over time becomes satisfied, if not happy- with his life and even his seemingly absurd death he is accepting with complete understanding of life, "for the first time, . . . I opened myself to the gentle indifference of the world. Finding it so much like myself-- so like a brother, really-- I felt that I had been happy and that I was happy again" (123).
I'm uplifted by both Camus and Mersault's tone. It's not what one would call entusiastic, yet it has taken a positive attitude toward the pessimistic idea that life is meaningless and society is simply trying to make meaning for us.
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