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Catherine Hand

Mrs. Morris

AP Literature Block G

13 March 2017

The Mask of Indifference

Some people believe that the best way to deal with ones emotions is to simply hide them

or believe that emotions have no true significance as life is meaningless. In The Stranger by

Albert Camus and The Wall by Jean-Paul Sartre, the main characters of each piece experience

struggles that would have elicited strong emotional reactions from normal people. However,

since both of these writings are usually seen as existentialist books, Meursault, from The

Stranger, and Pablo, from The Wall, both seem to put on a mask of indifference and act as if

their experiences are not affecting them in any way. Although the plots are much different from

one another, these two works have similar themes. Meursault and Pablo both do not fit in the

mold that society has created for its people. They are different from society because they are both

able to understand that life has no meaning because it all ends in death. Although what Meursault

and Pablo experienced is not exactly the same, what they experienced had a similar impact on

the characters themselves. Although they reacted differently to their sentences, these characters

were both able to see that life is truly meaningless because both waited in prison before their

planned execution, they were both able to accept death, and they realized that their existence is

insignificant because death is inevitable.

When Meursault and Pablo are put in prison, they are both placed in cells with other

people, showing how society would initially seem to tolerate their existence. However,

Meursault is removed from his cell and placed in his individual jail room, representing how
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society isolates him and treats him as an outcast. While Meursault is in the solitary jail cell, he is

calm and bored and waited in the jail cell for almost a year from the time that he killed the Arab.

This long waiting period shows how lengthy the process of admitting to oneself that life truly has

no meaning is. His inability to accept his fate stems from his hope. Hope prevents him from fully

accepting his situation because each day that he lives, he feels that the possibility of living

another couple decades would prevent him from living his final days to the fullest. Hope that

makes him want the guillotine to kill him on its first fall so that he does not have to endure

multiple attempts of execution. Because he was all alone in the jail cell, it shows societys

unwillingness to accept him. Since Meursault is unwanted by society, he was sentenced to death

for who he was rather than his crime, further emphasizing the fact that society does not want to

welcome him. When Pablo was put in prison, he had two cell mates. One is overwhelmed with

sadness and self-pity, while the other one tries his best to look at his death from an intellectual

point of view. These two cell mates represent Pablos inner struggle of either choosing to give

into despair, or trying to overcome the feeling of desolation and accept his situation. Hope is

what Meursault had to deal with while Pablo had to struggle to fully accept his circumstances,

but both would always have a desire to be freed. The understanding of the meaninglessness of

life was expressed through the time and false hope it took for the characters to accept this fact,

but it is also shown through the characters death sentences.

When they were sentenced to death, both of these characters were able to accept the fact

that their lives were going to end and because of that realization, they were able to see that life is

truly meaningless. Pablos sentence was getting shot to death, while Meursault was sentenced to

death via guillotine. Meursault was seemingly undisturbed, while Pablo had a harder time putting

up a barrier between his emotions and his rational mind. Although his mind was able to
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understand and accept his circumstances, Pablos bodily reaction to his execution shows fear, as

he finds himself drenched in sweat. This shows how much power ones emotions have on his

body, representing how some things cannot be controlled, especially the mind. The physical

effects also represent the fight between the emotional and rational parts of the brain, and how

underestimated the strength of the emotional side is. Meursault, however, did not show any

physical signs of being affected by the news of his execution. Both characters use this time in

prison to think about how death radically changes the characters perspectives on their own lives.

Pablo first thinks of what he will miss out on life, but ultimately decided that he had spent [his]

my time counterfeiting eternity, I had understood nothing. I missed nothing(Sartre 8). He

realizes that his life was just a damned lie, and that everything he does will ultimately lead to

death (Sartre 8). Pablo realizes that his jailors will also die, just later than himself. He realizes

that to live is to constantly have a death sentence hanging above ones head. When death is closer

than one expects, there is suddenly a strong awareness of life. Meursault, on the other hand, was

able to overcome his despair and fear of death after speaking with the chaplain because this

conversation allowed him to realize that death is inevitable, showing him that life is meaningless.

Meursaults enlightened views distances himself further from society, and his eagerness of going

through his own execution just to see the peoples reactions show that he is content with being an

outsider. Both characters were able to accept death, showing their acceptance of life having no

true meaning, as everyone has the same ending. Death, just like the wall in The Wall, puts a

barrier between the living and the dead, and everyone dies alone since the dying are the only

ones that can experience what is happening to them.

Before his execution, Meursault compares himself to the world. He decides that, similarly

to him, the world does not judge or control the lives of the humans that inhabit it. This shows
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that he realizes that death is an intangible thing that he cannot control, and that life has no real

meaning to it, allowing him to fully accept his situation. From this fact, he does not grow in

despair. Rather, he finds freedom and peace. Since he knows that he cannot control everything,

he is able to live a more simple life because he no longer has false hope of living longer or

fallacies of structure and meaning to life, as it does not matter. As Pablo and his cell mate, Tom,

imagine their deaths as brutally as they can, Pablo realizes his desire to live without illusions. He

shows that his expectation of death, imagining the bullets ripping holes through his body and

sinking into his flesh and imagining that it could take multiple rounds if the first volley reaches

no vital organs, has formed him into an indifferent person, showing that he has fully accepted

the fact that there is no meaning or order to life (Sartre 5). Both of the characters have overcome

the barrier, which can be represented by the wall, which prevents us from achieving a perfect

understanding of life and death.

Both Meursault and Pablo were able to understand why their lives are meaningless, giving

them the upper hand when being compared to societys views. Since they are different, they were

shunned. Though the plot of these writings was similar, it also had many differences, showing

the effect of existentialism and understanding the absurd on the two characters by showing the

pointlessness of life through the characters experiences. All in all, these characters were able to

see the meaninglessness of life expressed in many different ways, including the realization that

everything leads of death, and that life is not controlled and therefore does not have true order or

meaning.
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Works Cited

Camus, Albert. The Stranger. N.p.: Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., 1988. Print.

Sartre, Jean-Paul. The Wall. N.p.:n.d. Web.