12 AP 1st Semester Reflection- The Stranger 

The first semester of 12 AP English was one I have to say I enjoyed. The readings were intellectually stimulating and the discussions were engaging. However, one novel I really did not enjoy when I initially read it during this semester was Albert Camus’s The Stranger. I disliked it so much, in fact, that I wrote a highly critical blog post about it. After reading it, however, it lingered in my mind, and over time my feelings towards it have changed. It is now one of my favorite selections that I have read thus far.

What originally turned me off from the novel was its absurdity. It’s main focus IS absurdism and all of its elements follow suit. The writing style and narrative structure originally made me want to claw my eyes out from boredom, and the ending really made me question all the hours I had spent reading the book, as I had thought they would have been better off spent staring at my popcorn ceiling at that point. As time went on however, I truly realized why the book was magnificent in its own way because of the fact that it truly was an outsider, as the name suggests. I realized that I had fallen victim to the exact response to absurdity Camus was illustrating in the novel. It broke the definitions and restrictions I had set on how I defined ‘literature’- conditions that are simply constructions of my own and are by no means objective. As a response to this, I shunned the book because I really did not know HOW to respond. I perfectly emulated the response society had to Meursault in the novel after he had killed the man without providing reason. In realizing this, I grew to love the book. It was so meta that it got me, so I had to give credit where credit was due. On a serious note, this change redefined my outlook on literature. I realized that having boundaries set on what I consider literature ultimately closes me off to boundary-pushing ideas and higher-level thinking. In opening myself up to ideas that challenge my own beliefs, I have gained the potential to grow as a person far beyond anything I had before.


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