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Article: Meursault's dinner with Raymond: a Christian theme in Albert Camus's L'Etranger.(Critical essay)
- Article from:
- Christianity and Literature
- Article date:
- January 1, 2009
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2009 Conference on Christianity and Literature. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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As most readers of Albert Camus's masterpiece, L'Etranger [The Stranger] are aware, Camus conceived his protagonist Meursault as a type of Christ figure. In his famous introduction to the 1955 American University edition, he wrote, "[this is] the story of a man who, without any heroics, agrees to die for the truth ... I had tried to draw in my character the only Christ we deserve." Noting the irony in equating Jesus and Meursault, he reiterated, "I have sometimes said, and always paradoxically, that I have tried to portray in this character [Meursault] the only Christ we deserved. ... I said this without any intention of blasphemy and only with the slightly ironic ...