The Stranger, Albert Camus | Existentialism in the stranger
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Added on 2020-03-02
The Stranger, Albert Camus | Existentialism in the stranger
Added on 2020-03-02
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Discuss the Existentialism view of John Pa-Paul Sartre and its influence onmodern conceptsExistentialism can be described as the philosophical and literary movement. Thismovement mainly flourished in the two decades after the Second World War.However, this movement was developing during the earlier two decades and in thelater years also, it continued to have its influence. Jean-Paul Satre can be described asthe best known) spokesperson of this movement. The philosophical writings of Jean-Paul Satre, and also a number of novels and plays written by him, played an importantrole in spreading the existentialist thinking. It also contributed in makingexistentialism as thought with which the reading public was somewhat familiar(Dobson, 1993). However, there were some other well-known writers associated withexistentialism. These include Albert Camus, Simone de Beauvoir, Gabriel Marcel,Martin Heidegger, Karl Jaspers, and Miguel de Unamuno.Although generally existentialism is described as a distinct philosophy, it is verydifficult to give a definition of existentialism as an identifiable and unified school ofthought. In fact, there is no single doctrine, regarding which all the thinkers of themovement would actually agree (Flynn, 1997). However, it nevertheless makes senseto talk about this movement, because all the others have to face the basic problem,that is the idea of authentic existence. Therefore, in one way or the other, there is anotion presented existentialism according to which most of the persons are not livingin real life, but they are living a pseudo-life that cannot go to the heart of the genuine
human existence (Heter, 2006). Therefore, most of the persons fail to be trulythemselves as they thoughtlessly accept the patterns and precepts of their nativeculture and they automatically confirm what they are supposed to do. They areexcessively busy with the trivial issues and mundane matters or they'd seek shelterfrom the nihilism and emptiness of the modern life in some religion or cult. Therefore,these authors have claimed that it is not possible to live an authentic life by followingsome kind of a "herd" and by following the preoccupations and collective beliefs butit can be done only by resolutely living as a profoundly personal self - beyond therecognized and accepted loneliness related with individuality that is present in ameaningless and dark world (Martin, 2002). The radical individualism is not a new organs in the history of Western thought.Examples can be given of the principled defiance of the opinions of his countrymenby Socrates or the insistence of Kant, unabridged moral autonomy can be somehowcompared with a similar stance that has been advocated by existentialists. However,existentialist individualism can be distinguished from philosophical predecessors onthe basis of the nature of the world in which the authentic individual asserts it(McBride, 1991). Jean-Paul Satre has always spoken as a philosopher, and he never wanted to be a criticof culture or a historian. His topic remains the nature of the human beings in generaland is not concerned with the particular conditions that are present in differentcultures or times.
However the description given by Sartre of the human condition appears to beespecially plausible if it is read as the analysis of the modern world. What has beenpostulated by Sartre in the form of theoretical freedom of individuals in the senselessuniverse is basically identical with what has been described by the authors ofmodernity regarding the loss of traditions, orientations and roots by the modernindividuals under the conditions that are prevailing in the 20th century civilization(Murphy, (ed), 1999). Since the very beginning of the modern world, there has been aprogressive globalization. Hence, it can be said that modernity was the era, wheremost of the world was conquered by the West. Gradually, most parts of the worldwere subjected by the West to its scientific technological civilization. Due to thereason that generally the high productivity of capitalism, along with revolutionarytechnology and secular science receive support from the ruthless use of arms, more soin case of the populations and regions of the expanding global market, people areforced to become even more aware regarding the diversity of human cultures and theways of life that were present and are still present on the earth (Santoni, 2003). Thereis a particular point from where no educated person can seriously afford to assumethat their morality, religion or the way of organizing community was the only one thatwas true and valid. Having faith in the exclusive truth of a person's own faith or in theconviction of superiority of the individual's way of doing things has becomesynonymous with narrow-mindedness or even benighted arrogance (Stone andBowman,1986).
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