masterwordsmith-unplugged

Reading a book/watching a movie more than once is a worthwhile experience because each encounter may reveal certain aspects/perspectives which we might have missed in previous readings. I first read Albert Camus' book - The Stranger - in 1976, 1983, 1997 and read it for the fourth time this morning. Honestly, I am totally stunned at how Mersault's trial is quite similar to the TBH inquest.

FYI,  Wikipedia says:

Albert Camus ( 7 November 1913 – 4 January 1960) was a French Algerian author, philosopher and journalist. He was a key philosopher of the 20th-century, his most famous work being the novel The Stranger (L'Étranger). In 1949, Camus founded the Group for International Liaisons within the Revolutionary Union Movement, which was opposed to some tendencies of the Surrealist movement of André Breton.

Camus was awarded the 1957 Nobel Prize for Literature "for his important literary production, which with clear-sighted earnestness illuminates the problems of the human conscience in our times". He was the second-youngest recipient of the Nobel Prize in Literature, after Rudyard Kipling, and the first African-born writer to receive the award.[3] He is the shortest-lived of any Nobel literature laureate to date, having died in an automobile accident just over two years after receiving the award. CLICK HERE for more.

Here are some details about the book (taken from THIS LINK) before I discuss the similarities:

The Stranger or The Outsider (L’Étranger) is a novel by Albert Camus, published in 1942, and is Camus's best-known work. Its theme and outlook are often cited as examples of existentialism, though Camus did not consider himself an existentialist; in fact, its content explores various philosophical schools of thought, including (most prominently and specifically) absurdism, as well as determinism, nihilism, naturalism, and stoicism.


The title character is Meursault, an Algerian ("a citizen of France domiciled in North Africa, a man of the Mediterranean, an homme du midi yet one who hardly partakes of the traditional Mediterranean culture"[2]) who seemingly irrationally kills an Arab man whom he recognises in French Algiers. The story is divided into two parts: Meursault's first-person narrative view before and after the murder, respectively. CLICK HERE for more.

Now if you consider Part 2, Chapter 4 of The Stranger, you can see some startling similarities. If you have not read the book and wish to get a free version, kindly click on THIS LINK or you might prefer THIS LINK.

The main difference is that unlike TBH, Mersault is alive and present during the trial. Another difference is that Mersault is being tried for murdering an Arab whereas in the TBH inquest, the authorities are trying to discover the cause of his death and more.

Throughout this part of the book, we can see how the prosecutor cites Meursault’s obvious intelligence and lack of remorse as evidence of premeditated murder. The prosecutor highlights Meursault’s lack of grief over his mother’s death and paints a negative picture of Mersault. The prosecutor then argues that Mersault is just as guilty as the man who killed his own father and deserves the death penalty.

In his defense, Meursault denies he returned to the beach with the intention of killing the Arab and stated that he killed the Arab “because of the sun.” Different witnesses take the stand and each of them makes up his/her own version of Mersault's reality to the extent that at the end, Meursault is found guilty of premeditated murder and sentenced to death by guillotine.

A deeper analysis of this section of the book can show how Camus has written the narratives to show us how people think truth exists in the world and that it will always prevail in a judicial system which is deemed as fair and just in spite of its weaknesses. While many think they live in a world governed by reason and order, through his writings in this section, Camus shows this to be merely an absurd illusion.

How painfully true!!

Here's an interesting similarity which completely stumped me when I read it this morning. Throughout the book/trial, Mersault cannot give any reasonable of logical explanation for the murder of the Arab so the authorities move into overdrive to give an explanation of their own - all of which are created on faulty and wrong assumptions.

Deliberately, the witnesses join the dots and enforce a seemingly rational sequence on disconnected events - created, distorted and some real - to make Meursault appear to be a worse character than he is.

Does this ring a bell??

Interestingly, Camus' narrative in this section of the book shows how the trial and judgment processes are completely hopeless, false, and irrational. Society demands rational interpretations on the facts and events of Meursault’s life, regardless of the possibilities/implications. What happens is that Meursault’s lawyer and the prosecutor both offer false explanations, leaving the jury with a choice between two lies.

Does this sound familiar?

The prosecutor imaginatively creates a meaningful, rational connection between Meursault’s trial and the upcoming parricide trial, even though no actual link exists between the two cases. Craftily, the prosecutor weaves implications and meaning in his questioning to influence the jury's thought and rational processes leading them to agree with him that Meursault deserves a death sentence.

In the story, Meursault realizes in the trial that his life has been meaningless and remains vulnerable to the attacks from others who deceitfully define meanings for him.

Prior to that development, Meursault had been drifting from one point of his life to another without realizing what had happened. He never really thinks about his past, present, and future and only thinks about his life during the trial where he watches as if everything were happening to someone else.

TBH cannot confirm what is being said about him or make any objections to allegations because he is no longer with us. Dead man tell not tales. Sad, isn't it?

As the story progresses, Meursault comes to the realization that the prosecutor has successfully fictionalized  an interpretation of Meursault’s life so skilfully that in the jury’s eyes, he is guilty.Worse still is the manner in which Meursault’s own lawyer delivers this account in the first person, thereby weakening Mersault's defense.

Ultimately, Meursault is forced to take a good look as his own life  because the witnesses are constructing HIS LIFE.

Sounds familiar?

In the trial, Mersault listens to positive, negative, and neutral interpretations of his life/character and realizes  that his life is now OUT OF HIS CONTROL because the others have created their own images of who he is so that they can achieve their own agenda.

Sounds familiar?

In this part of the book, every single witness gives their interpretation of the same man, Meursault, but each of them give their personal account based on their own creation of whom they feel is the REAL Mersault. Tragically, Mersault has nothing to do with such baseless assumptions and cannot defend himself as it is the the rest of the world against HIM!

Startling, isn't it?

While many of us have been voicing our objections to many issues with regards to the TBH case/inquest/RCI, the fact remains that some of us (including myself) might have forgotten how TBH could be feeling in the spiritual realm, where he is watching the goings-on from a distance! (I know - this is a bit far-fetched but nonetheless, a bit of imagination in this area can help us to empathize with the case.)

A good portrayal of how the dead may feel when they view their lives from the spiritual realm is in Alice Sebold's book THE LOVELY BONES in the section where Susie Salmon (in spirit form) sees how her father smashes their ships in a bottle from frustration as he cannot get over her death.

We will never know the pain, indignation and tragedy that Teoh Beng Hock experienced. We can never fully understand the grief and the loss that his loved ones, family and friends have suffered from this tragedy.

BUT we have seen how, step by step, some horrible revelations (READ THIS POST)have been made public.

In 'The Stranger', Mersault dies. In the TBH case, his life came to an unexpected and tragic end. May there be justice for this young man and truth be revealed.

May God convict witnesses and all involved in the inquest/RCI to reveal/state nothing but the truth and the guilty ones be revealed, convicted and sentenced.