Through the Lens of Heidegger's Philosophy: An Analysis of Camus's Meursault in terms of Heideggerian Thrownness, Fallenness, Anxiety and Authenticity

The purpose of this study is to look at Albert Camus’s (in)famous character Meursault through the lens of Heideggerian philosophy, with a special emphasis on his concepts such as “thrownness”, “anxiety”, “fallenness”, and “authenticity”. Through a close textual analysis of Camus’s The Outsider (also known as The Stranger), the study addresses a significant gap in the existing scholarship —especially within the Heideggerian readings of the text —that reads Meursault as either an apathetic person or an “authentic” Dasein. The present study departs from such interpretations by arguing that Meursault neither remains “inauthentic” nor completely succeeds in becoming “authentic”, but gets suspended in his ontological liminality. His journey from “inauthenticity” to “authenticity” remains incomplete, maintaining an unresolved state of in-betweenness.