Decolonizing The Camusian Absurd

A Bakhtinian Reading of Kamel Daoud's The Meursault Investigation

Abstract

This paper studies the retelling of Albert Camus’ The Outsider written by the Algerian writer-journalist Kamel Daoud, entitled The Meursault Investigation. Daoud’s novel is analyzed in the light of three important Bakhtinian notions - Dialogism, Chronotope, and Heteroglossia. We see that through his novel, Daoud has not only counter narrativized the original story but also has broadened the scope of the philosophy of absurdism. While expatiating on Absurdism during the first half of the 2oth century, Camus’ readership was limited to the European world or only those who had access to it. The exclusion of Arabs from his writings while writing from Algeria, as an Algerian and the use of French language indeed mark the boundaries of his work. The literary adaptation by Kamel Daoud tries to fill the cavity in Camus’ work. On the other hand, the adaptation is taken to be a counter narrative to the original narrative. The study of such counter narratives has become ever so important in a society ridden by a binary logic and dialecticism. Daoud’s retelling shows the way to understand and represent histories in a non-binary and an inclusive manner. He has not discarded Camus and his discourse entirely in order to give the Arab a voice in the original narrative. This further opens a multitude of questions and outlooks on further research on the role of counter narratives in dismantling the existing social order.