"The procession seemed to me to be moving a little faster. All around me there was still the same glowing countryside flooded with sunlight. The glare from the sky was unbearable." Pg 16
"The sun glinted off Raymond's gun as he handed it to me. But we just stood there motionless, as if everything had closed in around us. We stared at each other without blinking, and everything came to a stop there between the sea, the sand, and he sun, and the double silence of the flute and the water. It was then I realized that you could either shoot or not shoot." Pg 56
At both points in "The Stranger" the environment seemed to be a huge role that impacted Meursault's decisions. In the first quote, Meursault is in the funeral procession and it seems as if the sun is pressuring him to do something. The impression I get is that the sun/environment is society and society is pressuring him to feel something or to cry and he does not give in. In the second quote, where Meursault is with the Arabs, Meursault is impacted only by the environment because he describes everything around him in that moment. It seems to me that again the environment or society is pressuring him to do or not do something. In this case it is to either shoot or not shoot the Arab. Society mandates a following of certain morals to live life and Meursault (in that moment) is choosing between following society's footsteps and being his own person. These points in the book are made by Albert Camus to show Meursault's struggle between submitting society's needs and rising above all of his pain and suffering to be his own person.
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