The Stranger and Seinfeld

Camus's The Stranger and Seinfeld do not share many similarities. One is television program from the early 1990s and one is a prominent liters work from the 1940s. Seinfeld is a comedy about a group of friends in New York City, while The Stranger is about a man living in French Africa. These works were not intended to be similar, nor would I say that Sienfeld was at all influenced by The Stranger. However, by benefit of human nature, some of the actions in these stories share some similarities. While, on their faces, these stories do not seem inherently similar, they both deal with some of the same ideas.

The first similarity is one of the philosophy of absurdism. Absurdism is the belief that it is impossible to find meaning in life; it’s best just to roll with life’s punches. In the Seinfeld episode “The Alternate Side,” Seinfeld calls his car phone after his car is stolen. He proceeds to have a contemptuous, but civil, conversation with the thief. Seinfeld recognizes that, like how there is use in getting worked up about a meaningless life, there is no use in becoming angry with the thief. In both cases, the observer has no control over their future, and it is therefore illogical to be angry. In The Stranger, Meursault goes through life in much the same way. Meursault isn’t even distressed about the death of his mother, narrating: “It occurred to  me that anyway one more Sunday was over, that Maman was buried now, that I was going back to work and that, really, nothing had changed.” (Camus 54) Now, there is a clear difference between losing a mother and a car, but the characters’ reactions are the same. These absurdist beliefs come into play in both of these stories because they are so common in human nature. Absurdism is just a fact of life.

The second similarity is between the way the characters George and Raymond deal with the issues presented to them in their respective stories. Both characters are presented with stressful situations. George gets in over his head parking cars, while Raymond gets in over his head with some Arab mobsters, of this, Meursault writes: "He's been followed all day by a group of Arabs, one of whom had been the brother of his former mistress." Both characters rely on their friends, Kramer and Jerry in George’s case, and Meursault in Raymond’s. However, all the friends wind up losing, Kramer loses a role in a Woody Allen movie, Jerry’s rental car is in an accident, and Meursault winds up shooting one of the Arabs. In both cases, the characters would have been better off not helping their friends. I feel like a lot of people have had similar experiences, yet people still help their friends. Seinfeld and The Stranger both play at the way we help our friends, often at our own expense.