The earth lay white under the night sky."(Kawabata, 1) This opening phrase of the novel is very revealing: the hero comes from the intimacy of darkness (the tunnel) into the open blankness of the Snow Country. The setting thus translates the sense of innocence but also that of emptiness and loneliness.

Camus' Stranger also hints at solitude and alienation even from the title. Mersault is already a famous literary character, the modern alien in society. The main difference between him and Shimamura is the fact that the latter has a Romantic bent towards fantasy and a narcissism that keeps him locked in his own world. The common trait that they share is their permanent sense of anxiety. Mersault, unlike Shimamura, is literally afraid of the people that surround him. Incapable of empathy, Mersault feels like a complete stranger not only because he cannot connect with the others but because he...
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