Alienation in A Soldier's Home and The Guest

¶ … alienation in "Soldier's Home" and "The Guest"

Ernest Hemingway's "Soldier's Home" and Albert Camus's "The Guest" both address the theme of wartime alienation. Although the two stories were written over thirty years apart, they each involve protagonists who have been negatively affected by the war. In this paper, "alienation" is defined as a condition where a person's state of mind is separated from their surroundings, and in which they are unable to accept the philosophy that others attempt to enforce. This paper explores how Hemingway and Camus emphasize the theme of alienation as it relates to setting, philosophy, and the narration and language of the story itself.

Both "Soldier's Home" and "The Guest" involve protagonists who are placed in settings in which they either do not want to exist or for which they simply show no enthusiasm. In Hemingway's story, the hero, Krebs, lives at his childhood home because he has returned from the war and he has no other place in which to live. He has no meaningful relationships in his childhood home with regard to employment, and he spends most of his days either at home, at the pool hall, or watching his sister play softball. These activities are all typical of a teenager, and one of the main ways that alienation surfaces in "A Soldier's Home" is that Krebs's behavior is that of a teenager yet his mindset is that of someone in his twenties. For example, he spends his days watching the local girls, but unlike someone in high school, he has no actual desire to take them on a date. There is, therefore, an incompatibility between Krebs's mental outlook and his setting.

The main character of "The Guest," Daru, also has an inability to embrace his setting. He exists in isolation, having been exiled during the Algerian War. The setting is also quite dangerous, as the snowfall is extreme. Daru has no love for the area, and he simply does what he needs to do to survive, such as taking care of his chickens. His lack of passions indicates that he is alienated, since he is clearly not in the setting of his choice.

Both Krebs and Daru are also alienated because they are unable to adopt the philosophy of the cultures in which they exist. Krebs comes from a religious household and a country that promotes ambition from men, yet he cannot accept God's existence, nor can he work up the enthusiasm to seek a job and make money. Similarly, Daru is forced to turn in an Arab prisoner-of-war, yet he does not have the heart to force the Arab to do anything. Instead, he lets the Arab decide whether to turn himself in or to hide with rebels. The actions of Krebs and Daru are unusual because in most stories, the characters are ambitious and try to change their surroundings if they are unhappy within them. However, Krebs and Daru show no motivation for escaping their environments, and their lack of motivation reflects their alienation.