Society may be demanding living up to its expectations; living up to the strains of society, pleasing others, and living a life which is said or much rather considered just according to social order. The portrayal of society varies in the Hesse's Siddhartha and Camus's Outsider, especially being set in two different locations in two different time periods as well as two different localities. Siddhartha is set around 400 BC in India whereas The Outsider is set during the colonial rule in Algeria. By comparing the portrayal of society in the lives of the protagonist Siddhartha in Siddhartha and Mersault in The Outsider to an existentialists point view, we are able to emphasize on the existence of the individual as a free and self determining agent.

An existentialist would say that "meaning is made, not found." In the Brahmin society in which Siddhartha is living in, the main ideal...