Killing An Arab

This song is about someone who has killed an Arab on a beach and is thinking about it in retrospect, observing the body.

This was inspired by Albert Camus' book The Stranger (also known as The Outsider). It is not a racist song, but still caused a lot of controversy because many people assumed so because of the title. The book deals with existentialism, and the title "Killing An Arab" was taken from a passage where the main character thinks about the emptiness of life after killing a man on a beach for reasons he can't explain. Camus published The Stranger in 1942. In 1957, he won the Nobel Prize for literature. He died in 1960 at age 46.

The Cure grew up in the rough-hewn town of Crawley, England, where their brooding lyrics and gothic look (make-up!) wasn't always welcome. This song came at a time when the National Front, a group whose rallying cry was "Keep England White," was on the rise. At some shows, disaffected youth associated with the group (often skinheads) showed up at Cure shows to sing along with a misinterpreted "Killing An Arab," only to learn that the group was about the introspective and sensitive side of punk rock ("Boys Don't Cry" was especially horrifying). The Cure took plenty of verbal abuse ("Poofs!"), but there were no major incidents of violence associated with the song, and during one show at The Nashville Room in London, The Cure won them over. "Soon all the skinheads were dancing to 'Boys Don't Cry,'" drummer Lol Tolhurst wrote in his 2016 memoir, Cured. "Robert looked around at me and grinned broadly."