"The Outsider" is written in the first-person narrative style and details the miserable and apparently lonely life of an individual who appears to have never had contact with another individual. The story begins with this narrator explaining his origins. His memory of others is vague, and he cannot seem to recall any details of his personal history, including who he is or where he is from. The narrator tells of his environment: a dark, decaying castle amid an "endless forest" of high, lightless trees. He has never seen natural light, nor another human being, and he has never ventured from the prison-like home he inhabits. The only knowledge the narrator has of the outside world is from his reading of the "antique books" that line the walls of his castle.