Jean-Paul Sartre - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Overview

Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre (icon; saʁtʁ; 21 June 1905 – 15 April 1980) was a French existentialist

Existentialism

Existentialism is a term applied to a school of 19th- and 20th-century philosophers who, despite profound doctrinal differences, shared the belief that philosophical thinking begins with the human subject—not merely the thinking subject, but the acting, feeling, living human individual...

philosopher, playwright, novelist, screenwriter, political activist, biographer, and literary critic

Literary criticism

Literary criticism is the study, evaluation, and interpretation of literature. Modern literary criticism is often informed by literary theory, which is the philosophical discussion of its methods and goals...

. He was one of the leading figures in 20th century French philosophy

Twentieth-century French philosophy

20th-century French philosophy is a strand of contemporary philosophy generally associated with post-World War II French thinkers, although it is directly influenced by previous philosophical movements.-Bergson:...

, particularly Marxism, and was one of the key figures in literary and philosophical existentialism

Existentialism

Existentialism is a term applied to a school of 19th- and 20th-century philosophers who, despite profound doctrinal differences, shared the belief that philosophical thinking begins with the human subject—not merely the thinking subject, but the acting, feeling, living human individual...

. His work continues to influence fields such as Marxist philosophy

Marxist philosophy

Marxist philosophy or Marxist theory are terms that cover work in philosophy that is strongly influenced by Karl Marx's materialist approach to theory or that is written by Marxists...

, sociology

Sociology

Sociology is the study of society. It is a social science—a term with which it is sometimes synonymous—which uses various methods of empirical investigation and critical analysis to develop a body of knowledge about human social activity...

, critical theory

Critical theory

Critical theory is an examination and critique of society and culture, drawing from knowledge across the social sciences and humanities. The term has two different meanings with different origins and histories: one originating in sociology and the other in literary criticism...

and literary studies. Sartre was also noted for his long non-monogamous relationship with the feminist author and social theorist Simone de Beauvoir

Simone de Beauvoir

Simone-Ernestine-Lucie-Marie Bertrand de Beauvoir, often shortened to Simone de Beauvoir , was a French existentialist philosopher, public intellectual, and social theorist. She wrote novels, essays, biographies, an autobiography in several volumes, and monographs on philosophy, politics, and...

.

Discussions

How we can be being in itself ? being for itself ? and being for others ?

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Quotations

He was free, free in every way, free to behave like a fool or a machine, free to accept, free to refuse, free to equivocate; to marry, to give up the game, to drag this death weight about with him for years to come. He could do what he liked, no one had the right to advise him, there would be for him no Good or Evil unless he thought them into being.

L'âge de raison (The Age of Reason (Sartre)|The Age Of Reason) (1945)

What then did you expect when you unbound the gag that muted those black mouths? That they would chant your praises? Did you think that when those heads that our fathers had forcibly bowed down to the ground were raised again, you would find adoration in their eyes?

"Orphée Noir (Black Orpheus)" preface, Anthologie de la Nouvelle Poésie Nègre et Malgache (1948)

Every age has its own poetry; in every age the circumstances of history choose a nation, a race, a class to take up the torch by creating situations that can be expressed or transcended only through poetry.

"Orphée Noir (Black Orpheus)"

Fascism is not defined by the number of its victims, but by the way it kills them.

"On the Execution of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg," Libération (June 22, 1953)

Our responsibility is much greater than we might have supposed, because it involves all mankind.

Existentialism and Human Emotions|Existentialism and Human Emotions (1957)

To choose this or that is to affirm at the same time the value of what we choose, because we can never choose evil. We always choose the good, and nothing can be good for us without being good for all.

Existentialism and Human Emotions|Existentialism and Human Emotions

If literature isn’t everything, it’s not worth a single hour of someone’s trouble.

Interview (1960), Quoted in Susan Sontag|Susan Sontag's introduction to Barthes: Selected Writings, “Writing Itself: On Roland Barthes,” (1982)

A writer who takes political, social or literary positions must act only with the means that are his. These means are the written words.

Refusing the Nobel Prize|Nobel Prize, New York Times (October 22, 1964)

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