No Exit (Huis Clos) by Jean-Paul Sartre Name: Nico Rodriguez

Biography: Birth and death dates, family, prizes won, other works of note, publishing/performance data, one interesting fact, picture.Jun. 21, 1905 Paris, France – April 15, 1980, Paris, France. Jean-Paul Sartre was born in Paris as the only child of Jean-Baptiste Sartre, an officer of the French Navy, and Anne-Marie Schweitzer.[4] His mother was of Alsatian origin and the first cousin of Nobel Prize laureate Albert Schweitzer. (Her father, Charles Schweitzer, was the older brother of Albert Schweitzer's father, Louis Théophile.)[5] When Sartre was two years old, his father died of a fever. Anne-Marie moved back to her parents' house in Meudon, where she raised Sartre with help from her father, a teacher of German who taught Sartre mathematics and introduced him to classical literature at a very early age.[6] When he was twelve, Sartre's mother remarried, and the family moved to La Rochelle, where he was formally bullied.Went to Cuba in 1960, to visit Fidel Castro. Was arrested in the 60’s for civil disobedience, he was pardoned with the quote: “You don’t arrest Voltaire.” He served as a meteorologist for the French Military. He was in an open relationship with Simone de Beauvoir, a famous feminist author. He won The Nobel Peace Prize, and declined in 1964, saying, “an author shouldn’t be contained to an institution.” He was a supporter of Marxism, but not communism. | Existentialism 1. Working definition of existentialism (look it up): a philosophical theory or approach that emphasizes the existence of the individual person as a free and responsible agent determining their own development through acts of the will.Sartrean version: key phrases, words, concepts: Individual, freedom, responsibility, acts of will“We live in an unfathomable universe.”Choose an action, be responsible for that action. “The loss of God is not mourned.” “Existence precedes essence.”Inauthentic is one who allows himself/herself | Sartrean HellExpectations of inmates— Tortured with red-hot pokers, pincers, hellfire, brimstone, but there is nothing of the sort. Details of chamber— 2nd empire furniture, bronze contraption on the mantle, no mirrors, no windows, 3 sofas, lights are always on, letter opener, very hot.Punishment (what is it?)—Similarities to other versions of hell—Differences to other versions of hell— | Character | Reason for being there | Sartrean Punishment | Traits/Archetypes/Physical Description | Quote | Garcin | Cruel to his wife, detestably cruel. He’ll bring girls back to the house, and make his wife make them breakfast the next morning. | | Cover: Pacifist.Actual: Coward | | Inez | Seduced her cousin’s wife, as a result, her cousin threw himself in front of a train. Florence, the wife, is so distraught, she turns the gas stove on and kills herself, and Inez. | | Presentation: Brutally honest, blows their cover. | | Estelle | | | Game: Wants to be loved, and coveted by a man. Vain.Actual: Pretty corrupt, selfish, vain, cruel. | | Valet | Orientation counselor, humour, guides them through their punishment. | | | “Can’t you use your brains?” |
Who is speaking in each of these quotes?
What principle of existentialism is represented?

1. “But don’t forget, my man, I’ve a good notion of what’s coming to me, so don’t you boast you’ve caught me off my guard. I’m facing the situation, I’m facing it.”

2. “So it comes to this; one doesn’t need rest. Why bother with sleep if one isn’t sleepy?…Ah, I see; it’s life without a break.” 3. “I’m to live without eyelids?…So one has to live with one’s eyes open all the time?…With one’s eyes open. Forever.” 4. “Ah, that’s the way it works, is it? Torture by separation.” 5. “And by the way, how does one recognize torturers when one sees them? Evidently you’ve got ideas on the subject.” 6. “Anyhow, I can assure you I’m not frightened. Not that I take my position lightly; I realize its gravity only too well. But I’m not afraid.” 7. “I’d rather be alone. I want to think things out, you know; to set my life in order, and one does that better by oneself.” 8. “Remember you’re not alone; you’ve no right to inflict the sight of your pain on me.” 9. “No. Don’t look up. I know what you’re hiding with your hands. I know you’ve no face left.” 10. “I don’t care much for men any way.” 11. “I never could bear the idea of anyone’s expecting something from me. It always made me want to do just the opposite.” 12. “I haven’t a notion, not the foggiest. In fact, I’m wondering if there hasn’t been some ghastly mistake.” 13. “I ran a pacifist newspaper. Then war broke out. What was I to do? Everyone was watching me, wondering: ‘Will he dare?’ Well, I dared. I folded my arms and they shot me. Had I done anything wrong?” 14. “What’s the point of playacting, trying to throw dust in each other’s eyes? We’re all tarred with the same brush.” 15. “A damned soul—that’s you my little plaster saint. And ditto our friend there, the noble pacifist. We’ve had our hour of pleasure, haven’t we? There have been people who burned their lives out for our sakes—and we chuckled over it. So now we have to pay the reckoning.” 16. “I mean that each of us will act as torturer of the two others.”

17. “When I can’t see myself I begin to wonder if I really and truly exist.”

18. “We’re between ourselves. And presently we will be naked as—as newborn babes.”

19. “I’m here because I treated my wife abominably.”

20. “When I say I’m cruel, I mean I can’t get on without making people suffer.” (“Moi, je suis mechante: ca veut dire que j’ai besoin de la souffrance des autres pour exister.”) Sadism, Inez

21. “If there’s someone, just one person, to say quite positively I did not run away, that I’m not the sort who runs away, that I’m brave and decent and the rest of it—well, that one person’s faith would save me.” 22. “I’ll endure anything, your red-hot tongs and molten lead, your racks and prongs and garottes—all your fiendish gadgets, everything that burns and flays and tears—I’ll put up with any torture you impose. Anything, anything would be better than this agony of mind, this creeping pain that gnaws and fumbles and caresses one and never hurts quite enough.” 23. “And can one judge a life by a single action?”

24. “A man is what he wills himself to be….I died too soon. I wasn’t allowed time to—to do my deeds.”

25. One always dies too soon or too late. And yet one’s whole life is complete at that moment with a line drawn neatly underneath it, ready for the summing up. You are—your life, and nothing else.” (“Tu n’es rien d’autre que ta vie.”)

26. “…there’s no need for red-hot pokers. Hell is—other people!” (“L’infer—c’est les autres!”)

27. Well, well, let’s get on with it…” (“Eh, bien, nous continuons.)