Sartre Essay Research Paper Jean Paul Sartre

Sartre Essay, Research Paper

.Jean Paul Sartre has been described as one of the most controversial of modern French playwrights, and his work is also known extensively outside France..

Examine the aims of the writer through close exploration of two of his plays.

2nd year/2nd term (31.3.2000) . B.A. Hons. Acting Studies Essay by Ralph Gassmann

Jean-Paul Sartre was born in Paris on the 21st of June 1905. He studied at the .cole Normale and subsequently became a lecturer in philosophy working in provincial secondary schools. His first public major work .Being and Nothingness. in 1943 established him as a existential philosopher. His plays dominated the stage of post-war France. During World War II he was held prisoner for one year . this was probably due to his open resistance to the Nazi occupation of France. When the war ended in 1945 he dedicated his time to both writing and editing the journal .Les Temps Modernes. (Modern Times).

Amongst other work he wrote classics such as .No Exit. (1947), .The Devil and the Good Lord. (1951), and .The Condemned of Altona. (1959). In 1960, he finished his second basic philosophical work, .Critique of Dialectical Reason., and in 1964 he went on to be known world-wide for the account of his childhood, .The Words.. That same year he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature, which he refused. Followed in 1971-72, the first three volumes of his detailed study of Flaubert.s life and work were printed. From 1975 Sartre began suffering from failing eyesight and by the end of his life he was to be rendered blind. He died in Paris of oedema of the lungs on the 15th of April 1980. Jean-Paul Sartre was renowned as a philosopher, literary figure, and social critic, and was seen as a famous representative of Existentialism.

From an existentialism point of view man is seen to be full of anxiety and despair, simply existing, until he has made a definite choice about his future . whilst the philosophy suggests that this is the only way to achieve one.s ultimate in life. Existentialists used social or political causes as a way of giving purpose to an existence. Sartre work (.Th..tre Engage. or .Theatre Committed.), is therefore revolving around social and/or political actions.

One of Sartre.s best plays displaying his attitude towards God, love and man.s freedom of choice, is undoubtedly .Le Diable et le Bon Dieu. or .The Devil and the Good Lord., which was first performed on the 7th of June 1951 at the .Th..tre Antoine. in Paris. The hero, Goetz, a bastard who has no proper sense of his identity tries to find a place in the world by becoming absolutely evil . by comming evil for its own sake. Although he does not really succeed in destroying society, his position as a commander in the army enables him to kill men. His ambition is to weaken the peasant forces and strengthen the power of the princes.

Goetz advised by a priest, that all men are sinners and commit evil deeds, he decides to do the improbable: absolute good. On his own lands, he then founds the .City of the Sun., a community where everybody is equal. However, soon he recognises that the peasants actually prefer the old system . Goetz.s absolutism fails because it disregards human individuality. Although making many sacrifices in his attempt to love men purely, the peasants don.t reciprocate this love. He even looses his battle with the priest selling indulgences because of his failure to realise that to love men, one must accept them with all their weaknesses . one must communicate at their own level. His vain attempt to prove his love for mankind by kissing a leper turns out to be futile when the leper says: .Here.s another one who wants to kiss a leper… If it.s for your salvation, I can.t refuse, but be quick about it. You.re all the same; it looks as though God gave me leprosy just to give them the opportunity of going to Heaven. (Goetz goes to embrace him) Not on the mouth! (Kiss) Pouah! (He wipes his face). (Tableau V, Scene 2).

Whatever Goetz does, good or evil, the end results are the same . in both cases disasters befall him. Why. Because his actions are made in order to please God, rather than to please man. At the beginning his acts of violence are carried out to contradict God and peasants are suffering by his plundering. However, although thinking of himself as a great destroyer, his anarchistic and evil behaviour destroys nothing of great importance. He is able to kill men but doesn.t succeed in killing society or its bases . his evil deeds only benefit the prince. Later on in the play he forsakes his evil doings to obey God. The peasants are still doomed to misery with his refusal to organise their revolt, and from his own point of view he merely destroys the human part of himself, obeying divine laws. Whilst trying to do absolute good or evil he only manages to carry on destroying lives.

The entire play centres around man.s relationship with god. From the playwright.s point of view, men who believe in god automatically take on destructive tendencies as they can only rise again from their ruins by destroying themselves. Sartre.s hero even manages to ruin himself to the point of senile dementia. He therefore refers to the bible itself in which we can all read ourselves that God does kill man as surely as the devil does . because of man.s deviance from the status quo. Finally, Goetz makes the radical d