SARTRE X EXIST

In learning about Sartrean existentialism, it is helpful to recall data about the climate in which Sartre grew up. Recall for a moment the sadness of his childhood when no one wanted him for a friend. Recall his heavy dependence on a fantasy life as an escape from a world which he found hostile and offensive. Recall that his father died when he was two years old, leaving him in an environment of emotional strain and pressure. Add to this the fact that he was held prisoner-of-war in Germany and that he was forced to accept a lifestyle repugnant to human decency. By the age of thirty-five, he had known more duress than many people experience in a lifetime, and his sentiment of the absurd grew in proportion to the circumstantial hardships.

Sartre viewed the universe as an irrational, meaningless sphere. Existence was absurd and life had no sense, no purpose, no explanation. Death was the proverbially absurd icing on the cake, making life even more intolerable, more ridiculous. He felt “nauseated” by the vastness of this empty, pointless predicament, and he wrestled many hours for a meaningful solution.