Uploaded October 2022 | Updated September 2026, 18 hours ago
An abridged audio presentation of an interview with Sartre for the book; "Sartre on Theatre". Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980) was a French existentialist philosopher, playwright, novelist, and political activist, who wrote many other books such as Being and Nothingness , Existentialism....& Human Emotions The Transcendence of the Ego , Search for a Method , etc.
The Writings of Jean-Paul Sartre , was published... that a book of this kind would fill a need and would be useful as a working tool both from the historical and documentary standpoint and from the standpoint of present-day relevance. He says of his own play No Exit : "what I wanted to express in the play was something beyond what was simply dictated by the circumstances, and what I wanted to say was that hell is other people. But `hell is other people' has always been misunderstood... I mean that if relations with someone else are twisted, vitiated, then that other person can only be hell. Why? Because other people are basically the most important means we have in ourselves for our own knowledge of ourselves. When we think about ourselves, when we try to know ourselves, basically we use the knowledge of us which other people already have. We judge ourselves with the means other people have and have given us for judging ourselves. Into whatever I say about myself someone else's judgment enters. Which means that if my relations are bad, I am situating myself in a total dependence on someone else. And then I am indeed in hell. And there are a vast number of people in the world who are in hell because they are too dependent on the judgment of other people. But that does not at all mean that one cannot have relations with other people. It simply brings out the capital importance of all other people for each one of us."
Sartre's comments (particularly when interpreting his own plays) are insightful and fascinating. Produced and read by Vincent Bagnall.(44 min)
An abridged audio presentation of an interview with Sartre for the book; "Sartre on Theatre". Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980) was a French existentialist philosopher, playwright, novelist, and political activist, who wrote many other books such as Being and Nothingness , Existentialism....& Human Emotions The Transcendence of the Ego , Search for a Method , etc.
The Writings of Jean-Paul Sartre , was published... that a book of this kind would fill a need and would be useful as a working tool both from the historical and documentary standpoint and from the standpoint of present-day relevance. He says of his own play No Exit : "what I wanted to express in the play was something beyond what was simply dictated by the circumstances, and what I wanted to say was that hell is other people. But `hell is other people' has always been misunderstood... I mean that if relations with someone else are twisted, vitiated, then that other person can only be hell. Why? Because other people are basically the most important means we have in ourselves for our own knowledge of ourselves. When we think about ourselves, when we try to know ourselves, basically we use the knowledge of us which other people already have. We judge ourselves with the means other people have and have given us for judging ourselves. Into whatever I say about myself someone else's judgment enters. Which means that if my relations are bad, I am situating myself in a total dependence on someone else. And then I am indeed in hell. And there are a vast number of people in the world who are in hell because they are too dependent on the judgment of other people. But that does not at all mean that one cannot have relations with other people. It simply brings out the capital importance of all other people for each one of us."
Sartre's comments (particularly when interpreting his own plays) are insightful and fascinating. Produced and read by Vincent Bagnall.(44 min)
