sartre-camus resartus

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Sartre-Camus Resartus

Author(s): Robert Greer CohnReviewed work(s):Source: Yale French Studies, No. 30, J.-P. Sartre (1963), pp. 73-77Published by: Yale University PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2929259 .

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ROBERT GREER COHN

Sartre-Camus esartusOver a period of thirty ears or more,Jean-PaulSartrehas beenpatientlyutstubbornly orking t an understandingf reality romtherootsup. The monumental eing and Nothingness,he likewiseCritiquede la raisondialectique, nd a dozen otherworks tandwit-ness to the man's progress.And stillSartre s so beset withqualmsas towhatbest to do thathislong-announced ook on Ethicshas yetto appear (thoughrumor ays it is well advanced). In 1952, afterhe had gone overthe problem f howto become morally r politi-cally involvedwithout osing one's liberty,with a Kantian orHusserlian horoughnessnd a modern nguish, p poppedhisquon-dam friend nd allyAlbertCamus to announce that Sartre'streat-mentof the whole issue was based on a contradiction:As longasyouhavenot clarifiedr eliminated he contradictionroughly,ibertyversushistorical eterminism],efined ournotion fhistory,ssimi-lated Marxism, r rejected t, how can we be deprived f the rightto contend that, no matterwhat you do, you remainwithintheboundaries f nihilism?"SinceCamus has, in his L'Homme revolte, eremptorilyelegatedall themajor mindsfromHegel to Nietzsche nd beyond within heboundaries fnihilism," artremay not have takenthisproscriptiontoo muchto heart;but is it reallyfairto ask a man to solve a kindof Zeno's paradox n the metaphysicalealm beforemaking n ethi-cal move? s it not rather he ntensity ithwhich man attempts osolvea dilemma hatcountsmost n our estimation f his fitnessojudge and to act?So Sartre: "I don'tadvise you to read Being andNothingness,hereadingwould seempointlesslyrduousto you: youdetestdifficultiesofthought.... But I explained hereprecisely heconditions fthisbreak [betweeniberty nd determinism]." nd Sartreyet again pa-tiently ummarized he paradox of freedom-and-involvementithwhich he has more stubbornly restled han anyone in our time:"theparadoxical spect of thisformula xpresses imply he paradoxof our historical ondition,"meaningthat, n the realmof praxisthere re no absolutesolutions, ry s we may, and must,for them.

As forextending is theoretical osition nto the domain of ethicsandpolitics, ewwriters avecommittedhemselvess frequentlyndconcernedlys J.-P.Sartre.The texts n whichhe had explainedhisattitudes owardhistory nd contemporarydeology are both num-73


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Yale French Studieserous ndweighty;hey ange romhe "Preface" o thefirstssueof Les Temps Modernes,Existentialisms a Humanism,What IsLiterature?, ntretiensur la politique, o various editorials, nd abook-lengthrticlen"Les Communistest a paix,"from hichweshallquote.But Camuswas oblivious: ere s thewayheendsthe Letterothe ditor fLes TempsModernes" hich etoffhe ireworks:Forwe shallneverurpassnything,nourselvesnd n our time,f wepermiturselves,oweverittle, o forgetur contradictions,o usein the ombatsf ntelligencehe rgumentsnda methodorwhichwe do not ccept therwisehephilosophicustifications,fwe con-sentto liberateheoreticallyhe ndividualll the while dmittingpracticallyhatmancanbe enslaved nder ertainonditions...This "ifwe permiturselveso forget, oweverittle, urcontra-dictions"s madepalpablenonsenseyCamushimselfnthe ntro-duction oL'Homme e'volte':the bsurd osition,s an act, s un-imaginable."No wonderartre ot rritatedt all this urity whathappenstothefamedMediterraneanemperateness?"amusseemed obesayingarewell,n readiness,s soon as the astwordwas deftlye-corded,ozoomstraightp into he ir n thewakeofSt.LeopoldBloom likea shot ff shovel."HenceSartre'sncredulouswhoareyouCamus?"ButCamus s alreadyutof sight,mid he ngelsonwhose idehe so consistentlyndprematurelyutshimself.Sartre ecovers is breath,nd muses: I didn't nderstandourdilemma 'either istoryas a sense r else thasn't,tc.' untilI rereadyourLetters o a GermanFriend.But it all becamecleartomewhen found hisphraseyouaddressedo a Nazi soldier:foryearsyou havetried omakemeenterHistory.'arbleu, saidtomyself,incehebelieves imselfobe outside,t'snormalorhim olay down onditionsefore oingnside. . . But supposing'm al-readyn, suppose hat rommypoint f viewyourvery ulkingstheproof f yourhistoricity.. . Wewillnotdiscusswhetherhereare values ranscendingistory: ewill implyote hatftherereany, heymanifesthemselveshroughuman ctionswhich re bydefinitionistorical.... f you aythat hisworldsunjust, ouhavelost hematch:youare alreadyutside,omparingworldwithoutjusticeoa Justice ithoutontent."ButCamushasa trump: artre as"lesmains ales," there reslave amps. he wayCamuswields his rumpa club, s itwere)is not very difying.e firstccusesSartre'sdisciple" eansonfnot alkingbout he ampswhile iscussing'Homme evolte,gnor-ing hefact hatJeanson aswritingreviewfa highlyheoreticalbook. By association,artre s then udgedguiltyfhis disciple'somissions.

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ROBERT GREER COHNSartre'sreaction s typicalSartre-as-polemicist:We are on theQuai des Orfevres, he cop walks and his shoes creak like in the

movies: 'We know everything, tell you. It's your silencethat issuspicious.Come on, admityou're an accomplice.You know aboutthosecamps,eh?Say it, t'llbe finished,nd then hecourtwillsettlewithyou foryour dmissions.'My God, Camus, howseriousyou areand, to use one of your own expressions, owfrivolous. ..."I've seen themrejoicing, he anticommunists,verthe existenceof theseslave camps; I have seen themuse them o give themselvesa ,good conscience; and I didn't get the impression hattheywerehelping heTurkmens, ut thattheywere exploiting heirmisfortuneas the USSR exploits heir abor. . . If one openedone's mouth oprotest versome extortion, e had it clapped shut with: And thecamps0' . . Aboutthat ime began to find hesemaster lackmail-ersabject. For, tome, the scandal of the camps s theproblem fallofus. You as wellas me. And all theothers; he roncurtain s onlymirror,nd eachhalf f theworldreflectshe otherhalf.... The onewho condemns oday must know that our situationwill obligehimtomorrow o do worsethanwhat he has condemned."This "worse"has not yetoccurred, ut therehave been furtherignsof the pos-sibility.Sartre demonstrated is good faith n regardto his concernforuniversal ecency:"we devoted n editorial o thecampswhich om-mittedme entirely,nd severalarticles. . . We putthequestionofthecamps and took a position t the verymoment renchopiniondiscovered hem.We came back to thesubjectseveralmonths aterinanotherditorial nd we made our views lear narticles nd notes.The existence f these camps can make us indignant, orrify s; itmay be that we are obsessed by them; but why should they em-barrass us? Have I ever recoiled when it came to saying what Ithought f thecommunist ttitude?And if am a fellow-traveller,

crypto-communist,n ashamed sympathizer, hence comes it thatit is me theyhate and not you?"At thispointNicola Chiaromonte ntered he fraywitha "LetterfromParis" (Partisan Review, Nov.-Dec. 1952) and a pretty oodsilencing echnique f his own. After iting xactlyfive nd one-halflines ofSartre'snineteen-pagelarge format)"Letterto Camus," asagainst wholepages of Camus' "Letter,"Chiaromonte ramaticallyproclaimed: "It remains that Jean-Paul Sartre has not answeredAlbertCamus."From hereon it was easy coasting o persuade n Americanpublicthat "Sartre . . is ready to swallow a totalitariandeologyplus atotalitarian rganization" r that "the amateur communist Sartrelconsiders t obvious that the Soviet Union is a fundamentallyuststate."75


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Yale French StudiesThis s, to put t mildly,n oversimplificationf Sartre's osition,as the followingxcerpts rom is article, Les Communistest la

paix,"would lone ndicate: theworkers . . want heRussiansntheUSSR and theAmericansn theUSA." Next, artre efinesherelation etween evolutionaryorcesn theWest ndRussia,.makingit clear hat ny lliance etweenhe wo s historical,.e. temporary,andnotnecessary:themore evere erdemands,hemore hewilltend o appear nthe yesof thepopular emocraciesndthepro-letariatss simply particularation . . the dentificationf theUSSR andtherevolutionaryausewillnever e complete . . theUSSRcandisappear." fterheHungarianevolt, e seemed o hopeit would isappear.Further,t s importanto note hat artres tryingn this art fhis article and indeed o a certain xtent hroughoutt todojustice o the viewsof a Westernevolutionaryho is not quiteSartre imself.his s notmerely fence-sittingevice, ut theex-pression f a dialectic hich s internals well s external,hesamethatwe see projectedn thecharactersf Mathieu is-a'-visrunetinthenovel eries, es Chemins e la liberte. fcourse, commit-ment merges rom ll this ust as from amus' contradictions-ab-surdity.he mportanthings that:1) Sartre ealizedt andCamusdid not;2) he had earned he righto choosemore han nybodyonecaneasily hinkf,notexcluding amus;3) we areintroubleifwe allow n intellectualcCarran ct to be enacted, huttingutallbut remotechoof European oices ikeSartre's.For thesereasons, findChiaromonte'sollowingemarksn-helpful: having eached he conclusion hatparticipation'n theCommunistystems the most ffectiveayto pacify ispoliticalconscience,t followshat hephilosopherf 'anguishedreedom'participatesn themoral mugnesshichhe ystem rantstsprose-lytes."No Frenchmanad everthoughtfcalling artre mug, o

far s I know evenMauriac peaks f his "tormentedoul"), andtheutter selessnessfthecharge ecomes pparent henwe dis-cover hat amushadalreadyemarkednJeanson'scuriousom-plex in whichrepentancend smugnessmingle;" nd Sartre nCamus: "a mixturefsomber elf-sufficiencyndvulnerability."Well,peopletook themselvesery eriouslyhen, empers ererunningigh; ll that d hominemtuffs bestforgotten.he issues,ofcourse, re still erymuchwith s andundoubtedlyartre,iketherest fus, regretshatCamus s no longer round o speakhismind.While e was alive,Camuswas more ichly ewardedhan llbut fewwriters not lways hebest everwere.As much swe admire heman,we know hatreputationsre apt to suffernthe ongrunfrom his ort f early dulation. artre, n the otherhand, as receivedaressthan isdue,particularlyrom mericans.76


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ROBERT GREER COHNHe was handicappedhereby not beinga footballplayer,nor hand-some, as well as forotherobviousreasons.But if we can look pastthese hings, o not a fewofus he is still he Frenchmano watch.

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