No Exit & the Flies: Two Plays By Jean-Paul Sartre

by Jean-Paul Sartre

Garcin : - Le bronze... (Il le caresse.) Eh bien, voici le moment. Le bronze est là, je le contemple et je comprends que je suis en enfer. Je vous dis que tout était prévu. Ils avaient prévu que je me tiendrais devant cette cheminée, pressant ma main sur ce bronze, avec tous ces regards sur moi. Tous ces regards qui me mangent... (Il se retourne brusquement.) Ha ! vous n'êtes que deux ? Je vous croyais beaucoup plus nombreuses. ( Il rit.) Alors, c'est ça, l'enfer. Je n'aurais jamais cru... Vous vous rappelez : le soufre, le bûcher, le gril... Ah ! quelle plaisanterie. Pas besoin de gril : l'enfer, c'est les Autres.

Genres: France, Classics, Plays, Theatre, Fiction, Philosophy, French Literature

Hardcover

First published January 1, 1946

About the author

Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre was a French philosopher, playwright, novelist, screenwriter, political activist, biographer, and literary critic, considered a leading figure in 20th-century French philosophy and Marxism. Sartre was one of the key figures in the philosophy of existentialism (and phenomenology). His work has influenced sociology, critical theory, post-colonial theory, and literary studies. He was awarded the 1964 Nobel Prize in Literature despite attempting to refuse it, saying that he always declined official honors and that "a writer should not allow himself to be turned into an institution."
Sartre held an open relationship with prominent feminist and fellow existentialist philosopher Simone de Beauvoir. Together, Sartre and de Beauvoir challenged the cultural and social assumptions and expectations of their upbringings, which they considered bourgeois, in both lifestyles and thought. The conflict between oppressive, spiritually destructive conformity (mauvaise foi, literally, 'bad faith') and an "authentic" way of "being" became the dominant theme of Sartre's early work, a theme embodied in his principal philosophical work Being and Nothingness (L'Être et le Néant, 1943). Sartre's introduction to his philosophy is his work Existentialism Is a Humanism (L'existentialisme est un humanisme, 1946), originally presented as a lecture.

Reviews

[Lisa · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Nobel Prize 1964 goes to the perfect description of Hell!

And Sartre, clever and free, refuses to accept the honour, knowing full well the implications of binding oneself to the hellish feeling of owing something to an institution, however honorable it may seem. A truly independent spirit who knew everything of the prisons human beings carry with them wherever they go: their minds full of desire for the things that are out of reach.

The only laureate ever to decline the prize out of conviction (Pasternak had to decline after pressure from the state), he is nonetheless a worthy (non-)laureate. It is not within his power to un-choose himself.

I read Huis Clos for the first time in High School. It immediately made a huge impression on me and has followed me ever since. The story is so straightforward and bitter. Three people, a man and two women, enter Hell and are at first relieved to discover that it is merely a room, not a torture chamber. They can't sleep anymore, so there is no relief from reality, but in the beginning, they have good hopes of getting along.

They are still engaged in the lives of people that they left behind in their previous living existence, and they suffer from their powerlessness to influence and manipulate the world. Slowly but steadily, their focus shifts to their new acquaintances in Hell, and now the torture begins. After confessing the reasons for their stay in Hell (vanity, cruelty, brutality etc...), they start to take an interest in each other and try to form alliances. But as human hearts go, they desire what they cannot have, and they discover they are stuck in an eternal triangle of unreciprocated desire, powerless to change the constellation or even just get a moment of relief.

"L'enfer, c'est Les Autres", one character sighs.

Utterly frustrated, one of the characters even tries to kill another, to face the silliness of the act immediately afterwards:

"Morte! Morte! Morte! Ni le couteau, ni le poison, ni la corde. C'est déjà fait, comprends-tu? Et nous sommes ensemble pour toujours."

This is Sartre's best play in my opinion, with a dark sense of humour in the bleak setting. I love the ending when the characters resign themselves to the fact that they are forever trapped in the hell of their triangle and decide to just go on annoying each other. There is nothing else to do:

"Continuons!"

My only question now is, as Sartre created this realistic scenario of humans torturing each other with their wishes and vanities, who is in his Huis Clos? Imagine Sartre sitting in his own hell now, who is there to anti-entertain him? Of the women and men he knew, who would be best suited to torture him in eternity? Or did he earn a place in heaven for resisting the greed to accept the Nobel Prize money? But heaven is populated as well, right? With a whole bunch of highly annoying people.

Or is he alone with himself, like Captain Jack Sparrow in Davy Jones' locker? Sartre discussing Sartre with Sartre in eternity. Hard to tell if that is heaven or hell.

Fabulous play, unsure if it counts in my Nobel month countdown or not!

[Luís · Rating 4 out of 5]

It is hell and forever for the three characters, Garcin, Estelle, and Inès, who are condemned to live there together. Criminals? Difficult to say. Knowing if their meeting in hell was due to chance, error, or specific design is even more challenging. All three look at each other, question each other, and seek to learn the truth. But do you know the truth, looking at ourselves in the mirror with courage and honesty to find the meaning we have given to our lives? And since we do not live alone, our life's responsibility is also towards others, towards the world in which we live.
Others can become the mirror that hurts, and the famous affirmation "Hell is others" is, above all, bad faith, the refusal to take responsibility for one's choices. Sartre says, "If relations with others are strained, vitiated, then the other can only be hell."
In this short piece, which he called Huis Clos, Sartre opens a wide window for us to reflect on being and appearing, on the gaze of the other, as a mirror that we would be wrong to ignore.
Read quickly and think about it at length!

[emma · Rating 4 out of 5]

i've said it before and i'll say it again: i used to be so much smarter than i am now.

i cannot even imagine being the version of myself that read Sartre's No Exit in the original french. who was she? where did she go? why does it feel like my brain has transformed over time, like an animorph, except into a tumbleweed or a pile of cotton balls instead of a child-sized animal?

see? the person who made that comparison is not the same person who read this book.

part of a series i'm doing in which i review books i read a long time ago and mourn what i have lost

[Manny · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hell is other people. It's a terrific piece of theatre. Though every time I read this play - I have unfortunately never seen it performed - it occurs to me that, logically, heaven should be other people too, and that Sartre is perhaps taking an unjustifiably gloomy view.

There is an incident in Huis Clos where one of the characters offers another one her eyes to use as a mirror. (There are no mirrors in Hell). I have wondered several times whether the Velvet Underground's track "I'll be your mirror" is a reference to this scene. Was Nico trying to cheer up Sartre? It seems possible that they could have met.

______________________________________

I was thinking about this play earlier, for some reason, and recalled a conversation I'd had with Beth Ann and Jordan some time in late 2007. We'd just watched the Bergman film Persona, and I was in the middle of a Smolin book, which as usual had a lot to say about General Relativity.

It occurred to me that there was a sort of connection. Both in Huis Clos and in Persona, you have a situation where a small group of people - three in the play, two in the film - are alone together for an extended period, cut off from the outside world. They discover that they have to redefine their personalities with respect to the perceptions of their fellow-prisoners, and they become reflections of those people. They don't really exist in the way they thought they did. It's a bit like the situation in Relativity. There is no absolute space or time; the frame of reference is created by the massive bodies in the Universe. If you're near to a black hole, it redefines spacetime so that nothing else is very important. I thought the analogy was particularly clear in Persona. Bibi Andersson is a much weaker character than Liv Ullmann, and she finds that she is being absorbed by the other woman. As in Huis Clos, this is a terrifying experience.

[Mohamed Bayomi · Rating 4 out of 5]

الندم خفيف و مسكر كالعدم لكن الحرية ثقيلة كالمنفى، كان اجاممنون احد ابطال الياذة هوميروس ، في الاسطورة انه قتل على يد زوجته وعشيقها بعد العودة من طروادة ، القصة هنا تبدأ بعد خمسة عشر عاما من قتل اجاممنون ، لازالت المدينة تلبس الحداد ، حتى ايجست وكليتمنستر القاتلان ، الكل يبكي خطاياه ، ويضع ندمه قربانا للخلاص ، دخول اورست ابن اجاممنون المدينة يمثل ميلاد الانسان ، فهو دخلها بريئا ، خفيفا من اي تصور يسبق وجوده ، فاذ هو يكتشف حريته ، اني حر يا ايلكترا ، انقضت علي الحرية انقضاض الصاعقة ، لذلك عندما يقتل والدته وزوجها ايجست ، لا يراوده اي شعور بالندم ، فهو محكوم بالحرية ، وتلك الحرية تجعل قيمه واحكامه انما صادرة عن نفسه فقط ، فهو يرى ان فعله حسن
كل هذا جميل لكن عندي مشكلة في منبت القيم الاخلاقية لانسان سارتر ، فهو يبشر بإنسان يصنع الخير لانه حر بعيدا عن الألوهية ، يقول دوستوفسكي في المراهق ، »ما شأني انا بما سيجري في انسانيتكم هذه بعد الف عام ، اذا كان قانونكم لا يهب لي جزاء ذلك حبا ولا حياة اخرى ولا شهادة بفضيلتي«
فأعتقادي ان اي دعوة اخلاقية تنفي الألوهية تسقط في التناقض

سر الالهة والملوك الاليم ، ذلك أن الناس احرار ،وهم لا يعلمون
ان جريمة لا يقوى صاحبها على الاضطلاع بحملها ليست جريمة انسان
ان الحياة الانسانية لاتبدأ الا في الشط الاخر من اليأس
ليس حريتك الا جربا يرعى جلدك ، الا منفى تحيط بك اسواره
انني احبها اكتر من نفسي ، ولكن الامها تنبعث من ذات نفسها ، فهي وحدها التي تستطيع التخلص منها ، انها حرة
لقد فعلت فعلتي ، وهو فعل حسن ساحمله على كاهلي وسأعبر به الى الشط الاخر لاقدم عنه الحساب وكلما ثقل علي حمله قرت به عيناي ، لانه حريتي ، وحريتي ليست شيئا سواه

[Steve]

Jean-Paul Sartre in 1946


« L’enfer c’est les autres »: The most famous line in Jean-Paul Sartre’s (1905-1980) most famous play, Huis Clos, (available in English translation under the title No Exit) written in the Autumn of 1943 and premiered on May 27, 1944, at the Vieux Colombier Theater in Paris. When I read this play (in translation then) a half-century ago (I kid you not), I was fully in the throes of my Sartre idolatry and read everything I could get my hands on. After all, a politically engaged philosopher who could write novels and plays – how I admired him! (Even though I was firmly set on entering a career of the purest science.) And his basic philosophy of creating one’s own values and self against the Regard of the others – how that appealed to the insecure, energetic, yet-forming youth just then active in George McGovern’s futile campaign against the then Devil, Richard Nixon, and his “secret plan” to end the war in Vietnam.(*)

Though I have moderated my view of Sartre since then, I have never joined the ranks of those who condemned his politics, his philosophy and his literature to the poubelles of history. Indeed, I am re-reading his plays now, again, and enjoying myself greatly. Looking over my GR reviews I note that I haven’t yet published a review of Huis Clos, an oversight to be remedied forthwith.

Since it is so famous (infamous in some circles), I expect everyone knows that it is about three dead people (they agree to use the euphemism “absent” early in the play) in Hell. But this Hell isn’t the arcanely elaborate Inferno of Dante – it is simply a Second Empire salon in which three strangers find themselves for the rest of eternity. This astonishing fact is only slowly revealed to the reader (or viewer). In this Hell there is no sleeping, no drinking, no eating, no nothing except a few pieces of furniture and the other two people in the room with the occasional appearance of what Sartre ironically calls a garçon d’étage. There are also no physical torments, aside from the rather elevated temperature in the room. Hence, “L’enfer c’est les autres”.(**)

That, as it turns out, is more than enough as they slowly warm to slicing each other up verbally (and, at one point, literally, though that was, of course, quite futile) and obliging each other to reveal their most shameful secrets. An Existentialist Jerry Springer Show!

I joke (partly), but that is because Sartre’s mordant humor throughout this play naturally inclines me to; it is bitterly funny. And it is bitterly hopeless: after a frenetic rise to a climax of mutual excoriation and despairing laughter as they realize this is the way it will be for the rest of time, there is a shocked pause as they eye each other. One rises and says “Eh bien, continuons.” What a stunning ending!

I found a most interesting article by Ingrid Galster(***), in which she provides a great deal of context and back story for the composition, performance and reception of this play and Les Mouches. You might be interested in some of the most salient points.

Apparently, Huis Clos was written to provide two unemployed friends with something to do: the husband of one of them proposed to finance a tour of the play through Vichy France (the Germans occupied the northern half and left the southern half to their Vichy lackeys, at least until D-Day). Though the German censors were primarily concerned with political matters, the Vichy censors were more concerned with (very Catholic) moral matters. Deciding to prod the Vichy government at its most sensitive point, Sartre selected his three “guests” of Hell to be a lesbian who “needs the suffering of others to exist”; a serial adulterer and deserter who loved to torment his faithful and loving wife; and an adulteress who killed her baby in front of its father, her illicit lover. These truths are only slowly revealed as the characters initially dissemble mightily their natures.

The original project collapsed when the wife of the financier (and one of the stars of the show) was arrested during a raid on the home of a member of the Resistance. So real life took a cue from the play’s deeply set ironies: the Germans had no objections to the play (Nazi morals being just a bit tenuous), and it premiered in Paris. The French fascists made a huge scandal, but before they could make any headway in their attempt to ban the show, a little disturbance on the Normandy coast very early on the morning of June 6, just over a week after the premiere, re-aligned their priorities… When the Allies rolled into Paris a few months later, Jean-Paul Sartre was with Les Mouches and Huis Clos the star of the French theatre.

Many plays come to life only on stage, but this one reads very, very well. It reads so well on the page that I have never even bothered to see a performance.

(*) Oh how Nixon pales beside the orangely-glowing orangutan pulling his vindictive strings in Mar-a-Lago!!

(**) In a much later interview Sartre revisited the significance of this line:

« “ L’enfer c’est les autres ” a été toujours mal compris. On a cru que je voulais dire par là que nos rapports avec les autres étaient toujours empoisonnés, que c’était toujours des rapports infernaux. Or, c’est tout autre chose que je veux dire. Je veux dire que si les rapports avec autrui sont tordus, viciés, alors l’autre ne peut être que l’enfer. Pourquoi ? Parce que les autres sont, au fond, ce qu’il y a de plus important en nous-mêmes, pour notre propre connaissance de nous-mêmes. Quand nous pensons sur nous, quand nous essayons de nous connaître, au fond nous usons des connaissances que les autres ont déjà sur nous, nous nous jugeons avec les moyens que les autres ont, nous ont donné, de nous juger. Quoi que je dise sur moi, toujours le jugement d’autrui entre dedans. Quoi que je sente de moi, le jugement d’autrui entre dedans. Ce qui veut dire que, si mes rapports sont mauvais, je me mets dans la totale dépendance d’autrui et alors, en effet, je suis en enfer. Et il existe une quantité de gens dans le monde qui sont en enfer parce qu’ils dépendent trop du jugement d’autrui. Mais cela ne veut nullement dire qu’on ne puisse avoir d’autres rapports avec les autres, ça marque simplement l’importance capitale de tous les autres pour chacun de nous. »

— Sartre, interview with Moshé Naïm, 1964

(***) « Le théâtre de Sartre devant la censure (1943-1944) », Cahiers de l’Association internationale des études francaises,‎ 2010, p. 395-418.


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[Michael Finocchiaro · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sartre was one complex individual. These two plays are not intended to make you smile or feel comfortable - but they will challenge your sense of being and existence and are extremely well-written. For understanding the French existentialists in the mid-20th century, these are unavoidable plays and entertaining to read even if they do not necessarily have happy endings.

[jazmin ✿ · Rating 3 out of 5]

“L'enfer, c'est les autres.”

⇢The Plot
This was somewhat interesting and had a unique take on what hell is and what it entails, but it just wasn’t that enjoyable, especially in French. It was too short to really leave me feeling impacted.

⇢The Characters
The characters were complex enough I suppose, but I hate when there’s not a single character to root for. I mean, who am I supposed to keep reading for, Garçon?? (And what was up with naming the other character Garçin when it's so similar to garçon? Why not call him by his first name like the others?) All three of the protagonists just existed to get on each other’s nerves which in turn, got on mine. 


⇢Overall
Definitely not the worst novel I’ve had to read for school, but certainly not the best. Wouldn't want to read again outside of school.

*2.5

. ⋅ ˚̣- : ✧ : – ⭒ ❦ ⭒ – : ✧ : -˚̣⋅ .

MY LINKTREE ❦

[Emily]

On Les mouches

Once, when I was enrolled in a Victorian Literature class in college, reading novel after essay after poem that grieved deeply over the religious upheaval brought on by the scientific breakthroughs of Charles Darwin and others, I asked my professor whether there weren't any 19th-century authors who felt liberated, rather than bereft, by these developments. As a profoundly a-religious person myself, I can try to imagine myself into the position of Arnold, Tennyson, Ruskin, Carlyle and others, who either grieved the loss of, or struggled to reconcile, their Christian beliefs with new geological and biological evidence. (Though I have trouble understanding the objection to a metaphorical reading of the Bible, which would seem to tie up all these problems with a neat little ribbon). But I would have thought that some 19th-century writers would embrace the demise of the god-concept and welcome a life of intellectual freedom and self-determination. My professor thought a while and then said yes, there were those writers, but that we wouldn't be reading Nietzsche in this class.

Nor have I read him since. But Jean-Paul Sartre's Les mouches (The Flies), an existentialist re-telling of the murder of Aegisthos and Clytemnestra at the hands of Orestes and Electra, comes close to what I was looking for back then, despite not having been written until 1943. Sartre takes the classical Greek tale, in which Orestes returns from his exile and is egged on by his long-lost sister Electra to avenge their father's death by killing their mother and her lover, and turns it into a parable about the changeable reality of gods in human lives, the role of remorse, and the power of free will. Having just read Anne Carson's translation of Sophocles's Orestes, the contrast was particularly clear in my mind between the crushing inevitability of the characters' fates in Sophocles, and the clarity with which Sartre's Orestes freely creates his own destiny.

There are other differences. In Sartre, we see the effects of Clytemnestra's and Aegisthos's crime on the regular citizens of Argos. The common people share in their rulers' guilt—something that feels alien to the royalty-centric worlds of Aeschylus, but very appropriate to a France of 1943, in which citizens had to decide whether to support the Resistance or collaborate with the fascist Vichy regime. Fifteen years before the play's action, Clytemnestra and Aegisthos murdered Agamemnon (Argos's king, Clytemnestra's husband), but were immediately seized with horrified remorse at their action. This remorse has taken over their lives and their style of ruling, becoming the ruling cult of Argos. As Electra tells her disguised brother,

[L]a reine se divertit à notre jeu national: le jeu des confessions publiques. Ici, chacun crie ses péchés à la face de tous; et il n'est pas rare, aux jours feriés, de voir quelque commerçant, après avoir baissé le rideau de fer de sa boutique, se traîner sur les genoux dans les rues, frottant ses cheveux de poussière et hurlant qu'il est un assassin, un adultère ou un prévaricateur. Mais les gens d'Argos commencent à se blaser: chacun connaît par coeur les crimes des autres; ceux de la reine en particulier n'amusent plus personne, ce sont des crimes officiels, des crimes de fondation, pour ainsi dire. Je te laisse à penser sa joie lorsqu'elle t'a vu, tout jeune, tout neuf, ignorant jusqu'à son nom: quelle occasion exceptionelle! Il lui semble qu'elle se confesse pour la première fois.

The queen is just amusing herself at our national game: the game of public confessions. Here, everyone shouts their sins in each others' faces; and it's not rare, on feast days, to see some merchant, having closed up shop, crawling on his knees through the streets, rubbing dirt into his hair and yelling that he's an assassin, an adulterer, or a liar. But the people of Argos are starting to get bored. Everyone knows everyone else's crimes by heart; the crimes of the queen, in particular, no longer interest anyone, they're official crimes, founding crimes so to speak. I'll leave you to imagine her joy when she saw you, young and new, not even knowing her name: what an extraordinary opportunity! It feels to her like she's confessing for the first time.

Thus the guilt and penitence of Aegisthos and Clytemnestra have become the dominant characteristic of the entire society—everyone is defined by their misdeeds, and are forever trying to leech some kind of absolution out of everyone else—a vicious spiral that becomes more and more insular and stagnant as time goes on, as symbolized by the plagues of flies that infest the city. The big national fête, for example, involves twenty-four hours of heightened fear and remorse for the citizens of Argos, as a priest moves a boulder away from a cave entrance, and Aegisthos declares that the city's dead have returned from the underworld. (Whether or not the dead actually have returned is a point of contention among the citizens, highlighted by a darkly funny conversation between two guards about whether the dead flies return on this night, or only the dead humans.) Jupiter, god of flies, death, and decay, rules over Argos, feeding on the back-looking contrition of its citizens, and he often demonstrates his vested interest in keeping the Argos people enchained.

Into this pit of recreational remorse steps Orestes, reared in privilege away from Argos and only recently informed of his parentage. Until now he has had no real ties, wandering the world at liberty, belonging to no one and with no one belonging to him. The central conflict of the play, then, involves Orestes's inner struggle over how to claim ownership over his ancestral past, not having shared his sister's years of servitude and hatred, and whether he can or should act to break the cycle of fear and remorse in Argos. In Sartre's hands his eventual murder of Clytemnestra and Aegisthos becomes a declaration of independence, a unique, freely-chosen action, over which Orestes takes full ownership and for which he refuses all regret. The furies, who in classical Greek tragedy haunt Orestes to madness after he murders his mother, are here sent by Jupiter as partisan beings who attempt to bully him into remorse—and must fall back when they see that he does not fear them, or regret his action.

It's such an interesting take on the story, because if I were to choose any era of literature that inclined least toward an expression of free will, I would probably choose ancient Greek tragedy. In a way, Sartre himself accomplishes something similar to Orestes's coup in overthrowing the dominant worldview in Argos: just like the people of Argos have believed for years that they are defined by the confession of their sins, the tellers of this story have always believed that the events therein were fore-ordained and controlled by the gods. For Sartre, however, as Jupiter unwillingly admits,

Quand une fois la liberté a explosé dans une âme d'homme, les Dieux ne peuvent plus rien contre cet homme-là. Car c'est une affaire d'hommes, et c'est aux autres hommes—à eux seuls—qu'il appartient de le laisser courir ou de l'étrangler.

When once freedom has burst into the soul of a man, the Gods have no power to act against him. Because he's now a human affair, and it's up to other men—to them alone—to let him run or to strangle him.

I've hardly mentioned Electra at all here, but Sartre's depiction of her was another unique feature of Les mouches, and the only part of this play that was a bit disappointing to me. In Sophocles and Euripedes (I haven't read Aeschylus's version of events after Agamemnon's death), Electra is if anything the stronger, more vengeful, more obsessive sibling, the one who never falters in her quest to see her mother dead and her father avenged. She is the one who cares for Orestes after the murders are done, the one less affected by the furies. In Sartre this dynamic is reversed: although Electra initially desires Orestes to kill Clytemnestra and Aegisthos, she recoils when faced with the reality of the deed. In the end she can't resist the pull of the remorse-cult on which she was raised, fleeing back into the killing arms of Jupiter. It's an effective choice, I think, and I understand why Sartre worked in this contrast between brother and sister, but I was still a tad bit disappointed not to encounter the blazing, defiant Electra I have come to expect.

All in all, though, another fascinating foray into existential theater, and a rare opportunity to see enacted a celebration of human self-determination, even when that self-determination is difficult and morally ambiguous.


On Huis Clos

This may be merely my brain's attempt to justify the hundreds of dollars I recently spent on French-language books, but I feel lucky to have read Jean-Paul Sartre's 1944 existential black comedy Huis Clos (No Exit) in the original. It's been a while since I've read a piece in which the conventions of language are so obviously integrated into the meaning of the whole, in ways that defy translation—and I enjoyed that synthesis so much that upon finishing the play I immediately started again from the beginning and re-read it. In particular, it was Sartre's use of the familiar (tu) and formal/plural (vous) forms of "you"—common to Romance and other languages but nonexistent in English—that intrigued me, and added a surprising amount of depth to the characters' interactions.

The plot of Huis Clos involves three people, recently dead and arrived in Hell. Garcin, Inès and Estelle are shown, one after the other, into the Second Empire sitting room where they will be spending eternity together. The atmosphere is hot but not unlivable, and at first the deprivations seem surprisingly tolerable. No mirrors, for example. No beds and no toothbrushes; no windows; no ability to turn out the lights or open the door. Furniture no one particularly likes. Other than that, nothing too horrible. All three sinners expect gruesome punishments ("Where are the stakes?" asks Garcin), but no judge or executioner arrives. Instead, the three converse and gradually reveal themselves and their sins, becoming a perfect three-way trap of torment each for the others.

At one point, Garcin warns Estelle (who is perpetually hungry for male validation) that he will never love her: "je te connais trop" ("I know you too well"). This equation of human knowledge with distaste, and familiarity with painful vulnerability, is pervasive throughout the play, and Sartre underlines it brilliantly with his use of tu and vous. Whereas one would normally expect a person to use tu in more affectionate, sympathetic situations (such as conversations with a close friend, lover or spouse), and vous in colder, more formal situations or to emphasize a power differential (such as in a professional setting or a conversation between strangers), Sartre turns this expectation on its head. Most often, the periods of respect and temporary alliances between characters are marked by their use of vous with each other, whereas the use of tu is almost always either an attempt at emotional manipulation, or an act of outright cruelty.

Take this scene partway through the play, when the other two gang up on Estelle. Inès and Garcin have just finished an extended conversation with each other, in which they both relate the reasons they've been damned. They offer their revelations willingly, and are as sympathetic with one another as anyone ever is in this play; throughout their exchange, they use vous with each other. They then turn on Estelle, who has claimed not to know what she might have done to end up in Hell:

GARCIN: (à Inès) Oh! vous avez raison. (à Estelle.) A toi. Qu'est ce que tu as fait?

ESTELLE: Je vous ai dit que je n'en savais rien. J'ai beau m'interroger...

GARCIN: Bon. Eh bien, on va t'aider. Ce type au visage fricasée, qui est-ce?

ESTELLE: Quel type?

INES: Tu le sais fort bien. Celui dont tu avais peur quand tu es entrée.

ESTELLE: C'est un ami.

GARCIN: Pourquoi avais-tu peur de lui?

ESTELLE: Vous n'avez pas le droit de m'interroger.

INES: Il s'est tué à cause de toi?

ESTELLE: Mais non, vous êtes folle.

Here both Garcin and Inès transition from using vous in their relatively gentle conversation with each other, to using tu in their aggressive questioning of Estelle. Garcin's "A toi" in the opening line is a badge of contempt: he's indicating that her refusal to be truthful about her past is costing her any respect he may have had for her. Estelle is put in the defensive, pleading position, and continues to use vous with her tormentors—even when, as in the case of the last quoted line ("Mais non, vous êtes folle"), the gendered grammar makes it clear she's speaking to one of them alone, in this case Inès. Being addressed as vous is thus associated with the position of power and consent, whereas being called tu is the mark of force, of the act of depriving someone of their essential protective skin. I can't think of any way to pack this kind of meaning into an English translation without adding words that weren't there in the original—having Estelle say "Mr. Garcin," for example, or assigning words of contempt (child, idiot) to Garcin's and Inès's speech. Otherwise there's definitely less there:

GARCIN: (To Inès) Oh, you're right. (To Estelle.) And you. What is it you did?

ESTELLE: I told you I have no idea. I've tried to think...

GARCIN: Fine. We'll help you out. That fellow with the smashed face, who is he?

ESTELLE: What fellow?

INES: You know perfectly well. The one you were so afraid of when you came in.

ESTELLE: He's a friend of mine.

GARCIN: Why were you afraid of him?

ESTELLE: You have no right to interrogate me.

INES: Did he kill himself because of you?

ESTELLE: Of course not, don't be absurd.

The workings of tu and vous are explicitly acknowledged in another scene, which also involves the fascinating gender dynamics of the play. Here the lesbian Inès is trying to manipulate Estelle's affections by playing on her vanity and need for admiration. Inès offers to take the place of Estelle's absent mirror, attempting to insinuate herself into the girl's affections. She uses tu as part of her sweet-talk toward Estelle and asks the girl to reciprocate. But Estelle stubbornly continues to use vous with Inès, only lapsing into tu under pressure, and eventually admitting that "I find it hard to use tu with other women":

ESTELLE: Et c'est bien? Que c'est agaçant, je ne peux plus juger par moi-même. Vous me jurez que c'est bien?

INES: Tu ne veux pas qu'on se tutoie?

ESTELLE: Tu me jures que c'est bien?

INES: Tu es belle.

ESTELLE: Mais vous avez du goût? Avez-vous mon goût? Que c'est agaçant, que c'est agaçant.

INES: J'ai ton goût, puisque tu me plais. Regarde-moi bien. Souris-moi. Je ne suis pas laide non plus. Est-ce que je ne vaux pas mieux qu'un miroir?

ESTELLE: Je ne sais pas. Vous m'intimidez. Mon image dans les glaces était apprivoisée. Je la connaissais si bien...Je vais sourire: mon sourire ira au fond de vos prunelles et Dieu sait ce qu'il va devenir.

INES: Et qui t'empêche de m'apprivoiser? (Elles se regardent. Estelle sourit, un peu fascinée.) Tu ne veux décidément pas me tutoyer?

ESTELLE: J'ai de la peine à tutuoyer les femmes.

English:

ESTELLE: Does it look alright? It's so annoying, not being able to judge for myself. Do you swear it looks alright?

INES: You don't want to use tu with me?

ESTELLE: Do you (tu) swear it looks alright?

INES: You are beautiful.

ESTELLE: But do you (vous) have any taste? Do you share my taste? Oh, it's annoying, it's annoying!

INES: I have your taste, because I like you so much. Look at me. Smile at me. I'm not so ugly either. Aren't I better than a mirror?

ESTELLE: I don't know. You intimidate me. My reflection in the mirror was tamed. I knew it so well...I'm going to smile: my smile will sink to the bottom of your pupils and God knows what it will become.

INES: And what's keeping you from taming me? (They look at each other. Estelle smiles, slightly fascinated.) You really don't want to use tu with me?

ESTELLE: I find it hard to use tu with other women.

The power dynamic here is less clear-cut than in the previous scene, but again we see the use of tu as an attempted power play—although Estelle's withholding of tu gives her a certain amount of power as well. Indeed, Inès's imprisonment with a beautiful woman she desires (and desires to control), but who will never take her seriously because Inès is not a man, is a key element of Inès's torture. Estelle craves the male gaze, and Inès, despite all her cunning and manipulation, simply cannot provide it. "[M'addresser à] elle?" Estelle exclaims at one point. "Mais elle ne compte pas; c'est une femme." ("[Talk to] her? But she doesn't count; she's a woman.")

Being a woman while also believing the socialized message that women "don't count" makes, of course, for a person who is hard put to spend any time alone, and goes a long way toward explaining why women like Estelle crave constant validation from men. Not that the idea of female invalidity is limited to Estelle, or to women. Sartre acknowledges it as widespread—Garcin, in fact, thinks so little of his wife (low-born as well as female) that he feels no regret at having casually abused her for years, and neglects to even mention to his fellow-prisoners when she dies. Instead, he obsesses about the opinions his former (male) colleagues hold of him and of his actions. Given the famed feminism of Sartre's long-term partner Simone de Beauvoir I'm not sure why I was so surprised at the insightful depictions here of the traps of gender, but, like Sartre's use of language, they came as a welcome treat.

As, despite its darkness, did this entire play. After two readings I know it's one I'll be coming back to again and again, especially as I learn more about the larger framework of Sartre's philosophy.

[maya ☆ (is furiously studying!) · Rating 3 out of 5]

peut-être que j'aurais dû rechercher la philosophie de jean-paul sartre avant de lire les deux pièces de théâtre. et peut-être que j'aurais mieux apprécié sartre. j'ai très peu de pensée pour sartre honnêtement.

commençant par huit clos, je comprends immédiatement qu'on tourne autour du jugement de soi par le biais des autres mais je ne savais pas ce qu'il y avait à dire. j'avais l'impression de tourner en rond, c'était un peu ennuyant. encore, si j'avais lu sur sartre avant ma lecture, je suis sûre que j'aurais bien aimé mais bon, ce n'est pas le cas donc laissez moi tranquille. je ne voyais pas le point à suivre des personnages tout à fait ignobles et détestables. je n'ai qu'un petit coeur pour ma reine lesbienne inès et personne d'autre. honnêtement, je crois que je n'ai que lu pour lire ici... malheureusement. pour les mouches, ah j'ai beaucoup plus aimé. j'aime le drame, quoi! ça ne perd pas de temps, on visite des personnages que j'ai connu par le passé et puis j'adore toujours les réutilisations de personnages mythiques grecs. le thème de la liberté et de ces fardeaux nécessaires m'a plu et j'ai connecté avec l'histoire très facilement.

après avoir lu sur sartre, je réalise qu'il est très proche de camus en fait. il traite de l'intersubjectivité et l'habilité de l'humain seul de faire sens du monde autour de lui. l'existentialisme m'est encore intéressant. si j'ai à lire de jean-paul sartre encore dans le futur, je lirai de la nonfiction du même auteur.

conclusion: huit clos; 2 étoiles. les mouches; 3.5 étoiles. 3 étoiles, c'est juste selon mon expérience.

[Noah Goats · Rating 4 out of 5]

In Huis clos Sartre tells the story of three people who die and are sent to hell. For these people, hell consists of a room in which they are to spend eternity together. Sartre uses the play to explore the idea that we perceive ourselves though the eyes of others and can be tortured by their perceptions. It's a grim little piece, most famous for the line, "hell is other people," which is a sort of summary of the whole thing.

I didn't read Les Mouches, the second play included in this book.

[Natalie Dixon]

Read Les Mouches for class. It was decent, most of my classmates couldn’t wait to be done with Sartre but I can get behind some of those sartrien existentialist themes. Basically wrote a fanfic of it (it was a creative expression) for my essay and got an A+ sooo

[Tom · Rating 2 out of 5]

'Huis Clos' represents something I do not like. In fact, I detest the message that Sartre is conveying in his rather famous play. It is this play that has spawned one of the most misunderstood quotes in literary history, c'est-à-dire "L'enfer, c'est les autres." What we are given by Sartre, is a room that houses three people; the rather tense Garcin, the empty-headed Estelle and Inès, one of the most ridiculously stereotypical lesbian characters I have ever encountered. (Seriously though. It has to be a joke.) As we come to learn throughout the play, all of these characters are actually dead and are placed in a 'waiting room' until they can move on to their 'next life' or whatever. They all have their crimes and their secrets, some of which will be revealed, most of which won't be. The point is, they are locked in with eachother, and they don't get along very well, resulting in the formulaïc thesis that hell is in fact the company of other people.

First of all - his famous line tries to convince you that hell is the company of those particular individuals that bring out the worst in us. Not the fact that other humans beings exist in the same space as we do. My primary objection though is that sarcasm and bitterness are easy, because everyone knows those feelings already. Moreover, what Sartre does with Garcin, Estelle and certainly Inès is just beyond proportions. Never in my life have I encountered characters that are so ridiculously empty, who are so self-absorbed as in this play. They are archetypes, based on thin evidence and a dangerous perception of the human mind. Nobody thinks the way Garcin does. And even though this results in some compelling dialogue, I find it to be utterly dangerous. One must resist the ideas presented by Sartre at all costs. Hell is not the company of other people, even those you don't tolerate. What in the end disturbed me the most, is the total lack of patience and empathy in this play.

But hey, it has a famous line in it, which is easy to remember. Plus, it feeds the bitterness, so yeah.

'Huis Clos' is followed by 'Les Mouches', which is rather funny at times. Sartre attacks the story of Orestes and Electra, using it to make a point about the cost of liberty and the impossibility to make other people see the reasoning behind your actions. There's more to it than that, but it's probably how I will remember this play. Again, I have some very primal reactions against the ideas Sartre brings to the plate here. I won't enter into detail - it can probably be partially explained by the fact that he uses/abuses a wonderful Greek story to do so. En plus, what a bitter little man is hidden behind these words. Either it's a morbid joke, either it's serious, but it's not in my wheelhouse.

So read it, taste it, forget about it. The moment you walk out the door, will be the moment you realize that life isn't lived within the confines of a small room, in the company of horribly flat characters, and you will rejoice.

[Nashwa Moustafa · Rating 3 out of 5]

بما أن الذباب شادد حيله معانا اليومين دول لسبب مجهول 😂 كان موفر جو ملائم جدا للمسرحية
لم أقرأ الكثير من الأعمال الأدبية ذات الابعاد الفلسفية أعتقد أن جان بول سارتر من أهم من قدم رؤيته الفلسفية من خلال أعمال ادبية ونجح في هذا العمل ببراعة أن يقدم مفهوم الوجودية يأخذ عليه فقط أنه في تسلسل النهاية عبر عن مجمل مفهوم فلسفته بشكل كان فيه مباشرة على لسان البطل
القصة تم صياغتها في أسطورة يونانية معروفة قدم من خلالها اسقاطات دينية وسياسية على ألمانيا خصوصا أن العمل اتقدم أثناء الحرب العالمية التانية واحتلال المانيا لفرنسا

[Mercurielle_ · Rating 4 out of 5]

J'ai adoré Huis clos. Les Mouches, un peu moins.

"On meurt toujours trop tôt - ou trop tard. Et cependant la vie est là, terminée; le trait est tiré, il faut faire la somme. Tu n'es rien d'autre que ta vie."

Et l'on sait bien évidemment que "l'enfer, c'est les autres."

[Sylvain · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bien sûr, il y a "L'enfer, c'est les Autres."
Mais ma ligne préférée est "Je suis tombé dans le domaine public."
Huis clos est un chef d'oeuvre, mais j'ai beaucoup moins accroché sur Les mouches...

[Margaux · Rating 5 out of 5]

l'enfer c'est les autres slay

[Alicia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pièces très intéressantes ;)

[Charlotte · Rating 4 out of 5]

Huis Clos eindelijk gelezen!!!! Loved it. Over Les Mouches gaan we het niet hebben

[Biaa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Nunca na minha vida pensei que fosse amar um livro deste género, what a beautiful written piece

[Aina Capó · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Rien n'est plus à toi sur la terre." Me'l varen regalar en Miquel i en Pau pes meu aniversari i just ara m'he dignat a llegir-lo. Gràcies al.lots!

[Emma · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ok but of course there had to be THE INCEST and what I hate électre so much!!! but the play was interesting and BLOODY

[Shea McMinn-Sullivan · Rating 2 out of 5]

I hate to sound like an ignorant American but I preferred the English version more

[Katie · Rating 4 out of 5]

JPS ate with just a few crumbs (e.g. iffy concept of freedom in Les Mouches lol) - why was this such a page-turner tho?? Pop off, Huis Clos deserves the hype, Les Mouches was a great wee bonus too with so many philosophical talking points! With thanks to Lunch + Langs book swap ❤️

[Azeann · Rating 4 out of 5]

3/5 Huis clos 4/5 Les mouches

[Elodie · Rating 4 out of 5]

J’ai lu que huit clos mais franchement cv l’histoire malgré que des fois j’étais un peu perdue car ils ne disent pas toujours clairement les choses et ya une belle morale ! il aide aussi avec le cours de philo car cela se réfère à la thèse déterministe et du libre arbitre

[Nonethousand Oberrhein · Rating 5 out of 5]

L’importance de ne mourir qu’après avoir vécu
Unies par le fil conducteur du libre arbitre, les deux pièces (ici présentées en ordre chronologique inversé) se font manifeste de la pensée existentialiste de l’auteur. C’est le libre arbitre assumé qui, tout en le châtiant dans Les mouches, libère le héros du conformisme étouffant tissé par les “maîtres de morale”, et c’est encore le libre arbitre, dans son double rôle de délivreur et bourreau, qui dans Huis clos, en l’absence d’interlocuteurs métaphysiques, détermine la peine éternelle dans l’au-delà. Les deux pièces incitent donc le lecteur à trouver le “salut” pas dans l’espoir d’une récompense post-mortem, mais dans l’acte volontaire du vivant.

[Viktor · Rating 5 out of 5]

25/05
J’ai juste lu Huis Clos, je reviendrai à Les Mouches quand j’ai lu Elektra. 3.5 étoiles

11/07
En ce qui concerne Les Mouches:

Je ne peux que donner cinq étoiles. Les personnages de Sophocles sont développés encore plus (ce qui était vraiment nécessaire). Electre, par exemple, devient plus mémorable et à la fin elle est opposée directement à son frère Oreste.
La pièce traite, entre autres, les thèmes de la culpabilité, du remords et de la relation entre homme et dieu(x).
Vivement recommandé si on a lu Elektra mais on l’a trouvée plutôt superficielle.

[Suzytornade · Rating 5 out of 5]

Quand j'ai appris que "the good place" (série télé géniale !) s'était inspirée de Huis clos, j'ai eu envie de relire la pièce pour me rendre compte de cette inspiration. Au delà de ça, Huis clos reste une oeuvre très intéressante et fascinante dans les interactions des personnages, se jugeant inlassablement pour l'éternité dans cet enfer sans pic ni démons, mais devenant ainsi dépendants affectivement des uns et des autres.

[Anis Siam · Rating 5 out of 5]

مسرحية وجودية تراجيدية ، ناقشت قضية الحرية المطلقة ، حتى من الالهة . وهذا اساس سارتر او بما يسمى السارترية . ان الحرية لعنة للانسان لكن بدون هذه اللعنة لا يكون كرامة للانسان .
التأثر الوجودي بالعدمي كان ابرز السمات في المسرحية كان التأثر بنيتشه العدمي بامرين هو الهبوط ، "هذا هو طريقي ... يجب ان اهبط بينكم ."والامر الاخر الهجوم على الاله جوبيتر ، بما يقابله عند نيتشه الهجوم على المسيحية . وهنالك مواقف اخرى يمكن الاطلاع على كتاب التراجيديا والفلسفة لكاوفمان .