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Black Orpheus
Translation of: Orphee noir, originally published 1948 as the preface to Anthologie de la nouvelle poesie negre et malgache de langue francaise, edited by Leopold Sedar Senghor.
65 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1956
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About the author
Jean-Paul Sartre
1,094 books12.9k followersJean-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.
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.
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Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews
June 23, 2012
I chuckled occasionally as I read in order to keep myself from feeling overly depressed at the way Sartre commandeered/colonized/forced the idea of negritude to speak only towards his own pet Marxist leanings. Am I saying that white people have no authority/place from which to speak about the struggles of "minority" groups? Yes, maybe I am and Sartre's essay could be read as a cogent example of such an opinion, but then I could be wrong.
May 12, 2019
این کتاب توسط دکتر مصطفی رحیمی قبل از انقلاب ترجمه و چاپ شده است.
اورفه سیاه مقدمه ای است که سارتر بر جنگ شعر سیاهپوستان نوشته است.
اورفه در اساطیر یونانی نام شاعر ی است مخترع چنگ که به نیروی شعر خود حیوانات و گیاهان و حتی جمادات را مسحور می کند.
در ادبیات اروپایی اورفه اسطوره شاعری است که بی تخیل آفریننده خود زندگی نمی توان کرد، و شعرش خواننده را تا مرزهای ناشناخته می برد.
در ابتدای کتاب شروع خواندنی خواهید داشت : «وقتی دهان بندی که دهان این سیاهان را می بست بر می داشتید جه انتظاری داشتید؟ منتظر بودید که سرود ستایش شما را بسرایند؟
«منتظر بودید که در این چشمها، چشمها و سرهائی که پدران ما به زور تا به زمین خم کرده بوند، به هنگام بلند شدن، نگاه تحسین بخوانید؟
اورفه سیاه مقدمه ای است که سارتر بر جنگ شعر سیاهپوستان نوشته است.
اورفه در اساطیر یونانی نام شاعر ی است مخترع چنگ که به نیروی شعر خود حیوانات و گیاهان و حتی جمادات را مسحور می کند.
در ادبیات اروپایی اورفه اسطوره شاعری است که بی تخیل آفریننده خود زندگی نمی توان کرد، و شعرش خواننده را تا مرزهای ناشناخته می برد.
در ابتدای کتاب شروع خواندنی خواهید داشت : «وقتی دهان بندی که دهان این سیاهان را می بست بر می داشتید جه انتظاری داشتید؟ منتظر بودید که سرود ستایش شما را بسرایند؟
«منتظر بودید که در این چشمها، چشمها و سرهائی که پدران ما به زور تا به زمین خم کرده بوند، به هنگام بلند شدن، نگاه تحسین بخوانید؟
May 25, 2007
این کتاب زیبای سارتر خوشبختانه توسط مصطفی رحیمی به فارسی برگردانده شده و در 1351 چاپ و منتشر شده است.
در مورد ژان پل سارتر، مطلبی جداگانه نوشته ام؛
http://www.goodreads.com/author_blog_...
در مورد ژان پل سارتر، مطلبی جداگانه نوشته ام؛
http://www.goodreads.com/author_blog_...
August 17, 2023
When you removed the gag that was keeping these black mouths shut, what were you hoping for? That they would sing your praises? Did you think that when they raised them selves up again, you would read adoration in the eyes of these heads that our fathers had forced to bend down to the very ground? Here are black men standing, looking at us, and I hope that you—like me—will feel the shock of being seen.
Sartre explicitly begins this by stating it is his explaining to a white audience what they should find aesthetically and politically important in black poetry, specifically the negritude poets like Césaire. As such this should be read rather as a companion piece both to Césaire, and to Fanon's Black Skin, White Masks which is explicitly in dialogue with Sartre, building up the phenomenological basis of what Sartre roughly sketches out here.
Sartre explicitly begins this by stating it is his explaining to a white audience what they should find aesthetically and politically important in black poetry, specifically the negritude poets like Césaire. As such this should be read rather as a companion piece both to Césaire, and to Fanon's Black Skin, White Masks which is explicitly in dialogue with Sartre, building up the phenomenological basis of what Sartre roughly sketches out here.
March 1, 2022
3.5⭐️
October 14, 2015
His ideological leanings were not too much to cause me to shut off and I thoroughly enjoyed his constant shade and vicious drag of Europe's love for enslaving and colonizing. However, while I enjoyed reading it I still have some reservations on "negritude" both in and outside of the literary canon.
October 17, 2024
I can appreciate this seminal* essay on the power of Black expression for what it is, but the gratuitous phallus/semen*/male-centric imagery distracting from the very real and cool ways Black erotics disrupt the Christian hoax of Black culpability in white imperialism is not so appreciated. More perilous is how Sartre grounds his essay and examination of the Negritude Movement on the essentialization of Blackness and attribution of Black poetry to some monolithic, mythical, primordial force embodied by precolonial African societies, towards which Black poets must necessarily delve within the depths of their souls to resuscitate.
Frantz Fanon exemplifies the danger of this essentialization in Black Skin, White Masks through hypothetical dialogue from the white patron to the Black poet: "Lay aside your history, your research into the past, and try to get in step with our rhythm. In a society such as ours, industrialized to the extreme, dominated by science, there is no longer room for your sensitivity. You have to be tough to be able to live. It is no longer enough to play ball with the world; you have to master it with integrals and atoms. Of course, they will tell me, from time to time when we are tired of all that concrete, we will turn to you as our children, our naive, ingenuous, and spontaneous children. We will turn to you as the childhood of the world. You are so authentic in your life, so playful. Let us forget for a few moments our formal, polite civilization and bend down over these heads, those adorable expressive faces. In a sense, you reconcile us with ourselves."
He even responds to Sartre, following a passage quoted from this essay: "When I read this page, I felt they had robbed me of my last chance. I told my friends: 'The generation of young black poets has just been dealt a fatal blow.' [...] Black Orpheus marks a date in the intellectualization of black existence. And Sartre's mistake was not only to seek the source of the spring, but in a certain way to drain the spring dry."
And finally, Fanon is so kind as to give us the tl;dr: "When I tried to claim my negritude intellectually as a concept, they snatched it away from me."
Frantz Fanon exemplifies the danger of this essentialization in Black Skin, White Masks through hypothetical dialogue from the white patron to the Black poet: "Lay aside your history, your research into the past, and try to get in step with our rhythm. In a society such as ours, industrialized to the extreme, dominated by science, there is no longer room for your sensitivity. You have to be tough to be able to live. It is no longer enough to play ball with the world; you have to master it with integrals and atoms. Of course, they will tell me, from time to time when we are tired of all that concrete, we will turn to you as our children, our naive, ingenuous, and spontaneous children. We will turn to you as the childhood of the world. You are so authentic in your life, so playful. Let us forget for a few moments our formal, polite civilization and bend down over these heads, those adorable expressive faces. In a sense, you reconcile us with ourselves."
He even responds to Sartre, following a passage quoted from this essay: "When I read this page, I felt they had robbed me of my last chance. I told my friends: 'The generation of young black poets has just been dealt a fatal blow.' [...] Black Orpheus marks a date in the intellectualization of black existence. And Sartre's mistake was not only to seek the source of the spring, but in a certain way to drain the spring dry."
And finally, Fanon is so kind as to give us the tl;dr: "When I tried to claim my negritude intellectually as a concept, they snatched it away from me."
January 31, 2022
Very patriarchal and male centric like most of Sartre. Also very metaphysical, elaborate, confusing and ‘French’, also like most of Sartre. One of the first existential texts about black anti-colonialism and a white man’s (albeit a progressive anti colonial one) look at negritude and it’s power. Overall, very typical of Sartre in both its strengths and weaknesses but overall drifted too much into male centric, confusing and/or psychosexual analytics.
Very Marxist undertones especially with his vision of negritude passing into class revolt once we reach the, what I see as mythical, “end of racism”. I disagree with his last few pages on his overall conclusions of negritude and it’s future. I think negritude and the celebration of black being is not a biologically determined similarity, as race does not exist biologically, but a revolt against a socially constructed label used for oppressive ends. There has been a dangerous development among leftist white society to ignore race and argue that class is the real and main oppressor as a facade to ignore deeply intrenched colonial structures.
His last paragraph just reveals his typical white fear of ‘idk about allyship what if you blacks take over and don’t join the Marxist revolution’. Then tough luck buddy. The colonised deserve liberty and have the right to reject your politics once they achieve it. You can’t offer independence with terms and conditions.
“If a man gives you freedom, it is not freedom. Freedom is something you, you alone, must take” - Jose Dolores.
I’m concerned over whether Sartre only offered freedom with terms and conditions rather than accepting his own role in a colonial system and ‘letting’ the ‘black man’ ignore his advice and political goals and take a different road themselves.
Very Marxist undertones especially with his vision of negritude passing into class revolt once we reach the, what I see as mythical, “end of racism”. I disagree with his last few pages on his overall conclusions of negritude and it’s future. I think negritude and the celebration of black being is not a biologically determined similarity, as race does not exist biologically, but a revolt against a socially constructed label used for oppressive ends. There has been a dangerous development among leftist white society to ignore race and argue that class is the real and main oppressor as a facade to ignore deeply intrenched colonial structures.
His last paragraph just reveals his typical white fear of ‘idk about allyship what if you blacks take over and don’t join the Marxist revolution’. Then tough luck buddy. The colonised deserve liberty and have the right to reject your politics once they achieve it. You can’t offer independence with terms and conditions.
“If a man gives you freedom, it is not freedom. Freedom is something you, you alone, must take” - Jose Dolores.
I’m concerned over whether Sartre only offered freedom with terms and conditions rather than accepting his own role in a colonial system and ‘letting’ the ‘black man’ ignore his advice and political goals and take a different road themselves.
March 18, 2024
This is an essay which served as a preface to Senghor's anthology of black poetry. In this respect, it does what it sets out to do. Sartre analyses some of the key themes present in the collection and — more generally — why poetry as a medium is so important in the context of black literature. Leaning on Marxist sentiments, I found this essay to be quite tasteful — Sartre is keenly self-aware of his position as a white man to even be criticising and commenting on the artistic work of black people. Sometimes, however, Sartre loses this self-awareness and attempts to pigeonhole the works into something necessarily radical. He insists that Black people must go to the depths of their soul — much like Orpheus — in order to retrieve an atavistic and primordial sense of negritude. In doing this, they can touch upon aspects of their being that are otherwise obfuscated by their sociological context, or by the use of a colonialist language. This is no doubt true for some kinds of black poetry. But to say that this is necessary for a black person's poetry to be successful or insightful, is unconvincing.
December 1, 2019
Un libro complesso e poco scorrevole ma con nozioni e suggestioni interessante e vivide.
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June 14, 2021Sartre is going to get millyrocked when I meet him in Hell.
December 12, 2022
My comments on this book arfe posted to my blog at http://williamseaton.blogspot.com/201....
December 29, 2024
poetics are a response to the failure of language 💗 ugh sartre u get it
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January 29, 2025jan pawel dlaczego poczatek ci się udal ale im dalej tym gorzej
November 30, 2025
“and I shall name this poetry ‘orphic’ because this untiring descent of the Negro into himself causes me to think of Orpheus going to reclaim Eurydice from Pluto”
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
October 16, 2024
SARTRE’S PREFACE TO AN ANTHOLOGY OF PAN-AFRICAN WRITERS
Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980) was a French existentialist philosopher, playwright, novelist, and political activist.
He begins this 1948 essay with the statement, “What would you expect to find, when the muzzle that has silenced the voices of black men is removed? That they would thunder your praise? When these heads that our fathers have forced to the very ground are risen, do you expect to read admiration in their eyes? Here, in this anthology, are black man standing, black men who examine us; and I want you to feel, as I, the sensation of being seen. For the white man has enjoyed for three thousand years the privilege of seeing without being seen.” (Pg. 7)
He continues, “I address myself to white men, to whom I wish to explain that which black men know already: why it is necessary through a poetic experience that the black man in his present situation must first take conscience of himself and, inversely, why [black] poetry in the French language is, in our times, the sole great revolutionary poetry.” (Pg. 11)
He concludes the essay by asking, “What will happen if the black… wishes to be considered only as a proletariat? What will happen if he no longer allows himself to be defined except by his objective condition; if he obliges himself, in order to right against the white capitalism, to assimilate the white techniques? Will the source of Poetry silence itself? Or indeed will the great black river, despite all, color the sea into which it hurls itself? No matter; to each epoch its poetry, for each epoch the circumstances of history elect a nation, a race, a class, to rise against the torch, in creating situations which can express or surpass themselves only through Poetry. At times the poetic clan coincides with the revolutionary clan and at times they diverge.” (Pg. 64-65)
One of Sartre’s most important “political” essays, despite having been written nearly fifty years ago.
Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980) was a French existentialist philosopher, playwright, novelist, and political activist.
He begins this 1948 essay with the statement, “What would you expect to find, when the muzzle that has silenced the voices of black men is removed? That they would thunder your praise? When these heads that our fathers have forced to the very ground are risen, do you expect to read admiration in their eyes? Here, in this anthology, are black man standing, black men who examine us; and I want you to feel, as I, the sensation of being seen. For the white man has enjoyed for three thousand years the privilege of seeing without being seen.” (Pg. 7)
He continues, “I address myself to white men, to whom I wish to explain that which black men know already: why it is necessary through a poetic experience that the black man in his present situation must first take conscience of himself and, inversely, why [black] poetry in the French language is, in our times, the sole great revolutionary poetry.” (Pg. 11)
He concludes the essay by asking, “What will happen if the black… wishes to be considered only as a proletariat? What will happen if he no longer allows himself to be defined except by his objective condition; if he obliges himself, in order to right against the white capitalism, to assimilate the white techniques? Will the source of Poetry silence itself? Or indeed will the great black river, despite all, color the sea into which it hurls itself? No matter; to each epoch its poetry, for each epoch the circumstances of history elect a nation, a race, a class, to rise against the torch, in creating situations which can express or surpass themselves only through Poetry. At times the poetic clan coincides with the revolutionary clan and at times they diverge.” (Pg. 64-65)
One of Sartre’s most important “political” essays, despite having been written nearly fifty years ago.
Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews