SARTRE THE EXISTENTIALIST (1905-1980) "Man is condemned forever to be free."

EXISTENTIALISM
Sartre's philosophy of freedom derives from the existentialist claim that existence precedes essence. There is no such thing as a given "human nature", determining how we act and behave. Rather it is our everyday acts and choices that make up our identity. Man first of all exists and defines himself afterwards. We can choose to abandon ourselves passively to the prevailing state of affairs, conform to status quo - thus reducing ourselves to a mere object among objects. Or we can choose to transcend what is given, by projecting ourselves authentically towards a new horizon of possibility. Either way, we are what we make of ourselves.

FREEDOM
Sartre siezed on the need to view everyday objects as phenomena - to examine them from different perspectives, to identify their very essence. His first philosophical works explored the importance of the imagination. Therein lay a major aspect of human freedom - the mind unfettered by rules could recreate the world.

MAJOR WORKS

• "Nausea" (1938)
• "Age of Reason" (1945)
• "Being and Nothingness" (1943)
• "Existensialism" (1947)
• "What is Literature?" (1949)
• "Search for a Method" (1958)
• "Critique of Dialectical Reason" (1960)
• "The Words" (1964)
• "Between Existensialism and Marxism" (1974)