Tuesday 20 December 2016

More quotes...

“I don’t believe in the Nietzschean notion that what doesn’t destroy you makes you stronger. You see these soldiers come back with PTSD; they’ve been to war and seen death and experienced these existential crises one after the other. There are traumas in life that weaken us for the future. And that’s what’s happened to me. The various slings and arrows of life have not strengthened me. I think I’m weaker. I think there are things I couldn’t take now that I would have been able to take when I was younger.” Woody Allen
“You can decide your own fate. Are you going to let it all fall apart? Or are you going to own it?” Patti Smith

Sunday 20 November 2016

Le harcèlement à l'école...

We are our choices...

Jade Hameister going to the North Pole, alone...

“It is therefore senseless to think of complaining since nothing foreign has decided what we feel, what we live, or what we are.” (Jean-Paul SartreBeing and Nothingness)

Wednesday 9 November 2016

Commentaire de Jean-Paul Sartre sur le CD Huis Clos, 1964

" "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."

Monday 8 August 2016

Ideas for essays or speeches inspired by the theme...

  • Can I only define myself through others’ gaze?
  • The family: a redundant institution?
  • A marriage made in hell…
  • How can I make moral choices in an immoral world?
  • Existence precedes essence; does that prove God is dead?
  • All the lonely people, where do they all belong?
  • Who am I?
  • Should I care what other people think of me?
  • Je me moque du regard des autres!
  • Why do people become terrorists?
  • Social networks are hell...
  • Life as a teenager is hell!
  • If hell is other people, why are there so many politicians/teachers/religious leaders/scientists/visionaries?
  • Parents: who needs them?!
  • Life's a box of chocolates...
  • Others make my life hell, but I cannot live without them…
  • The United Nations: avoiding hell on earth?
  • The EU: a recipe for hell?
  • Is it right to tell someone living in extreme poverty that they have a "choice"?
  • We are at the gates of hell...
  • Is altruism proof of weakness?
  • Hell is... shopping!
  • Refugees are other people...
  • Hell is man-made...
  • Overpopulation = hell.
  • Freedom is slavery...
  • How much choice do I actually have?
  • Why do we always blame others?
  • Why be nice?
  • Can I act as if others don't matter?
  • Am I responsible for the world’s woes?
  • Militarised frontiers: a necessary evil?
  • Should I do what I want to do, even if it hurts others?
  • We are in Hell, and Trump is the Devil…
  • Do you make someone’s life hell?
  • Individualism (loneliness), materialism and consumerism are the result of a hellish world... Or is it the other way around?
  • How to have fun in an absurd and unfair world...
  • Is Hell other children?

Books, films, TV series, etc. related to the theme

Books:
  • Les Mots, Sartre
  • L’Étranger, Camus
  • La Peste, Camus
  • The Trial, Kafka
  • The Castle, Kafka
  • Steppenwolf, Hesse
  • The Secret Agent, Conrad
  • The Heart of Darkness, Conrad
  • The Heart of the Matter, Greene

Films:
  • Papa ou Maman
  • Retour chez ma mère
  • Forrest Gump
  • The Third Man
  • Citizen Kane
  • Into the Wild
  • Papillon
  • 127 Hours
  • Festen
  • Still walking
  • Harry, un ami qui vous veut du bien
  • Dogville
  • The Hunt
  • The Truman Show
  • Pink Floyd's The Wall
  • Easy Rider
  • A Clockwork Orange
  • Straw Dogs
  • The Wicker Man
  • Les Combattants
  • Paris-Shanghai (short film)

Plays:
  • Waiting for Godot, Beckett
  • Hamlet, Shakespeare
  • Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare

TV series:

L'Existentialisme est un humanisme (1946)


> Le texte:

> Citations:

> Article in Philosophy Now:

Citations/quotes

« Pour obtenir une vérité quelconque sur moi, il faut que je passe par l'autre. »
Sartre, L'Existentialisme est un humanisme, 1946

« Par conséquent, à la façon dont nous regardons dans un miroir quand nous voulons voir notre visage, quand nous voulons apprendre à nous connaître, c'est en tournant nos regards vers notre ami que nous pourrions nous découvrir, puisqu'un ami est un autre soi-même. »
Aristote, Éthique à Nicomaque

"Thus humanity is male and man defines woman not in herself but as relative to him; she is not regarded as an autonomous being… She is defined and differentiated with reference to man and not he with reference to her; she is the incidental, the inessential as opposed to the essential. He is the Subject, he is the Absolute – she is the Other."
Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex

"Power exists as long as the group stays together against the “others”… Exercising power over other people affects them, through action or inaction…whether or not those who exercise power are aware of the success or consequences of their practices and whether or not the other party is aware of the power being exercised over him or her."
Professor Philomena Essed, sociologist

"There is nothing every man is so afraid of as getting to know how enormously he is capable of doing and becoming".
Søren Kierkegaard

« On est ce qu’on veut… » ("A man is what he wills himself to be…").
Sartre, Huis Clos


« Faute de renseignements plus précis, personne, à commencer par moi, ne savait ce que j'étais venu foutre sur terre. »
Sartre, Les Mots (1964)

What is "hell"?


"Hell" can be:
  • Torture 
  • Cruelty
  • Moral decline
  • Physical and psychological pain
  • Being trapped
  • Suffering
  • Loneliness
  • Depression
  • The absence of God, goodness, love
  • Madness
  • Schizophrenia
  • Punishment
  • Poverty
  • Absurdity
  • Drugs
  • Weakness
  • War
  • Psychological misery
  • Not knowing what to do, what is right
  • Sin (lust, gluttony, greed, sloth, wrath, envy, pride, etc.)
  • Isolation
  • Dying (fear of)
  • Noise
  • A crowd
  • Shame
  • Violence
  • Genocide
  • Waiting
  • Not knowing
  • Pride
  • Lies
  • Prison
  • A concentration/death camp
  • Having to choose
  • Losing
  • Failure
  • Work
  • Working conditions
  • Boredom
  • Eternity
  • Routine, repetition
  • Vanity
  • Global warming
  • No privacy
  • Hunger
  • Unrequited love
  • Jealousy
  • No hope
  • Sexual violence
  • Indifference
  • Not getting what you want
  • Scandal
  • Futility
  • Insomnia
  • Loss
  • Feeling/being lost
  • Feeling/being threatened
  • The presence/the absence of others
  • People observing/judging you
  • People ignoring you
  • Negative social relations
  • Being used (exploited)
  • Guilt
  • Being bullied at school or work
  • Hurting others
  • Being selfish
  • Injustice
  • Humiliation
  • Suicidal tendencies
  • A negative relationship to other people
  • ...
Links to hell:

Sartre's "Being and Nothingness"


"Chaque regard nous fait éprouver concrètement […] que nous existons pour tous les hommes vivants."
"C'est à partir du jour où l'on peut concevoir un autre état de choses qu'une lumière neuve tombe sur nos peines et sur nos souffrances et que nous décidons qu'elles sont insupportables."

> Spark notes:

> Course by Prof. Spade:

> Wikipedia article:

Saturday 6 August 2016

Who are "other people" (who make - perhaps - your life "hell")?


"Other people" is anyone who is not me/us and might include:
  • A person (a human being) or people like me I (we) do not necessarily know, the "other" ("autrui" in French) who may or may not have an influence on me;
  • Humanity;
  • People different from myself (superior, inferior, close, distant, of a different sex, gender or sexual orientation, of a different character, with different values and practices, physically different, with different moral values, etc.);
  • A partner (husband, etc.);
  • The members of my family (my mother, father, children, in-laws, brothers, sisters, etc.);
  • Other generations (ancestors, dead or alive);
  • Friends;
  • My peer group members;
  • Neighbours;
  • The members of my tribe or of another tribe;
  • The members of my ethnic group or of another ethnic group;
  • The members of a political party, trade union, religious, sport, or other group (to which I might belong);
  • Rivals;
  • My work colleagues;
  • Competitors, clients;
  • People in my village, neighbourhood or region;
  • People in neighbouring villages, towns, cities, regions, countries;
  • "Society";
  • Foreigners;
  • Immigrants;
  • Strangers;
  • Tourists;
  • The "enemy";
  • Those I dominate (rule, direct, exploit, denigrate, etc.);
  • Those who dominate me;
  • Those who are more/less knowledgeable than I am;
  • Those I love or those I hate (or ignore);
  • Terrorists;
  • Mentally or physically ill people;
  • Those who threaten me or keep watch on me;
  • People carrying (contagious) diseases;
  • Institutions (the State, bureaucracy, political organizations, the judicial system, the media, etc.);
  • The police, the secret service, the army;
  • Figures of authority (teachers, politicians, religious leaders, etc.);
  • People with power, dictators (members of dictatorial, corrupt or totalitarian regimes), etc.;
  • Big Brother, secret societies, sects, conspirators (cf. conspiracy theories);
  • Zombies, monsters, vampires, ghosts, aliens, etc.;
  • Myself in the mirror;
  • My alter ego;
  • An actor's character.

> A definition of "Other" by Wikipedia: click HERE!
> A sociologist's definition of "otherness": click HERE!

Sunday 19 June 2016

Article sur Huis Clos dans La-Philo


"Tous ces regards qui me mangent… Ha, vous n’êtes que deux ? Je vous croyais beaucoup plus nombreuses. Alors, c’est ça l’enfer. Je n’aurais jamais cru… Vous vous rappelez : le soufre, le bûcher, le gril... Ah ! Quelle plaisanterie. Pas de besoin de gril : l’enfer c’est les autres."

Mots clés

Huis Clos

Huis Clos (2016)


Huis Clos (1954)

Texte:
http://lewebpedagogique.com/annelaureverlynde/files/2015/08/Huis-clos-et-les-mouches-pdf.pdf

"La naissance de Huits Clos" Texte dit par Jean-Paul Sartre en préambule à l'enregistrement phonographique de la pièce en 1965

Afficher l'image d'origine

Sartre

Sartre in 10 minutes...

> Wikipedia article on Jean-Paul Sartre:

> Wikipedia article on Existentialism:

> Wikipedia article on Phenomenology:

> BBC Radio 4 (2 videos) A History of Ideas:

> Sartre by The School of Life:

> Sartre and bad faith by The School of Life:

> Sartre quotes:

No exit


> Comments on the 1964 Harold Pinter adaptation in English of Sartre's "Huis Clos":

> Full text:

> Spark notes on No Exit:

> Schmoop:

> Wikipedia article on No Exit: