The existentialist says at once that man is anguish.

For the time being I have seen enough of living things, of dogs, of men, of all flabby masses which move spontaneously.

This [service to oppressed] is the writer's task, and, if he fulfills it as he should, he acquires no merit from it.

I want to leave, to go somewhere where I should be really in my place, where I would fit in . . . but my place is nowhere; I am unwanted.

We will freedom for freedom’s sake, in and through particular circumstances. And in thus willing freedom, we discover that it depends entirely upon the freedom of others and that the freedom of others depends upon our own. Obviously, freedom as the definition of a man does not depend upon others, but as soon as there is a commitment, I am obliged to will the liberty of others at the same time as my own. I cannot make liberty my aim unless I make that of others equally my aim.

From the period when I wrote La Nausea I wanted to create a morality. My evolution consists in my no longer dreaming of doing so.

Respectable society believed in God in order to avoid having to speak about him.