All I want is' - and he uttered the final words through clenched teeth and with a sort of shame - 'to retain my freedom.' I should myself have thought,' said Jacques, 'that freedom consisted in frankly confronting situations into which one had deliberately entered, and accepting all one's responsibilities. But that, no doubt, is not your view.
Jean-Paul SartreDo you think I can read [Alain] Robbe-Grillet in an underdeveloped country? He does not feel himself maimed.
Jean-Paul SartreThe viable jewels of life remain untouched when man forgets his vocation of searching for the truth of his existence.
Jean-Paul SartreI'm going to smile, and my smile will sink down into your pupils, and heaven knows what it will become.
Jean-Paul SartreIt would be much better if I could only stop thinking. Thoughts are the dullest things. Duller than flesh. They stretch out and there's no end to them and they leave a funny taste in the mouth. Then there are words, inside the thoughts, unfinished words, a sketchy sentence which constantly returns...It goes, it goes ... and there's no end to it. It's worse than the rest because I feel responsible and have complicity in it. For example, this sort of painful rumination: I exist, I am the one who keeps it up. I.
Jean-Paul Sartre