Sartre-castañeda

“L'homme est condamné à être libre” Jean Paul Sartre

That Sunday, as always, I entered to the coffee Café de Flore in Saint Germain-des-Prés, and the smell of Simone de Beauvoir invaded the place. The red of the walls of the café was the same red of the flags that we (the students) have raised days ago in La Sorbonne. We were screaming to the world that Sartre was right, that Sousles pavés, la plage! and that there was Ni Dieu ni maître!. For us the existentialism was the only alternative in order to make the world known that the revolution was incredible because it was really happening. As I got into the cafe I saw Jean Paul with a Hispanic man, and I thought that I should try to listen that conversation, as all the students of my generation usually did when Sartrestarted talking. Maybe it was due to the respect that the younger man seemed to have to elders, or maybe it was because the writer of Nausea had much to say, but (for my pleasure) Sartre took over the conversation. I wrote downs some notes and this is what I can share with you about that dialog:
(Carlos)- So, amigo, Did you create a character that was traveling around in order to study this MonsieurRollebon? I was traveling too, and also with an interest in a factual thing, not in exploring ideas. However, I ended understanding a different description of the world that Don Juan introduced me to.
- (Jean Paul) -You said you didn’t want to study ideas, but the intellectuals have the responsibility of being committed with the notion that what happens around us is our direct responsibility,and we have the freedom to make the decisions that shape our world, but you are just thinking that you can shape the reality, creating the ideas in your mind. That’s why; as I remember you told me in our last conversation, you think that you can drive a car that is not moving. But, mon ami, the important thing here, is to be able to understand a reality that is already there, that have been createdbefore for others, and that we are also generating in this moment. Oui, it is terrible to see it, and the feeling is disgusting, but we can change it to a peaceful one, getting involved in what is going on. For example now, with these kids here in France, or in Cuba and its revolution, as intellectuals we need to take part in changing our reality. That is not going to happen if we create adifferent understanding of the world where your mind, your imagination, let you be “free” and let you feel powerful, when you are not doing anything to change what make us slaves.
(Carlos) - Querido Sartre, you need to stop being connected with what you think and do what Don Juan suggest: stop the world. It was difficult for me, I just couldn’t understand why I should cut the relations that hold me tomy past, and when I felt bad, I didn’t realize that it was because I was progressing in the understanding of Don Juan; I thought it was based on my inability of stop the world and create a new understanding of the reality. But this it was because I was becoming a warrior. Now I understand that the average man is hooked to his fellow men, while the warrior is hooked only to infinity.
(Jean Paul)-My character is use to live alone now, at the beginning he thought that that was the fact why he suddenly felt so badly, because there was nobody to share his day-to-day living; but after, he realized that it wasn’t his life in particular what made him feel that anguish, it was life, normality, society, what surround us, what we create. But, let me tell you, Carlos -I think what you describe as“seeing” after “stopping the world” is extremely unreliable, is based on essence, on ideas of things. Is not based on existence, on the material understanding that we (as an individual reality), have an immensity quantity of elections to make. I agree with you that the objects that we see are not as we usually conceived, but this is only because the description of the object is a separate...