L'Homme et le néant chez Jean-Paul Sartre (review)

The present volume is one of the very many that were published to mark the centenary of Jean-Paul Sartre's birth. If Royle's book shares the aims of most of the other short 'centenary' volumes — that is, to demonstrate the continuing relevance of Sartre for the twenty-first century — it differs significantly in the audience that it is targeting: this is not a volume for the curious general reader. Nearly all of the ten chapters are close readings of selected themes in L'Être et le néant, from guilt to solipsism, passing through negation and irrationalism. Although the volume is packaged as a book, as opposed to a collection of articles, it is difficult to give an idea of the development of the argument, and this is doubtless due to the rather odd architecture of the volume: whilst the argumentation within chapters is normally very tight, almost pedantically so at times, the signalling of the relationship between chapters ranges from weak to random. This impression of a baroque construction is reinforced by effects of contrast: whereas most of the chapters are marked by high seriousness and technical competence, two of the early chapters appear almost whimsical in comparison. These chapters are the only ones to deal with Sartre's prose fiction and drama (Royle's best-known specialism). Both chapters interrogate Sartre's humanism, and they do so by exploring the network of word-play around the obsessive presence of crustacean imagery in Sartre's work. The main problem here is that Royle appears unsure as to the status of the pun in Sartre's work — or the status of the pun, full stop: he asks, quite seriously, if it is possible to conceive of an unconscious pun ... There is also some uncertainty as to the location of the line that separates the probable from the downright fanciful; that line is surely crossed in Royle's pursuit of the signifying chain that takes him from Ramon Gris — a character (who does not appear) in 'Le Mur' — to Ibbieta (a character who does) via Viva la muerte!, Iberia and the ibex! This hermeneutic self-indulgence is unfortunate because it detracts from Royle's more serious attempts to build on the nexus of meanings around homme/homard (but not hommelette) in a way that supports his general effort to champion Sartre's brand of humanism. This effort culminates in the ultimate confrontation in Chapter 10 between Sartre's humanism and a certain postmodern tendency represented — somewhat arbitrarily, it seems to me — by de Man and Derrida. In the end, it has to be said, this is a flawed volume: flawed in its structure, flawed in its ultimate design and flawed stylistically — some chapters comprise upwards of thirty per cent quotation, lending the writing an air of outmoded scholasticism. Most of the chapters function best when abstracted from the baroque architecture of the whole and treated as discrete articles; when they are viewed in this way, it is easier for the reader to appreciate the tenacity and finesse of Royle's close readings.