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Hell Is Other People — But Why Exactly?
“Hell Is Other People” wrote Jean Paul Sartre in his novel “No Exit”. The quote has been hailed as the slogan for introverts and a lovely way to explain any sort of discontent or dissatisfaction we encounter with family members, strangers on public transport and our time-stealing co-workers. It also fits snug with the American conception of the existentialist as a sad, lonesome, life-hating frequenter of run-down cafes. One can even imagine Sartre, peering out from the Cafe du Flor, reminiscing about the Nazi Occupation or his time as a POW or any of the many philosopher friends he would come to have a falling out with and exclaim, with a silence that only Beauvoir could register “Hell is other people”.
But what did it really mean? Sartre was a humanist, a socialist socialite, a man who cared deeply about the human condition and would even reflect on his prisoner years fondly, recalling the many nights in which he would sleep with a camaraderie that came from feeling another mans shoulder on his leg. Is this yet another quote that has been neutered by pop culture and misuse to the point in which its meaning has become but an oversimplified motto for people that don’t like other people?
In short, yes.
Sartre asks us to imagine a nice evening in a neighbourhood park. As we look around, the park presents itself to us, the squirrels, the trees, the singing of the birds. Then, all of a sudden, a man enters our gaze. Suddenly the presence of this stranger forces us to realize that he too is constructing his own world around him. What an insult to the idea that we are the Hero or, at the very least, main character in this Disney-esque stroll through the park!
“The green of the grass turns itself towards the other man as well as towards me, and some of my universe drains off in his direction”.
In this sense, Sartre argues that we were before some sort of nothingness, something that looks and consumes experience. But, with the sudden entrance of another’s gaze, we become just another object!
Sartre then adds the idea of the peeping tom. We creepily stare into the keyhole…
