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What Is Literature?
Jean-Paul Sartre was one of the most important philosophical and political thinkers of the twentieth century. His writings had a potency that was irresistible to the intellectual scene that swept post-war Europe, and have left a vital inheritance to contemporary thought. The central tenet of the Existentialist movement which he helped to found, whereby God is replaced by a...more
Paperback, 280 pages
Published
2001
by Routledge
(first published 1947)
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مقتطفات متفرقة من الكتاب ..
( لا يلقى الكاتب في كل مكان سوى معرفته , إرادته , مشروعاته , باختصار , هو يلقى نفسه , والشيء الذي يبدعه لا يبدعه لنفسه فحسب , فالفعل الخلاق مجرد لحظة من لحظات العري الفني ) .
( لا وجود للفن إلا بالآخرين , ولأجل الآخرين ) .
( الكتابة نداء موجه إلى القارىء كي يخرج إلى الوجود ) .
( من البديهي عند مخاطبتي للقارىء أنني أنظر إليه على أنه حرية خالصة , وقدرة مستقلة على الخلق , وإيجابية غير مشروطة , إذ لا أستطيع على أي حال أن أخاطب سلبية ما ) .
( القراءة هبة .. للنفس بكاملها .. بعو...more
This 1947 essay was fun to read, written with very lively force. As for its content, it's a long argument about the nature and purposes (these two being inseparable) of prose writing, entwined with a Marxist history of French literature (and, in passing, a critique of how the Communist Party is anti-revolutionary and against socialist interests). In the second chapter, Sartre rises into very abstract philosophical realms, but it's crucial to understanding the entire book to know what he means ab...more
Like most other people, I first read Sartre early in my time at college- Nausea, Being & Nothingness, Words. And I was, of course, smitten by this man who understood so well my experience of isolation, freedom and how irritating it is when tools don't work properly. And then, like (I hope) most other people (including, it must be said, Sartre), I got over it, realized that the world existed neither to irritate me nor to coddle me, and that there were more important things than the state of m...more
Jan 01, 2011
Madeline
rated it
3 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
non-fiction,
philosophy,
library-books,
thesis-reading,
translations,
2010,
francophilia,
race,
class,
lit-crit,
books-about-books,
socialism,
wwii,
existentialism
Sartre's organization is a little too fluid and/or specious to really work for me as serious philosophy - at the same time, it makes his work kind of endearing. Because! He is! SO EXCITED! And also really angry about some things (hint: Nazis). I know that this is considered less of a "problem" in French, and I'm certain that my own biases are for very clearly structured works of philosophy - which plays into my reaction to this work.
One of the things I really liked about Mallarmé or the Poet of...more
One of the things I really liked about Mallarmé or the Poet of...more
Should be required reading for workshop classes; too often students are taught craft but not meaning. Sartre, in his own way in 1947, gives here a treatise on literature through philosophy, politics, history, & aesthetics, delving into the relationship between author & reader, author & self, and author & history. Heavily politicized through Sartre's spectacles of freedom, but altogether elucidating and full of important truths.
"The function of a writer is to call a spade a spade....more
"The function of a writer is to call a spade a spade....more
“When symbolism discovered the close relationship between beauty and death, it was merely making explicit the theme of the whole literature of a half century. The beauty of the past, because it is gone; the beauty of young people dying and of flowers which fade; the beauty of all erosions and all ruins; the supreme dignity of consumption, of the disease which consumes, of the love which devours, of the art which kills; death is everywhere, before us, behind us, even in the sun and the perfumes o...more
Read this for a Literary Theory Seminar I am taking. Provides an insightful and very natural account of literature and the act of reading, especially Sartre's discussion of how the experience of a writer reading his own work is fundamentally different to that of a reader reading someone else's work and of how the author guides the reader in the process of creating the author's work. The end section about "The Situation of the Writer in 1947" is more politically-oriented and directed, but is stil...more
في هذا الكتاب لا يعبر سارتر عن موقف فكري فقط ، بل عن موقف نضالي دائم و مستدام ، في سبيل قضايا عليا يرى أن من واجب المثقف أيا ً كان موقفه الفكري التحلي بها ، أفكار من مثيل التحرر الوطني و السياسي و الفكري ، و الحرية و قضايا حقوق الإنسان ، كلها يستعرضها من خلال النص الأدبي أولا ً ثم موقف الكاتب كبنية أخلاقية في المرتبة الأولى ، ثم بنية إنتاجية ، فعنوان الكتاب ما الأدب يوحي بفكرة نقدية في المرتبة الأولى بينما هو موقف أخلاقي لأي إنسان يمتهن الكتابة الأدبية و الفكرية .
في هذا الكتاب هناك عدة عناوين كل...more
في هذا الكتاب هناك عدة عناوين كل...more
نظریه معروف به "تعهد نویسنده" اولین بار توسط سارتر در ادبیات چیست مطرح شد که در زمان خود در بین روشنفکران و نویسندگان دو اردوگاه چپ و راست دوران جنگ سرد، با استقبال روبرو شد و پیروانی چون "امه سه زر" و "فرانتس فانون" یافت . اگرچه برخی معتقدند که نظریه ی تعهد سارتر در ادبیات که لاجرم وابستگی به یک عقیده ی سیاسی را ملزم می کند، با نظریه ی آزادی انسان که سارتر همه جا طرح کرده است، مغایرت هایی دارد، با این همه برای چند دهه "تعهد" و "التزام" به ویژه میان روشنفکران چپ تبلیغ و تشویق می شد.
ادبیات چیست ر...more
ادبیات چیست ر...more
I wasn't really expecting Sartre's brief history of modern French literature, although I'd imagine that may be the highlight for some readers. Otherwise, in answer to the question that forms the title, there are some real moments of clarity that make the book well worth reading, especially if you are considering writing and want to reflect on why and for whom you are writing - Sartre's appeal for "littérature engagée" is inspiring.
A great thinker always challenges us to reflect. http://goo.gl/r7OnK
Jan 25, 2011
Alireza
rated it
1 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
philosophy,
literature
ادبیات متعهد؟ ولمان کن بابا!
"Language is our shell and our antennae, it is the prolongation of our senses, a third eye which is going to look into our neighbors heart" (35).
"We are within language as within our body"(35).
"To speak is to act; anything which one names is already no longer quite the same; it has lost its innocence" (37).
"We are within language as within our body"(35).
"To speak is to act; anything which one names is already no longer quite the same; it has lost its innocence" (37).
Call me an elitist prick, but I can't find much fault in Sartre's reasoning here.
Aug 02, 2007
Farnaz
marked it as to-read
Recommends it for:
never read it if you dont like litrature
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i need help to understand some part of this book!
Jun 17, 2013
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Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre, normally known simply as Jean-Paul Sartre, was a French existentialist philosopher and pioneer, dramatist and screenwriter, novelist and critic. He was a leading figure in 20th century French philosophy.
He declined the award of the 1964 Nobel Prize in Literature "for his work which, rich in ideas and filled with the spirit of freedom and the quest for truth, has ex...more
More about Jean-Paul Sartre...
He declined the award of the 1964 Nobel Prize in Literature "for his work which, rich in ideas and filled with the spirit of freedom and the quest for truth, has ex...more
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“For the artist, the color, the bouquet, the tinkling of the spoon on the saucer, are things in the highest degree. He stops at the quality of the sound or the form. He returns to it constantly and is enchanted with it.”
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