In Sartre’s play ‘No Exit’, Henri, a member of the Maquis – the underground resistance group, which fought against the Nazis in German-occupied France during World War II – is taken prisoner and brought to the local Gestapo headquarters to be interrogated.
Henri knows himself to be a physical coward who will not be able to withstand the torture he will be subjected to by the Gestapo to obtain information about the Maquis.
When he is asked by his inquisitors, as to where the next Maqui attack will take place, to mislead the Nazis, Henri gives them false information by naming the wrong place.
However, he knows that when the Germans realise they’ve been misdirected they’ll return and he will be tortured to give up the right information.
In order not to betray his comrades-in-arms, Henri tries to get out of his dilemma by the only way he can: he jumps out of an open window and falls to his death on the prison courtyard, three floors below.
Henri never realises that the sacrifice of his life has been in vain. Knowing Henri’s weakness, and fearing that if captured and tortured he would eventually succumb and give his captors the knowledge they sought, the members of his group had deliberately fed him misinformation about their operations
So when Henri, in his desperation, gives the Gestapo what he believes is wrong information, in a cruel irony he unwittingly betrays his comrades by directing the Germans to where the raid has actually been planned, resulting in the entire group being gunned down by the Nazis.
Sartre’s play dramatically sums up the crux of his existentialist philosophy: We are always, and inevitably, free to choose our actions, what we will or will not do, but we cannot choose, or have any control over, what the outcome of our choice will be. Henri was free to choose between betraying his comrades and ending his own life, and chose the latter.
But his self-sacrifice was of no avail for he unknowingly did betray his comrades and cause their deaths. Can Henri be held morally responsible for this?
This is the core dilemma of all existence. All of us, in our day-to-day lives, have to make choices – what career to pursue, whom to choose as life partner, what faith, if any, to follow, whom to vote for in an election – without having any knowledge of what the end result of our choice will be.
We can’t opt out of making choices by saying ‘Que sera, sera’, what will be will be, and leave everything in the hands of destiny, fate, or some deity. For such a decision, of choosing not to choose, is also a choice, and will lead to consequences we cannot foresee or foretell.
Are we, like Sartre’s Henri, responsible for the end results of the choices that we have no choice but to make?
We can say that we can be held responsible only for that which we do knowingly; we cannot be held responsible for the unforeseen, and unforeseeable, repercussions of our choices.
Fair enough. But making a choice, any choice, is a conscious act, which must include some conjecture as to what effect that choice may have on us, and on others. To that extent, we cannot disown, or disassociate ourselves, from the choices we make, because these choices define our existence; they define who we are.
There is no exit from the interrogation room of existence, no escape from inescapable choice.
DISCLAIMER:
The views expressed in the Article above are Author’s personal views and kashmiribhatta.in is not responsible for the opinions expressed in the above article
Courtesy: Times of India,S.T ,March 16,2019
In Sartre’s play ‘No Exit’, Henri, a member of the Maquis – the underground resistance group, which fought against the Nazis in German-occupied France during World War II – is taken prisoner and brought to the local Gestapo headquarters to be interrogated.
Henri knows himself to be a physical coward who will not be able to withstand the torture he will be subjected to by the Gestapo to obtain information about the Maquis.
When he is asked by his inquisitors, as to where the next Maqui attack will take place, to mislead the Nazis, Henri gives them false information by naming the wrong place.
However, he knows that when the Germans realise they’ve been misdirected they’ll return and he will be tortured to give up the right information.
In order not to betray his comrades-in-arms, Henri tries to get out of his dilemma by the only way he can: he jumps out of an open window and falls to his death on the prison courtyard, three floors below.
Henri never realises that the sacrifice of his life has been in vain. Knowing Henri’s weakness, and fearing that if captured and tortured he would eventually succumb and give his captors the knowledge they sought, the members of his group had deliberately fed him misinformation about their operations
So when Henri, in his desperation, gives the Gestapo what he believes is wrong information, in a cruel irony he unwittingly betrays his comrades by directing the Germans to where the raid has actually been planned, resulting in the entire group being gunned down by the Nazis.
Sartre’s play dramatically sums up the crux of his existentialist philosophy: We are always, and inevitably, free to choose our actions, what we will or will not do, but we cannot choose, or have any control over, what the outcome of our choice will be. Henri was free to choose between betraying his comrades and ending his own life, and chose the latter.
But his self-sacrifice was of no avail for he unknowingly did betray his comrades and cause their deaths. Can Henri be held morally responsible for this?
This is the core dilemma of all existence. All of us, in our day-to-day lives, have to make choices – what career to pursue, whom to choose as life partner, what faith, if any, to follow, whom to vote for in an election – without having any knowledge of what the end result of our choice will be.
We can’t opt out of making choices by saying ‘Que sera, sera’, what will be will be, and leave everything in the hands of destiny, fate, or some deity. For such a decision, of choosing not to choose, is also a choice, and will lead to consequences we cannot foresee or foretell.
Are we, like Sartre’s Henri, responsible for the end results of the choices that we have no choice but to make?
We can say that we can be held responsible only for that which we do knowingly; we cannot be held responsible for the unforeseen, and unforeseeable, repercussions of our choices.
Fair enough. But making a choice, any choice, is a conscious act, which must include some conjecture as to what effect that choice may have on us, and on others. To that extent, we cannot disown, or disassociate ourselves, from the choices we make, because these choices define our existence; they define who we are.
There is no exit from the interrogation room of existence, no escape from inescapable choice.
DISCLAIMER:
The views expressed in the Article above are Author’s personal views and kashmiribhatta.in is not responsible for the opinions expressed in the above article
Courtesy: Times of India,S.T ,March 16,2019