A commissioned foreword became a 700-page philosophical treatise

Evidence

But then Sartre’s foreword grew to be 700 pages long. Rather than whacking Sartre over the head with the manuscript in a rage, Gallimard agreed to publish it as a separate book, under a title highlighting its theme of transfiguration: Saint Genet. This proved a good decision; it was as much a treatise of ideas as a biographical work. Sartre used elements of Marxist analysis, but mainly he approached Genet’s life as a way of demonstrating his theory that ‘freedom alone can account for a person in his totality’. — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café, 692

Categorization

• CANDY: The image of a 700-page foreword is an amusing, easily retold publishing anecdote.