Late-life Sartre endorsed reciprocal mutual self-abandon in love, reversing his earlier stance
Evidence
In a long section of Simone de Beauvoir’s 1974 Entretiens avec Jean-Paul Sartre, Sartre discusses candidly with her his original negative reaction to selfabandon to the Other. But to our great surprise, he also ascertains that the ideal basis for reciprocity in a love relationship is the equal self-abandon of each partner to each other, and Beauvoir totally agrees. Th is assertion is certainly in complete opposition to Sartre’s well-known stance, which stresses the activity of the project, and transcendence away from the contingency of the body, that is, passive and feminine self-abandon. — Christine Daigle, Jacob Golomb (eds.), Beauvoir and Sartre, 122
Categorization
- QUESTION: What precisely triggered Sartre’s late reversal on self-abandon — and can it be dated against Beauvoir’s influence?
- XREF: Connects to the broader Beauvoir-Sartre authorship/influence debate and to Beauvoir’s Second Sex ‘Woman in Love’ chapter. — connects to: Sartre came to embrace collaborative thinking with a partner — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café: Freedom,…, 973; Sartre’s love relationships reveal steady growth toward accepting another’s self-abandon — Christine Daigle, Jacob Golomb (eds.), Beauvoir and Sartre: The Riddle of…, 144; Sartre’s late Hope Now ideas emerged from Beauvoir’s notion of reciprocal self-abandon — Christine Daigle, Jacob Golomb (eds.), Beauvoir and Sartre: The Riddle of…, 156 (+1 more)
Broader Connections
- Sartre’s love relationships reveal steady growth toward accepting another’s self-abandon
#expands(0.82) — Christine Daigle, Jacob Golomb (eds.), Beauvoir and Sartre, 144 - Sartre’s late Hope Now ideas emerged from Beauvoir’s notion of reciprocal self-abandon
#expands(0.75) — Christine Daigle, Jacob Golomb (eds.), Beauvoir and Sartre, 156 - Sartre’s ideal mother figure prefigures his later doctrine of self-abandon to the other.
#complicates(0.72) — Christine Daigle, Jacob Golomb (eds.), Beauvoir and Sartre, 148