Sartre repeatedly failed to finish grand philosophical conclusions

Evidence

By the time the third volume appeared in 1949, La mort dans l’âme (variously translated as Iron in the Soul, The Defeat or Troubled Sleep), we see Mathieu bravely defending a village bell tower as France falls. He uses his freedom to better ends now, but the defeat appears to be the end of him. A projected fourth volume was meant to show him surviving after all, and finding real freedom through solidarity with comrades in the Resistance. Unfortunately, as generally happened when Sartre planned a grand conclusion for a project, the volume was never finished. Only a few fragments appeared, many years later. Just as the ethics question was left hanging in Being and Nothingness, the freedom question remained hanging in Roads of Freedom. In neither case was the problem to do with Sartre losing interest: it was because of his tendency to keep changing his mind philosophically and politically. — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café, 528

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the reader’s knowledge of Sartre’s unfinished ethics in Being and Nothingness; shows a recurring pattern across Sartre’s oeuvre. — connects to: Sartre abandons several abstract claims when moving to concrete analysis — Christine Daigle, Jacob Golomb (eds.), Beauvoir and Sartre: The Riddle of…, 212; Sartre ultimately abandoned his early doctrine of absolute freedom — Christine Daigle, Jacob Golomb (eds.), Beauvoir and Sartre: The Riddle of…, 173; Sartre’s farewell to literature meant abandoning revision, not writing — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café: Freedom,…, 699 (+1 more)

Broader Connections

• Sartre abandons several abstract claims when moving to concrete analysis #exemplifies (0.85) — Christine Daigle, Jacob Golomb (eds.), Beauvoir and Sartre, 212
• Sartre ultimately abandoned his early doctrine of absolute freedom #exemplifies (0.80) — Christine Daigle, Jacob Golomb (eds.), Beauvoir and Sartre, 173