Sartre repurposed his wartime French play to address postwar German guilt

Evidence

The implication was that Germany was now similarly paralysed by its shame. Sartre’s play had been designed to urge the French to shake off the past and act constructively for the future; perhaps this message could be reinterpreted to fit the German situation. — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café, 644

Categorization

• XREF: Connects thematically to the reader’s prior material on ritual sacrifice and collective guilt — Sartre’s The Flies retells Orestes’ vengeance against a guilt-ridden city, which resonates with communal-shame dynamics explored there. — connects to: Sartre wrote The Flies as a freedom allegory for occupied France — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café: Freedom,…, 510; Sartre made freedom and personal responsibility the burden of his resistance allegory — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café: Freedom,…, 511

Broader Connections

• Sartre wrote The Flies as a freedom allegory for occupied France #expands (0.80) — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café, 510
• Sartre made freedom and personal responsibility the burden of his resistance allegory #expands (0.75) — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café, 511