Summary of NauseaÂ
Antoine Roquentin, the protagonist of Sartre’s novel “Nausea”, is a historian and former adventurer who, tired from his travels, has settled in the town of Bouville. He attempts to write a biography of the Marquis de Rollebon, an 18th-century French aristocrat. Roquentin is a solitary, melancholic, and depressed man who becomes repulsed by the mere existence of the people and objects around him – and by the apparent meaninglessness of his own existence. This overwhelming sensation, which he calls “nausea”, forms the crux of the novel. Written in the form of a diary, “Nausea” describes Roquentin’s efforts to understand the origins and nature of his existential crisis.
Reasons to read Nausea
“Nausea” is regarded as a masterpiece of 20th-century literature, primarily for its philosophical and psychological depth, rather than its plot. Jean-Paul Sartre was a leading French author and existentialist philosopher. As an author, he is best known for his plays “No Exit” (“Huis-clos”) and “The Devil and the Good Lord” (“Le diable et le bon dieu”), and for his novels “Nausea” (“La Nausée”) and the “The Roads to Freedom” (“Les chemins de la liberté”). Sartre was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1964, which he famously declined. “Nausea”, also published in English as “The Diary of Antoine Roquentin”, was Sartre’s debut novel and earned him widespread recognition.
Setting: Le Havre (France)
Book set in France: The fictional town of Bouville is thought to be based on Le Havre, where Sartre was living when he wrote this book.
Original title: La nausée
Year of publication: 1938
Nr of pages: 192
