SARTRE

1905-1980
French philosopher and playwright
Seven years younger than Brecht, so contemporaries, but as our
introduction says, Sartre’s plays were more or less conventional
in style, though not in content
So not really a realist either, explored impossible situations,
famously No Exit with “hell is other people”

Deemed an “Existentialist-Marxist”
Post-WWII, political character to his work
Reworked/built on Hegelian master-slave dynamics
A general theme in them is the intersection of the psychological
and the sociological, which, WWII, so makes sense
Individual agency/responsibility, complicity, social/historical
determinism from his philosophical work applied to theater,
here

His conceptualizations of Freedom and Situation, from his

philosophical work, are particularly relevant here and come up
a lot in the text, so to touch on those briefly,
His idea of freedom is a denial of determinism. Vehemently
opposes a deterministic worldview, that the past determines our
choices. We make our own choices; in fact, we can only make
our own choices.

That being said, we don’t make choices in a vacuum either, he

acknowledges socio-historical realities, “the human condition”,
that oppression exists and “we live in a society” as it were

For A Theater of Situations, the text we are reading today,

basically calls for an application of this philosophy in theater

Tragedy is defined by freedom, is all about making choices,

and tragic fate doesn’t equal determinism, just
consequences/reaffirmations of our choices

Psychological theater meaning a deterministic understanding of

the world, where there is no choice, we are beholden to our
pasts, histories, genetics, etc. past drives the plot, no room for
agency
Agrees with Nietzsche here that Euripides killed tragedy,
essentially
Doesn’t specifically call out realists, but they would fall under
psychological theater as well, I think.

Neo-Aristotelian understanding of character and tragedy.

Tragic hero/character should be responsible for their own
downfall, and character only happens/emerges after a choice is
made
A decision made in a situation
Decision to die, ultimate decision to reaffirm self and freedom,
pursuing it even to its end, kind of

What we can gather from this, according to Sartre,

 theater should be “deeply human”, “universal and
extreme”, not particular and commonplace, I guess
 The goal of the theater is to “unite/unify” the audience
 It should also “immerse” and “move us”
 Theater’s universal problems/situations should be
relevant to the age. Antigone is nice and all, but where
would we really be faced with that question today?
Otherwise Neo-Classical, in terms of character and the
importance of decision/choice, but of the mind that
themes must respond to the moment
A theater that is formally not very fashionable or cool,
but of the moment/cutting edge in terms of content
 A semi-practical guide? to aspiring playwrights. Choose
a conflict of your age that that concerns you, than work
from there.
 Again, somewhat humble/reasonable goal in mind, to
make sure theater regains “its lost resonance”
 But not very romantic or anything, tragedy isn’t really
the end all be all, the goal isn’t to set society right, or
theater the only recourse of humanity etc.