Nausea
by Jean-Paul Sartre · La Nausée
Assigned by 1 of the 9 reading lists, catalogue entry only
- Written
- 1938
- Form
- Novel
- Language
- French
- Length
- Medium · 180 pp120 to 300 pages
- Difficulty
- Demanding3 of 5 for a first-year reader
We recommendNausea, translated by Lloyd AlexanderNew Directions, 2013The long-standing English text, with Hayden Carruth's introduction.
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The diary of Antoine Roquentin, a solitary historian living in the seaside town of Bouville while he researches a biography of an obscure eighteenth-century marquis. Ordinary objects begin to unsettle him: a pebble on the beach, a glass of beer, his own hand. He gives up the biography, quarrels with a self-taught humanist who has read the library in alphabetical order, and in a park before a chestnut tree root he sees existence itself, gratuitous and without justification. At the end a jazz record suggests the only way out he can imagine, which is to make something.
No reading guide yet
The catalogue entry above is complete: the dates, the form, the themes and every program that assigns Nausea are verified against each program's published list.
What is missing is the part that takes real work: the summary, the key passages, and a recommended translation. The edition named below is the one most programs assign, so the buy links are useful already.
