Jean-Paul Sartre Quotes

Life is nothing until it is lived; but it is yours to make sense of and the value of it is nothing else but the sense that you choose.

I exist. It's sweet, so sweet, so slow. And light: you'd think it floated all by itself. It stirs. It brushes by me, melts and vanishes. Gently, gently. There is bubbling water in my throat, it caresses me- and now it comes up again into my mouth. For ever I shall have a little pool of whitish water in my mouth - lying low - grazing my tongue. And this pool is still me. And the tongue. And the throat is me.

Tonight I love you in a way that you have not known in me: I am neither worn down by travels nor wrapped up in the desire for your presence. I am mastering my love for you and turning it inwards as a constituent element of myself. This happens much more often than I admit to you, but seldom when I’m writing to you. Try to understand me: I love you while paying attention to external things. At Toulouse I simply loved you. Tonight I love you on a spring evening. I love you with the window open. You are mine, and things are mine, and my love alters the things around me and the things around me alter my love.

I have no religion, but if I were to choose one, it would be that of Shariati's.

J'existe, c'est tout.

I marvel at these young people: drinking their coffee, they tell clear, plausible stories. If they are asked what they did yesterday, they aren't embarrassed: they bring you up to date in a few words. If I were in their place, I'd fall all over myself.

J'ai commencé ma vie comme je la finirai sans doute : au milieu des livres.

I live in the past. I take everything that has happened to me and arrange it. From a distance like that, it doesn't do any harm, you'd almost let yourself be caught in it. Our whole story is fairly beautiful. I give it a few prods and it makes a whole string of perfect moments. Then I close my eyes and try to imagine that I'm still living inside it.

Consciousness is a being the nature of which is to be conscious of the nothingness of its being.

That’s what existence means: draining one’s own self dry without the sense of thirst.

For an occurrence to become an adventure, it is necessary and sufficient for one to recount it.

I don't even bother looking for words. It flows in me, more or less quickly. I fix nothing, I let it go. Through the lack of attaching myself to words, my thoughts remain nebulous most of the time. They sketch vague, pleasant shapes and then are swallowed up: I forget them almost immediately.

It's just what people do when they're getting old, when they're sick of themselves and their life; they think of money and take care of themselves.

Thus it amounts to the same thing whether one gets drunk alone or is a leader of nations.

I wanted the moments of my life to follow and order themselves like those of a life remembered. You might as well try and catch time by the tail.