Name: the maids and deathwatch two plays by jean genet
Price: 381.00 ZAR
Availability: InStock
Author: Jean-Paul Sartre
ISBN: 9780802150561

portada the maids and deathwatch two plays by jean genet

the maids and deathwatch two plays by jean genet

Type

Physical Book

Author

Jean Genet

Preface by

Jean-Paul Sartre

Publisher

Grove Press

Language

English

Format

Paperback

Dimensions

21.2 x 13.7 x 1.2 cm

Weight

0.19 kg.

ISBN

080215056X

ISBN13

9780802150561

Synopsis "the maids and deathwatch two plays by jean genet"

The two plays collected in this volume represent Genet's first attempts to analyze the mores of a bourgeois society he had previously been content simply to vilify. In The Maids, two domestic workers, deeply resentful of their inferior social position, try to revenge themselves against society by destroying their employer. When their attempt to betray their mistress's lover to the police fails and they are in danger of being found out, they dream of murdering Madame, little aware of the true power behind their darkest fantasy. In Deathwatch, two convicts try to impress a third, who is on the verge of achieving legendary status in criminal circles. But neither realizes the lengths to which they will go to gain respect or that, in the end, nothing they can do--including murder--will get them what they are searching for.

Jean-Paul Sartre

(Preface by)

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Jean-Paul Sartre (Paris, June 21, 1905 – April 15, 1980) was a French philosopher, novelist, playwright, and political activist, considered the main representative of existentialism and a key figure in twentieth-century thought. He studied at the École Normale Supérieure, where he met Simone de Beauvoir, his lifelong intellectual and romantic partner.

His most influential philosophical work, Being and Nothingness (1943), develops an ontology based on the radical freedom of human beings, proposing that “existence precedes essence,” meaning we are not predetermined and must construct ourselves through our choices. In literature, he stood out with Nausea (1938) and the play No Exit (1944), where he addressed the absurdity of existence and human relationships.

Sartre was also a committed political activist: he participated in the French Resistance during World War II, supported decolonization movements, and was critical of capitalism and totalitarianism. In 1964, he declined the Nobel Prize in Literature, believing that a writer should not be institutionalized.

He died in 1980, leaving a philosophical and literary legacy that continues to influence ethics, politics, and existential theory.

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