SARTRE AND THE MEDIA

Also by Michael Scriven

SARTRE'S EXISTENTIAL BIOGRAPHIES

PAUL NIZAN: COMMUNIST NOVELIST

EUROPEAN SOCIALIST REALISM

WAR AND SOCIETY IN TWENTIETH-CENTURY FRANCE

Sartre and the Media

MICHAEL SCRIVEN Professor of French Studies

University of Bath

150th YEAR

M St. Martin's Press

© Michael Scriven 1993 Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 1993

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Scriven, Michael, 1947-Sartre and the media / Michael Scriven. p. cm. Includes bibliographical referenc(.>s and index. ISBN 978-0-312-10617-1 1. Sartre, Jean Paul, 1905- 2. Mass media-france-Influence. 3. Philosophy, French-20th century. I. Title. B2430.534S37 1993 194--dc20 93-31332

CIP

I

For Sara and Jonathan

If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear

George Orwell

Contents

List of Abbreviations viii List of Tables ix Preface x Acknowledgenu:nts xiii

1 Initial Considerations 1 2 Intellectual and Cultural Divisions 5 3 Politics and the Media 11 4 Sartre and the Press 24 5 Sartre and Radio Broadcasting 71 6 Sartre and Television Broadcasting 94 7 Freedom of Expression 116

Notes and References 121 Bibliography 138 Index 149

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List of Abbreviations --------------------------------------------------

CGT FNL FO GP INA MRP ORTF PCF RDR RPF RTF RTL SFIO SFP UJCML

Confederation Generale du Travail Front National de Liberation Force Ouvriere Gauche Proletarienne Institut National de I' Audiovisuel Mouvement Republicain Populaire Office de Radio-Television Fran\ais Parti Communiste Fran\ais Rassemblement Democratique Revolutionnaire Rassemblement du Peuple Fran~ise Radio-Television Fran\aise Radio-Television Luxembourg Section Fran~ise de l'Intemationale Ouvriere Societe Fran~aise de Production Union des Jeunesses Communistes Marxistes­Leninistes

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List of Tables

4.1 Sartre and the Press 26 5.1 'Tribune des Temps Modernes': October-November

1947 76

ix

Preface

On 19 April 1980,50,000 people spontaneously took to the streets of Paris to pay tribute to Sartre at the moment of his death. The sheer size of the crowd surrounding the funeral cortege as it made its way towards Montparnasse cemetery said far more about the significance of Sartre than could have been expressed in words. This was, as Claude Lanzmann remarked at the time, the 'final demonstration of May 1968',1 a silent protest against the death of the contemporary left-wing writer and intellectual who above all others symbolised French popular moral conscience. It has become fashionable during the past decade which has witnessed tht: progressive demise of communism and the collapse of the Soviet Union, to denigrate aspects of Sartre's political itinerary, to criticise his links with totalitarian regimes and sys­tems, in particular to compare Sartre unfavourably with Raymond Aron, to assert that Aron was in the final analysis 'right', and that Sartre was 'wrong'. These criticisms, however justifiable in terms of specific instances, none the less miss the fundamental point that those present at Sartre's funeral were making on the streets of Paris. In the post-war period, Sartre, through his solidarity with the socially disadvantaged in their effort to gain a better life, became a symbol of the struggle for freedom and justice. Beyond Sartre's achievements as a philosopher and as a writer, beyond the errors of judgement that he unquestionably made at certain moments in his political itinerary, what remains is the exem­plary quality of Sartre's existence: the refusal to be ensnared in the ritualistic chains of institutional honours; the quest for authenticity and the rejection of intellectual complacency and self­satisfaction; the commitment to defend and promote the cause of the underprivileged both at home and abroad. Sartre remains important because he symbolises the aspiration towards popular liberation. This exemplary quality is at the heart of the account that follows.

To write a book on Sartre is to make a choice: a choice of subject-matter and approach. To write a second book on Sartre is to confirm the validity of an original choice. Although the

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Preface xi

subject-matter of this book, Sartre's relationship with the media, is quite distinct from that of my first book on Sartre, centred on the nature and development of a biographical project, there is none the less an underlying continuity to the two narratives. It has always struck me that more than any other writer Sartre cannot be adequately represented by a particular text or by a particular series of texts. Not only does Sartre's significance extend beyond the limitations of conventional writing categories, but also his importance is located as much in the social, political and ideological sphere as it is in the philosophical, literary or cultural domain. It is, of course, possible to select texts such as La Nausee, L'Etre et Ie neant or Les Mots, as Sartre's finest achievements, especially worthy of our attention. The difficulty with such an approach, however, is that it tends to focus attention on Sartre's importance as a creator of cultural products designed for aesthetic contemplation and admiration, rather than as an instigator of a dynamiC process aimed at raising cultural awareness, at prompt­ing the reader to a radical re-evaluation of his/her life. As Sartre pOintedly remarked in 1968, 'the only way to learn is to protest'.2

My approach to Sartre in 1993, therefore, remains consistent with that adopted in 1984. Sartre's work constitutes for me the site of an interactive process, not a collection of finished cultural products. To use Sartre's own terminology, cultural production is synonymous with the free appeal of the committed writer to the freedom of the reader/listener / viewer. In this sense, Sartre's involvement in the media is most accurately perceived as a series of interventions in the political and ideological disputes of his time. To examine Sartre's relationship with the press, radio and television is therefore to pay as much attention to the social and political context in which Sartre's media interventions occurred, as to the printed/ audiovisual form and content of the interven­tions themselves. In other words, the very subject-matter of this book redefines the nature of the debate about Sartre; discussion is extended from the purely formal and cultural sphere to include wider social and political issues.

Ostensibly, then, the substantive theme of this book is the nature and development of Sartre's relationship with the media in France during the post-war period. However, as will become clear in the course of the argument, this detailed account of one particular facet of Sartre's activities, interesting as it might be in its own right, is aimed ultimately at giving prominence to the

xii Preface

exemplary quality of Sartre's existence as a committed French writer and intellectual. To study Sartre's relationship with the press, radio and television, in short, is to offer an explanation why 50,000 people transformed his funeral into the 'final demon­stration of May 1968'.

The responsibility for the ideas expressed in this book is entirely my own. I would, however, like to take this opportunity to thank a number of people who have been of particular assis­tance to me in the course of my research into Sartre's relationship with the media. First, and above all, I would like to record my gratitude to Liliane Siegel who generously shared with me on numerous occasions her privileged personal recollections of Sar­tre. My discussions with Liliane enabled me to gain a direct and invaluable insight into the reality of Sartre's lived experience. Second, I wish to thank Michel Contat who readily and frequently responded to my questions on Sartre's work, and whose extensive knowledge of the whole range of Sartre's output assisted me in deepening my awareness of the particular sphere of Sartrean activity analysed in this book. Third, I would like generally to thank the many people who over the past four years have dis­cussed with me Sartre's links with the press, radio and television; more specifically, I wish to thank Benny Levy and Olivier Todd, both of whom, in different ways, prompted me to re-evaluate Sartre from a stimulatingly new perspective. Finally, I would like to thank the British Academy for the award of a research grant which enabled me to carry out work in Paris on Sartre and the media.

Acknowledgements

A version of chapter 5 first appeared in Modern and Contemporary France, 43, October 1990. A version of chapter 6 first appeared in French Cultural Studies, vol. 1, part 3, October 1990. I am grateful to the editors and publishers for permission to reprint.

All translations are my own.

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