
You don’t come to Sartre for hugs and affirmations.
You don’t open Nausea looking for happy endings or life hacks.
You open it because deep down, you already know.
Life’s not a party; it’s a long, drawn-out punchline, and you’re the poor sap waiting for the laugh track that never comes.
Jean-Paul Sartre knew it too. He wrote Nausea in 1938, probably chain-smoking in a dingy Parisian room with a view of nothing.
The novel follows Antoine Roquentin, a historian who’s cracking under the weight of existence. The world around him becomes too much—too real, too heavy, too absurd.
It’s like waking up one day and realizing you’re not the main character. You’re just another warm body in a cosmic joke.
Sartre was the godfather of existentialism, and Nausea was his manifesto in novel form.
Think Camus, but sweatier. Think Kafka, but French. This is a book that doesn’t just talk about life’s absurdity—it grabs you by the collar and rubs your nose in it.
Let’s break it down into five moments that hit like a shot of whiskey chased with regret.
1. The Root of Nausea: The Chestnut Tree Scene
Here’s where it all starts to unravel, where the thin veil between the ordinary and the absurd gets ripped to shreds.
Roquentin is just sitting there, minding his business by a chestnut tree, maybe thinking about lunch or the weather—normal, harmless thoughts.
And then it happens. The world sucker-punches him, right in the gut, with no warning and no mercy.
He looks at the tree root, and for the first time in his life, he sees it. Not as a tree root, not as part of the scenery, but as this hideous, throbbing thing.
It’s there—brutally, unavoidably there. It’s not just some backdrop to his existence; it’s a thing, existing in its own grotesque, pointless way.
And suddenly, he feels sick. Not a little queasy, like when you eat a bad clam or drink gas station wine. This is deeper. This is a sickness that curls up in your chest and spreads through your veins.
The root, with its twisted, gnarled fingers, isn’t romantic. It’s not beautiful. There’s no poetry in it, no secret meaning hiding beneath the bark.
It’s obscene. Its existence is so raw, so there that it becomes unbearable. The bark presses against his mind, heavy and absurd, mocking every thought he’s ever had about order or meaning.
And that’s the truth Sartre smacks you with. The chestnut tree doesn’t care about you.
It doesn’t care about Roquentin. It doesn’t care about anything. It just exists, indifferent, silent, stupidly solid.
The universe is the same way. No sugarcoating, no gentle metaphors, no comforting lies. Sartre shoves your face into the fact that existence is just that: brutal, undeniable, and utterly pointless.
You can dress it up with philosophy or religion or art, but at the end of the day, it’s still just a tree root, sitting there in the dirt, daring you to look at it and not lose your mind.
2. The Diary: Roquentin’s Mirror
Roquentin writes everything down in this ragged little diary, pouring himself out in ink like a man bleeding onto the page.
It’s not pretty. It’s not polished. It’s like someone’s confessional after three bottles of cheap wine and no sleep.
There’s no filter, no careful phrasing to make himself look smart or noble. It’s raw, jagged, and messy, like his thoughts are clawing their way out of his skull, desperate to be heard.
He isn’t just trying to make sense of the world. No, the real fight is closer to home. He’s trying to untangle himself, figure out what the hell he’s doing here, breathing air, moving through days that feel like heavy sludge.
And it’s not going well. Not at all. Every word he writes feels like an argument with himself—an endless tug-of-war between wanting answers and knowing there aren’t any.
And that diary? It pulls you in like quicksand. There’s no buffer, no safe distance between you and Roquentin’s unraveling. You’re not just reading his thoughts; you’re drowning in them.
He drags you down into the muck of his mind, into the dark corners where every comforting illusion has been stripped away.
It’s intimate in the worst way, like walking in on someone crying in the bathroom, but instead of backing out, you’re forced to stay and listen.
His words are uncomfortably close, sticking to you like sweat in a crowded room. You can’t look away, even when it feels too personal, too raw, like you’re reading the diary of a man who doesn’t know if he’ll make it to tomorrow.
It’s not the kind of diary you want to read. It’s the kind you can’t stop reading.
3. People Are Gross: The Cafe Scene
Roquentin doesn’t just feel nauseated by the world around him—the roots, the walls, the suffocating weight of existence.
People make him sick, too. The way they move, the way they breathe, the way they go about their lives like everything’s fine when nothing is.
There’s a scene, simple enough on paper. Roquentin sits in a cafe, probably hoping for some kind of distraction, maybe a little peace. And then he sees this man eating a sandwich. It’s harmless at first. Bread, meat, chewing—it’s basic stuff. But the longer Roquentin watches, the less human the man becomes.
The guy’s jaw starts to look like a hinge, his throat like a drainpipe. His hands move like gears in a machine. Chew, swallow, chew, swallow. The sandwich disappears bite by bite, but there’s nothing behind it. No spark of humanity. No soul. Just this grotesque process of food going in and disappearing down a fleshy conveyor belt.
Roquentin stares and feels his stomach turn. This isn’t a person, not anymore. It’s just biology in action, a bag of organs doing what it’s programmed to do. The man doesn’t seem aware of how absurd he looks, which makes it worse. He’s chewing like his existence makes sense, like he’s not just a piece of meat waiting to rot.
It’s not just the man, though. It’s all of us. Roquentin’s sitting there, disgusted, because he knows this scene isn’t special. People are machines, walking around pretending to be more. Eating, sleeping, working, screwing—what’s the difference between that and some factory assembly line?
You ever sit on a bus, look at the guy next to you, and feel a little freaked out by how human he isn’t? The way his hands grip the pole, the way his mouth hangs slightly open, the way his chest rises and falls like a broken bellows? That’s this scene in a nutshell.
The sandwich man is just the beginning. Once you see it, you can’t unsee it. Everyone starts looking like they’re held together with duct tape and bad habits, just functioning until they stop.
4. Love Is a Joke: Anny
Enter Anny. She’s not just some girl from Roquentin’s past; she’s a walking wound, raw and beautiful in that way people are when they’re too broken to hide it. She’s intense, sure, the kind of intense that feels like staring into a black hole. Beautiful, but dangerous. Beautiful, but heavy.
It’s been years since they’ve seen each other, and when they finally meet again, it’s not fireworks. It’s not even a spark. It’s awkward, like two people standing in the rubble of something they once tried to build, unsure whether to cry or just walk away.
Roquentin still feels something for her, or at least he thinks he does. He wants connection, redemption, maybe even a second chance at meaning.
But Anny’s not here for that. She doesn’t want to rekindle the old flame or patch things up. She wants something bigger. Something she can’t even name. It’s like she’s reaching for a star that burned out long before she even knew it existed.
Their conversation is a slow-motion train wreck. Roquentin says the wrong things. Anny says things that don’t make sense. They’re both lost, floundering in their own existential crises, hoping the other might throw a rope, but all they’re doing is pulling each other further down.
He wants her to play the role he’s written for her in his mind—the muse, the lover, the savior—but Anny’s not interested in playing along. She’s got her own chaos to deal with.
It’s like two ships passing in the night, but there’s no poetry to it. One’s sinking, leaking desperation and regret, and the other’s already at the bottom of the ocean, its crew long gone.
Sartre doesn’t romanticize it. Love isn’t a solution. It’s not the light at the end of the tunnel or the glue that holds it all together. It’s just another layer of absurdity, another way to remind you how alone you really are.
You can reach for someone, but they’re reaching for something else, and even if you touch, it’s never enough.
In the end, Anny isn’t Roquentin’s salvation. She’s just another ghost haunting the wreckage of his life, a reminder that relationships don’t save you. They just hold up a mirror, and what you see in it isn’t pretty.
5. The Ending: A Shrug and a Cigarette
By the end of the novel, Roquentin is standing at the edge of everything, staring into the void, and the void doesn’t bother staring back.
He doesn’t get the answers he’s been clawing for. He doesn’t find a grand purpose or a neat little bow to tie around existence. Life doesn’t work like that. Life doesn’t care.
But he makes a choice. A small, almost laughable choice in the grand scheme of things. He decides to write a novel.
Not because it’ll save him, not because it’ll make him happy or give his life meaning. It’s not even about the novel. It’s about doing something. Anything. It’s about moving forward, even if you’re just dragging your feet through the mud.
And that’s the punchline, isn’t it? After all the nausea, all the soul-crushing realizations about the absurdity of existence, the big climax isn’t a revelation or an epiphany. It’s a shrug and a decision to keep going. Roquentin doesn’t transcend his despair. He just learns to live with it.
The ending isn’t grand or sweeping. It doesn’t rise to meet you with a symphony or a sunrise. It’s quiet, anticlimactic, like a man lighting a cigarette in an empty room.
But that’s the beauty of it. Sartre isn’t interested in giving you a happy ending. He’s not here to make you feel good about yourself or your place in the universe. He’s here to remind you that life is absurd, and the only way to survive it is to face it head-on.
So Roquentin chooses to write. Not because it matters, but because it’s something to do. Write, paint, armwrestle—whatever keeps you upright. Just don’t fool yourself into thinking it means anything.
Sartre’s message is clear: there’s no escape from the absurdity of existence. You’re stuck here, just like the rest of us. But maybe that’s okay. Maybe it’s enough to just keep moving, one meaningless step at a time. Because in the end, what else are you going to do?
Life’s a Bad Joke, and You’re It
So, what does Sartre leave us with? A middle finger to meaning. A smirk at the chaos. Roquentin doesn’t walk away enlightened, with the secret to life tucked under his arm like a paperback.
No, he staggers off the page with the same nausea gnawing at him, the same absurdity pressing on his chest.
The world didn’t change. He just learned to look it in the eye without blinking.
Sartre’s world isn’t a bleak pit of doom. Sure, it’s heavy—existence is crushing when you think about it too long. But it’s also ridiculous, so absurd that it loops back around to being funny.
The chestnut tree, the sandwich guy, the whole messy parade of existence—it’s a joke. A weird, stupid, cosmic joke.
And here’s the trouble: you’re part of it. You exist. You’re here, reading these words, breathing, blinking, digesting your lunch. How is that not insane? It’s absurd. But if you tilt your head just right, it’s funny, too.
The chestnut tree is still sitting there, oblivious to everything. The guy in the cafe is still chewing his sandwich like a machine that doesn’t know it’s broken. And you? You’re still here, trying to make sense of all this madness.
So, what do you do? You laugh. You write. You grab a drink and raise a toast to the chaos.
You find something to do—not because it’ll fix the absurdity, but because it’s all you’ve got. You’re here, so you might as well live, even if it doesn’t mean a damn thing.
The joke’s not on you. You are the joke. You, with your messy, complicated existence, trying to carve meaning out of a world that couldn’t care less. And there’s nothing funnier—or more human—than that.
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