A book a day: Jean-Paul Sartre: The Kidnapped of Altona

Original language: French

Original title: The kidnapped people of Altona

Translation: Aurora Bernardez

Year of publication: 1959

Valuation: Okay (Recommended for devotees and completists)

Since that unfortunate day when I dared to put a Disappointing to my dear Antonio Machado, now ‘There is no one who can stop me’as the song says. The great Sartre could be the next one to put the rubber bands on.

The old philosopher and writer, inspiration for entire generations, used, among other formats, the dramatic medium to expose ideas about the individual, society or political issues of the moment, sometimes literally and other times resorting to allegory. And since most of his theatrical work is set in the middle of the last century, the weight of the experiences of Nazism and war is very present. On this occasion, attention converges on Frantzwho was a combatant on the Russian front although he had previously tried to help a Pole escape from a concentration camp. The strange episode he experienced in his youth has not been erased from his memory, although he later showed himself to be a fervent Nazi.

Frantz He has been voluntarily isolated in a room in the family home for years and we could say that at this point he does not seem mentally very stable, to which his mysterious sister, who is his only interlocutor, eagerly contributes. Despite his confinement, Frantz He cannot be free from the family problems that arise when his father, a rich businessman, announces that he is suffering from a terminal illness.

So diverse circumstances come together around the character, which will form an apparently simple plot but which hides multiple perspectives: the turbulent past of Frantzthe future of the family business, the complex and murky feelings of the characters. Sartre introduces essential questions about life, guilt, loneliness, fidelity, and then an argument that seemed to focus on the aftermath of Nazism moves towards the terrain of existentialism. Decisions not made, or those that were adopted to lead to dead ends, end up weighing decisively, even on the characters who seemed best to face the crossroads of life.

The work is not without interest, of course, it is not for nothing that it is written by one of the most brilliant thinkers of the century. One can dwell on the psychology of the characters, their hidden inclinations, their weaknesses. Or in the blame of German society for the rise of Nazism, in those who prospered in its shadow and try to progress in new times. We can delve into the dilemma of the ex-combatant, between a Germany devastated by war but faithful to its supposed national spirit and a country reborn at the cost of renouncing its essences. Many points for a careful analysis in the field of existentialism, both individual and collective.

But let’s not forget that this is a play, and in that perspective is where in my opinion it does not stand up to analysis. Putting all these ingredients in a dialogic fiction seems almost reckless to me. We are in a format designed so that the viewer remains attentive to the characters for hours and hours and, regardless of whether in that time the viewer experiences more or less sensations, they should be offered something more than dark interventions under which conflicts are hidden. and reactions that are not easy to perceive on the fly. Sartre’s dialogues, long, winding and full of meanings, are almost always tedious, with so much and varied load that they generate more perplexity than anything else, other than boredom.

Perhaps in this case the work is more appropriate to be read than to see it performed. Or maybe, instead of continuing the theatrical night with dinner or a few drinks, set up a discussion to unravel, each with their own perceptions, the large number of things that they have wanted to tell us. In any case, I think that Don Juan Pablo, who left us so many interesting things, also in dramatic format, had much better moments.

Other works by Jean-Paul Sartre reviewed in ULAD: Nausea, Existentialism is a humanism, Dirty hands, Behind closed doors