No Exit and Three Other Plays

这本集子最锋利的地方，是萨特把「地狱」从宗教想象里抽走，换成一句冷硬的人间判词：他人即地狱。《禁闭》里三个人困于一室，爱也爱不上、恨也恨不脱，彼此的目光成了无法逃离的刑具——没有酷吏，狱卒就是彼此。读者反复记住的正是这种「关系即牢笼」的窒息感：不是外在的惩罚，而是我们如何被他人的注视钉在原地。其余三篇各有所指，从俄瑞斯忒斯旧事的现代重写到对美国种族问题的尖锐抨击，共同点是拒绝给出安慰的答案。它适合愿意被冒犯的读者：如果你寻求清晰结论或情感抚慰，这里只会留下不安；若你享受被逼到墙角逼问自身处境，这四出戏值得反复咀嚼。

Novelist, playwright, and biographer Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-80) is widely considered one of the greatest philosophers of the twentieth century. His major works include "No Exit," "Nausea," "The Wall," "The Age of Reason," "Critique of Dialectical Reason," "Being and Nothingness," and "Roads to Freedom," an allegory of man's search for commitment, and not, as the man at the off-licence says, an everyday story of French country folk.