Existentialism

Imagine being in hell waiting for your torturer to come but instead you're put into a well furnished decorative room, yet you have to share with others. Is this still hell?. Jean Paul Sartre plays with this idea of hell, existentialism, and dramatic tensions to create the play and characters in “No Exit” . To create this play Sartre uses the idea of a “triangle” to create dramatic tensions through each character's faults and then slowly exposing these faults to the others in the room. By doing this

everything to fulfilling the needs of his family. Kafka’s existentialist perspective on the meaning of life is illustrated through the use of the protagonist of Gregor Samsa. Existentialism is a philosophy “concerned with finding self and the meaning of life through free will, choice, and personal responsibility” (Existentialism). Gregor is unable to fulfill the existentialist view of finding meaning in one’s life; he acted only according to what his family wanted. Kafka’s belief that there is no meaning

Existentialism is a philosophy that emphasizes the idea of freedom of choice and that choices made should be made alone and not with the assistance of others or by society’s standards. From the point of view of an existentialist they accept the risk and responsibilities of their choices, along with whatever consequences follow. This is especially true in the novel written by Albert Camus titled The Stranger, a book about a man named Meursault’s who lives an existentialist life style. Throughout The

empty. First popularized in Ivan Turgenev’s Fathers and Sons in 1862, nihilism is associated with a revolutionary movement that occurred in Russia from 1814 to 1876. The principles of nihilism often can be linked with those of utilitarianism, existentialism, and anarchism. Dostoevsky demonstrates his aversion to this philosophy through

Happiness: a Human Disease -- An Examination of the Allegorical Theme of Existentialism in the Happy Man The short story, “The Happy Man” by Naguib Mahfouz, discusses the human condition, presenting existentialism as its central theme. Specifically, the story seeks to illustrate unhappiness of the common man and the effect it has on his life. It is an allegorical piece, in which the unnamed protagonist showcases the state of the human as unhappy; only scarcely finding joy. Indeed, the euphoric feeling

The progression of societal beliefs regarding our approach towards death is dependent upon the changing nature of both cultural and historical contexts. In Donne’s Holy Sonnet ‘Death be not proud’ he uses second person narration to address “Death” as “thou”, “thee” and “thy”, death is not considered conceptually but anthropomorphised as the poems fundamental pride. In ‘Death be not proud’, we see how the rumination of death is shaped by Elizabethan values. Through the subverted Petrarchan structure

deepen their interpersonal relationships. Expanding on Glasser’s ideas, existentialism and the choices it offers, gives an individual the opportunity to experience freedom. They are no longer tied to a deterministic view of life, but are instead given license to create the life they wish to have, unencumbered by the weight of societal, cultural, or familial expectations (Corey, 2013). Both choice theory and existentialism closely mirror ideas taught in Protestant Christianity: people are free

Amir was a son of a well-to –do business man, Baba, and had a delightful and privileged childhood in Afghanistan. Amir’s life as depicted in the novel reflects literary existentialism as he struggles to create an identity for himself and attempts to exercise his choices in the troubled relationships in a world that riddled with class and racial prejudices. He unintentionally lets his friend Hasan to be raped by teenage bullies

Ernest Becker once said, “Man is literally split in two: he has an awareness of his own splendid uniqueness in that he sticks out of nature with a towering majesty, and yet he goes back into the ground a few feet in order blindly and dumbly to rot and disappear forever.” In his novel The Denial of Death, Ernest Becker explores the fragility of religion and explores how religion is a illusory quest for the immortality formula. Albert Camus’s upbring in French Algeria gave him a unique perspective

The world we live in is an odd one; some cope with its absurdities through intensive faith, others through utter disregard of all its meaning. Existentialism, however, leads us down a peculiar path that blurs these concepts into one unique belief system. While we might be faced with situations beyond our complete control, we do have the power to control how we handle said situations and whether or not we choose to cultivate significance from them. The search for significance is very primitive and