Jean-Paul Sartre worked on 'Being and Nothingness' while a prisoner of war

Sartre spent his time in the French Army working on a novel

The writer's physical limitations (including partial blindness and balance issues) prohibited him from serving on the front lines. Instead, he worked as a military meteorologist. The job was not very demanding, so he spent most of his time writing. He told Simone de Beauvoir it was "extremely peaceful work; indeed I cannot think of any branch of the services that has a quieter, more poetic job."

Sartre staged his first play in a POW camp

While imprisoned by the Nazis, the French writer was given permission to write and produce a Christmas show for 15,000 of his fellow POWs. He took the opportunity to produce "Bariona, or the Son of Thunder," a Nativity play that subtly criticized his captors without arousing their suspicions.

Sartre eventually denounced communism

The French philosopher was a long-time ardent supporter of communism and the USSR. He finally spoke out against the movement with the 1956 Soviet invasion of Hungary, saying that the move was "made possible by 12 years of terror and imbecility."

Jean-Paul Sartre rejected his Nobel Prize for literature

Sartre won the award in 1964, but refused it, explaining, "The writer must therefore refuse to let himself be transformed into an institution, even if this occurs under the most honorable circumstances, as in the present case."

Novelist Richard Wright joined the existentialists in Paris

The author of “Black Boy” and “Native Son” left the United States in 1946 to escape his home country’s racial inequality. In Paris, he explored existentialist ideas and spent time with Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre. “The Outsider,” a novel he wrote while living in France, embraced many of the philosophy’s central themes.

Jean-Paul Sartre believed 'existence precedes essence'

The existentialist figurehead argued that humans are not born with an identity or purpose; instead, they develop them throughout their lives. For Sartre, this meant making meaning for oneself rather than relying on authorities (like religion or government) to provide it.

Camus and Sartre admired each other's work before becoming friends

The two writers, who would later be considered two of the biggest names associated with existentialism, wrote positive reviews of each others' early work, with Camus praising Sartre's novel "Nausea" and story collection "The Wall" and, later, Sartre favorably compared Camus' "The Stranger" to Franz Kafka and Ernest Hemingway. Still, their reviews included some critiques, hinting at the larger disagreements that would come much later.

Jean-Paul Sartre was amazed by American jazz

The French philosopher wrote about a 1947 trip to a New York jazz club as a transcendent experience, describing the magic of the relationship between performer and audience: "You shout, they shriek, they whistle, they are possessed, you are possessed."

Camus edited an underground newspaper during World War II

The paper, called "Combat," was aligned with the French Resistance fighting against the Nazi occupation. Like his fiction, his journalism was clear-eyed: When Hiroshima and Nagaski were bombed, he criticized the many writers impressed with the destruction, writing, "our technical civilization has just reached its greatest level of savagery."

Champagne played a role in resisting the Nazis

When France surrendered to the Nazis in 1940, the invaders occupied the north. This was home to wine regions like Champagne and Bordeaux, which the Nazis were eager to loot. Winemakers took a stand by sheltering dissidents in their cellars, passing intelligence across borders, and even giving their lives to the cause.

Existentialist writer Jean-Paul Sartre coined the famous phrase 'Hell is—other people' in his play 'No Exit'

Sartre wrote an 8-hour screenplay for a Freud biopic

Sartre was hired to write the screenplay for what would eventually become John Huston's 1962 film "Freud: The Secret Passion," about the life of the psychoanalyst. Sartre, however, had trouble sticking to the parameters of Hollywood. An early draft was estimated to be five hours long. Rather than shortening it, as Huston suggested, Sartre extended it to eight hours and was eventually removed from the production.

Simone de Beauvoir's lone play has mostly been overlooked

Although primarily known as a philosopher, Beauvoir wrote the play "The Useless Mouths," which debuted in Paris in November 1945. The work is about a government allowing "useless" citizens—women, children, the elderly—to starve during a food shortage. While it's not widely staged, some Beauvoir scholars believe it's a significant text that explores many of the existential themes she explores in her other work.

Sartre and de Beauvoir's literary journal was named after a Charlie Chaplin movie

The couple founded the magazine Les Temps Modernes in 1945 and it quickly became essential reading for French intellectuals. Its name came from "Modern Times," Charlie Chaplin's 1936 movie that satirized the industrial revolution's dehumanizing effects.

Jean-Paul Sartre famously wrote that 'Hell is—other people'

The line appears toward the end of the play "No Exit." One character, realizing that he's confined to live out the rest of his days with the play's other two characters, exclaims, "There's no need for red-hot pokers. Hell is—other people!"

Voltaire's writing sent him into exile

In 1717, the writer's satirical poem "La Henriade" landed him in prison for a year. By 1726, the French government's distaste for his work caused him to leave the country for England, though he returned a few years later. That would be short-lived: In 1734, his "Lettres Philosophiques" sent him packing again, moving to Champagne, then Berlin, then Switzerland, before finally returning to Paris in 1778.

The man behind the dark novel abandoned on the floor of the Bastille

As tensions rose in the days before the French Revolution of 1789, Donatien Alphonse François attempted to fan the flames by shouting at passersby about false horrors happening inside the Bastille where he was imprisoned. This 39-minute podcast...

Dreaming under the Nazi Regime

Days after Hitler seized power, a man told psychoanalyst Charlotte Beradt that he had dreamed of being forced to raise his arm in a Nazi salute ("It took me half an hour to get my arm up, inch by inch"). Beradt recorded this dream and many others so they "might one day serve as evidence." This is an English translation of her work, "The Third Reich of Dreams."

Kurt Vonnegut's 'Cat's Cradle' was inspired by the bombing of Hiroshima

The writer fought in World War II and witnessed the firebombing of Dresden, which he recounted in 1969's satirical "Slaughterhouse Five." Six years earlier, though, he wrote about the bombing of Hiroshima in "Cat's Cradle," channeling some of the horror he witnessed in Dresden to write about the dropping of the atomic bomb. (Some users may experience a paywall.)

The story of the 1945 Minnesota Starvation Experiment

Amid the severe conditions of World War II, researchers were eager to learn the effects of starvation in a controlled study. This podcast dives into a yearlong study of 36 men at a Minneapolis college who endured a six-month period of semi-starvation, where their caloric intake was halved. Results from the experiment became a landmark study in human starvation.

Plato's allegory of the cave is a metaphor for the value of learning

In the story, which comes from the Socratic dialogue, "The Republic," a group of prisoners are confined in a cave since birth—chained and facing a wall with a fire behind them, so any glimpses of life were rendered by shadows. One prisoner escapes and lands in a strange and unfamiliar world, an analogy for the role of the philosopher.

The ideas of Einstein and Freud combined in 'The Persistence of Memory'

The Persistence of Memory was painted on a canvas roughly the size of a sheet of paper, depicting a desolate landscape with melting clocks, ants, and a distorted figure. The piece incorporates Freud and Einstein's ideas, resulting in a haunting composition symbolizing time's fluidity and Dalí's personal anxieties.

Pilates was invented by an acrobatic WWI prisoner of war

As the Great War raged on, and as months gave way to years, the imprisoned Joseph Pilates explored a question that he had pondered since childhood: Could he reimagine the capabilities of the human body through an anatomically based method of training, taking inspiration from scientific treatises, the carefree movement of children, and the dexterous ease of cats? Read this article to learn about the birth and legacy of Pilates.

Detailing the horrific conditions of life in the trenches

What was it like to live and fight in a trench during World War I? If you were on the German side you might have bunkers, electricity, and other basic comforts. If you were on the British and French side the conditions have been described as muddy and "horrific". Find out how unpleasant trench warfare was and how it affected WWI soldiers.

John Steinbeck spent 6 years studying at Stanford, but never earned a degree.

Teenager Guy Gabaldon captured the most prisoners in US military history

After the vicious battle of Saipan outside Japan in World War II, the Japanese were opting for suicide rather than surrender. Gabaldon, a Marine with a track record for skillfully convincing the enemy to surrender, managed to capture 800 Japanese single-handedly.

Famed poet TS Eliot rejected the manuscript for George Orwell's political fable 'Animal Farm,' writing that its criticism of authoritarianism was not 'the right point of view.'

American dance legend Martha Graham, sometimes called 'the Picasso of dance,' refused to perform at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin and conceived the piece 'Chronicle' in response to the experience.

Against his wishes, Albert Einstein's brain was removed before his cremation, and the pathologist responsible stored it for decades in mason jars within a beer cooler.

Before writing 'Walden,' transcendentalist Henry David Thoreau nearly burned down his hometown with a campfire that grew out of control.

In 1945, Surrealist artist Salvador Dalí and legendary animator Walt Disney began collaborating on a short film that was not completed until 2003, years after both men had died.

The concept of phantom limbs, the perception that amputated limbs are still present, dates back to a French military surgeon in the 16th century.

During the French Revolution, a botanist's letter asking about "dear Rhus" (poison ivy) was intercepted, leading authorities to suspect he was conspiring with the Russians.

The identity of the Tank Man in the iconic photo from the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests remains unknown and was possibly killed.

In 1915, workers recovered a submarine-like vessel from the Chicago River, prompting fears of German espionage

The Ramones' 'Pet Sematary,' the theme song for the Stephen King novel of the same name, was written while the band was admiring the writer's collection of horror memorabilia.

After her fellow cult members tried to kill her with an LSD-infused hamburger, one member of the Manson Family, the murderous cult led by Charles Manson, decided to testify against the group's leader.

In 1939, baseball star Lou Gehrig delivered his inspirational 'Luckiest Man' speech after retiring due to the health condition that now bears his name.

Explore a list of the 100 best novels of all time, compiled by some of the world's best living writers, including Salman Rushdie, Stephen King, and Jennifer Egan.

Netflix profits when you're not watching, and its movies are designed that way—read a detail-rich critical essay exposing lesser-known Netflix takes

Lesser-known phobias include turophobia, or the fear of cheese, and nomophobia, the fear of being without your cell phone.

In 2025, four executives from large tech companies were given positions in the US Army Reserves—including Palantir Chief Technology Officer Shyam Sankar, which reinforced Palantir's ties with the US military and its role as a leading defense partner.

Warren Buffett's former professor Benjamin Graham is known as the 'father of value investing,' a strategy in which investors seek to buy stocks trading below their intrinsic worth.

'Shogun,' a 1980s TV series, helped popularize sushi in the US by stimulating an American interest in Japanese culture.

Art theft is the third-largest source of criminal revenues worldwide, thanks in part to the subjective nature of valuing a work of art.

The word 'jazz' evolved from 'jasm,' 19th-century American slang for 'energy'

Most of the observable universe's volume consists of voids and supervoids—enormous regions of space with little to no galaxies, stars, or light.

Explore the archaeological treasures of Pompeii, the city buried under volcanic ash when Mount Vesuvius erupted in 79 CE.

How fusion—which releases energy when two lighter atoms combine to form a heavier atom—differs from fission

The Russia-Ukraine conflict is the largest ground war in Europe since World War II in casualties, forces mobilized, and displacement of civilians.