Existentialism In No Exit

Existentialism is the philosophical notion that existence precedes essence. We are born first and then decide what meaning our lives will have. Existentialism maintains, that our choices determine our nature and that there is no predisposition of what each human is born to do. Humans, according to existentialist beliefs, are condemned to be free. With freedom comes consequences. Since humans are free to make their own decisions, we are each responsible for our own consequences. Letting others choose for us would be being in bad faith because that would be putting oneself in the position to have as much free will as an inanimate object. In the play No Exit, all three characters Joseph Garcin, Estelle Rigault, and Inez Serrano are put in this …show more content…
Estelle being number one because she is the most superficial, and most worthy to be in hell. Next in the rating of who deserved what they got in existential hell is Garcin, and finally Inez. Before explaining the ranking let us first visit the concept of the existential hell. Unlike what we commonly imagine as hell, existential hell is embodied in a single room decorated in Second Empire furnishings. Overall the surrounding is more comfortable then our traditional ideas of the torture that goes on in hell. The only catch is we later find that three strangers are put in this room for the rest of eternity, and we learn that “Hell is other people” as Garcin so famously says. Additionally, although the furnishings are “comfortable” for an existentialist the lavishness is what makes it superficial and that is rejected by existential philosophers. Sartre’s hell thus exists for him not in the supernatural realm but in reality. These three characters who obviously all belong in hell for some reason are forced to share every moment with each other, and that itself is hell. Who deserves this hell more than the others for me is defined by who is mostly in bad