Existentialism in Utrecht

Abstract

In December 1946, Jean-Paul Sartre visited the Netherlands. On 7 December, he gave a lecture at Utrecht University. The following day he continued his visit in Amsterdam. Sartre had been invited by the psychologist David Jacob van Lennep, who had read and admired L’Être et le Néant immediately after its publication in 1943. Sartre's work had a profound influence on the literature, theology and philosophy of the immediate post-war period. As a result, the most important intellectuals of the time came to listen to him, meet him and enter into discussion with him. The visit to the Netherlands was also reflected in Sartre's own work. In Les Mots (1964), Sartre recalls the psychological test Van Lennep put him through in Utrecht. Van Lennep presented him with four images, one of a man, one of a horse, one of a motorboat and one of a train, and asked him to say which gave the best impression of speed. Sartre chose the motorboat because it ‘seemed to take off from the lake’ and manifested a ‘power of uprooting’.