Marian Perla
Professor Jeremiah Crotser
English 1301 T, R 2:30-4:00
October 4, 2014
Choices of an Existentialist
The essay I chose to analyze is Hughes’ essay because his and Sartre’s essay in ways are similar. The connection I made had to do with religion. Hughes’ essay was based on whether to believe in god or to not. He made his choice to please people in his life but in the end he decided not to believe in god because he did not help him when he needed his help. In Sartre essay he describes an existentialist as a person who makes their own choices, and do not depend on god to make things happen for them in their life. This is why Hughes is an existentialist.
Sartre stated “when we say that a man is responsible for himself, we do not only mean that he is responsible for his own individuality, but that he is responsible for all men.” (1128). This quote from the text corresponds to Hughes’ essay because the choice which he made did affect others around him. When Hughes finally made his decision he thought “maybe to save further trouble, I’d better lie, too, and say that Jesus had come, and get up and be saved.” (1060). His choice was to say he either saw God in his soul or not. The choice he made was to say he saw God, but he really did not. The reason he choose to lie was because if he said he had not seen God he would have disappointed many individuals in his church who were all waiting for him to confess that he had seen God. So although he did not want to lie, he knew if he had told the truth he would affect people in a negative way if he had told the truth. His choice was made based on his responsibility to the people in his church; which from the story you can tell he was raised and taught to believe and see God in his soul.
After Hughes had made
