VOL. 57, BOOK 1, PART B, 2019, pp. 301 – 309 Full text (En)

Author: Daniel Kamenov

Affiliation: Paisii Hilendarski University of Plovdiv

Abstract

Thomas Wolfe’s second novel, Of Time and the River, is a tale about a young man, his clash with the world outside his hometown, and the people inhabiting it. The current article will make use of Jean-Paul Sartre’s “Look” and examine Eugene Gant’s relations with the existential Other as an attempt at justification of his own being-in-the-world. Eugene’s Faustian hunger is present throughout the book: it creates a problem of purpose that can only be answered through the verification that Others can give. This study is an overview of his attempt at such acknowledgement.

Key words: Thomas Wolfe, Sartre, Other, Existentialism, the Look, Dialogue