Paul Auster’s Sunset Park: Communal Existence vs. Mass Objectification

A Sartrean analysis of any society gives us the fact that all communities are composed of two groups of people: subjects and objects. This dualism creates a binary pair in which the former is always subjugating the latter, giving rise to mass objectification in the hands of a few. Action against the few is, however, possible if objects make a sort of communal existence, in Sartrean terms, against their subjugation. This kind of existence happens if the us of the objects turns into the we of the subjects in order to master their own existence, a fact that requires certain individuals with a common goal of mastering their fates to make a unity against the ruling system. Paul Auster’s Sunset Park presents us with such a community in which four typical figures make a local unity to resist the American Capitalism so that they can live their own lives amidst mass objectification. As such, their attempt at survival in such society is an existentially authentic action which can be investigated in the light of Sartre’s philosophy for its merit in acting against objectification.

Keywords:

Auster , communal existence , objectification , Sartre , Sunset Park