‘We were never more free [sic] than during the German occupation. We had lost all our rights, beginning with the right to talk. Every day we were insulted to our faces and had to take it in silence. […] Everywhere, on billboards, in the newspapers, on the screen, we encountered the revolting and insipid picture of ourselves that our oppressors wanted us to accept. And, because of all this, we were free. Because the Nazi venom seeped even into our thoughts, every accurate thought was a conquest. Because an all-powerful police tried to force us to hold our tongues, every word took on the value of a declaration of principles. Because we were hunted down, every one of our gestures had the weight of a solemn commitment. The circumstances, atrocious as they often were, finally made it possible for us to live, without pretense or false shame, the hectic and impossible existence that is known as the lot of man.[…] (Sartre, ed. Liebling; 1947, p. 498)’
Sartre, Jean-Paul (1944) ‘La République du silence’, published in The Republic of Silence, ed. A.J. Liebling (2003) Simon Publications and Situations, III:Lendermains de guerre (1949) Paris: Gallimard, pp. 11-12
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