Most people hear the name Jean-Paul Sartre and immediately think of dusty turtlenecks, thick glasses, and a crushing sense of existential dread. They aren't entirely wrong. But when you actually sit down with The Roads to Freedom—his sprawling, unfinished cycle of novels—you realize it’s not just a philosophical lecture disguised as fiction. It’s messy. It’s sweaty. Honestly, it’s a bit of a disaster, much like the lives of the characters it follows through the buildup to World War II.
If you’ve ever felt paralyzed by a big life decision, you’ll find a kindred spirit in Mathieu Delarue. He’s the protagonist of the first book, The Age of Reason, and he is essentially the poster child for overthinking. He wants to be "free," but he mistakes freedom for a lack of commitment. He spends the entire first novel trying to scrounge up money for an abortion for his mistress, Marcelle, not because he’s a villain, but because he’s terrified that a child will tie him down. It’s uncomfortable to read because it’s so humanly selfish.
What Most People Get Wrong About Freedom
We usually think of freedom as having options. You go to a restaurant with a massive menu, and you’re "free" to pick anything. Sartre argues the opposite in The Roads to Freedom. For him, that’s just "the spirit of seriousness." True freedom isn't about having a thousand choices; it’s about the terrifying moment you actually pick one and own the consequences.
Mathieu is miserable because he refuses to choose. He’s a philosophy teacher who lives in a state of permanent "maybe." This is what Sartre calls mauvaise foi, or "bad faith." You’re lying to yourself. You’re pretending you’re a fixed object—like a rock or a table—that can’t change, when in reality, you are a conscious being who is constantly "becoming."
It’s easy to judge Mathieu. We look at him wandering the streets of Paris in 1938, obsessed with his personal drama while the Nazis are literally knocking on the door of Europe, and we want to shake him. But how many of us do the same thing? We scroll through our phones or worry about our career paths while the world is arguably on fire. Sartre isn't just writing a story; he’s holding up a mirror that’s very hard to look into.
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The Shift from Personal to Political
By the time you get to the second book, The Reprieve, the style shifts completely. It’s chaotic. Sartre uses a "simultaneity" technique he borrowed from American novelists like John Dos Passos. One sentence you’re in Mathieu’s head, the next you’re with a character named Ivich, and then suddenly you’re at the Munich Conference with Neville Chamberlain.
It captures that specific, frantic energy of September 1938. Everyone is waiting to see if there will be war. The "roads to freedom" start to look a lot more like dead ends.
Here’s the thing about this trilogy: it’s deeply rooted in the historical reality of the French defeat. Sartre himself was a meteorologist in the army and became a prisoner of war. He knew what it felt like to have your personal freedom stripped away by a global catastrophe. In the third book, Iron in the Soul (sometimes translated as Troubled Sleep), the French army has collapsed. Mathieu finally picks up a rifle.
Does he become a hero? Not really. But he finally acts. There’s a scene where he’s firing from a church tower, and for the first time in the entire series, he feels a sense of liberation. It’s dark, sure, but it’s the first time he isn't just a spectator in his own life.
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Why Daniel is the Most Interesting Character (And the Most Problematic)
If Mathieu is the "boring" intellectual, Daniel Sereno is the lightning rod. Daniel is a wealthy, self-loathing man who struggles with his sexuality and a desperate desire to be "judged" so he doesn't have to be free. At one point, he tries to drown his cats. He even attempts to marry Marcelle just to spite Mathieu.
Daniel represents a very specific kind of psychological trap. He wants to be seen as an "object." If someone else defines him—as a sinner, as a husband, as a martyr—then he doesn’t have to deal with the "anguish" of creating his own values. Sartre uses Daniel to show that freedom is so heavy that people will literally do anything to give it away.
Even today, you see this in the way people cling to labels or political tribes. It’s easier to say "I am [Label]" than to wake up every day and decide what you stand for. Daniel is an extreme example, but he’s basically the embodiment of the desire to escape the "burden" of being a person.
The Fourth Book That Never Was
Sartre never finished the fourth volume, which was supposed to be called The Last Chance. We have some fragments, but the project stalled. Why?
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Some critics, like Simone de Beauvoir (who was Sartre’s lifelong partner and a genius in her own right), suggested that Sartre struggled to write about the Resistance without making it sound like a "moralizing" propaganda piece. It’s easy to write about people failing to be free; it’s much harder to write about people successfully exercising freedom in a way that feels authentic and not cheesy.
The fact that The Roads to Freedom is unfinished is actually perfect. It fits the philosophy. If life is a constant process of "becoming," then a story about finding freedom shouldn't have a neat, tied-up ending. It should be open. It should be a bit of a mess.
Is It Worth Reading Today?
Honestly, yeah. But don't go into it expecting a fast-paced thriller. Go into it for the atmosphere. Sartre is incredible at describing the smell of a bar, the feeling of a hot Parisian afternoon, or the gut-wrenching anxiety of a man who realizes his youth is gone and he hasn't actually done anything yet.
The books remind us that we aren't just the sum of our thoughts. We are the sum of our actions. You can think about being a good person, a creative person, or a "free" person all day long, but until you commit to something, you’re just Mathieu wandering the streets, looking for a way out.
Actionable Insights from the Trilogy
- Stop waiting for the "right" moment to choose. Mathieu waits until the world is ending to make a move. Freedom is practiced in the mundane, daily decisions before the crisis hits.
- Acknowledge your "Bad Faith." Identify the areas where you say "I have no choice." Usually, you do have a choice; you just don't like the consequences of the alternatives.
- Commitment is the cure for anguish. The characters in the books who are the most miserable are the ones who keep all their options open. Choosing one path inherently kills the others, and that’s okay.
- Understand the "Other." Sartre spends a lot of time on how we see ourselves through the eyes of other people. Realize that while you can't control their "look," you aren't defined by it unless you choose to be.
The next time you're stuck in a loop of indecision, remember Mathieu Delarue. Don't be the person who spends three volumes of a novel trying to decide who they are. Just pick the rifle—metaphorically speaking—and start walking.