The Jean Paul Sartre Cookbook -- Full version
This little meme is one of the funniest things I've ever read. Unfortunately, it's nigh impossible to find the full-length version on the web. It has a checkered past, and was reprinted in short form by some magazine at some point, and 90% of the versions you can find online are the short excerpted version. So, I decided to put the full version here for my own purposes.
The Jean-Paul Sartre Cookbook
We have recently been lucky enough to discover several previously
lost diaries of French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre stuck in between
the cushions of our office sofa. These diaries reveal a young Sartre
obsessed not with the void, but with food. Apparently Sartre, before
discovering philosophy, had hoped to write "a cookbook that will put
to rest all notions of flavour forever." The diaries are excerpted here
for your perusal.
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October 3
- Spoke with Camus today about my cookbook. Though he has never actually
eaten, he gave me much encouragement. I rushed home immediately to
begin work. How excited I am! I have begun my formula for a Denver
omelet.
-
October 4
- Still working on the omelet. There have been stumbling blocks.
I keep creating omelets one after another, like soldiers marching
into the sea, but each one seems empty, hollow, like stone. I want
to create an omelet that expresses the meaninglessness of existence,
and instead they taste like cheese. I look at them on the plate, but
they do not look back. I tried eating them with the lights off. It
did not help. Malraux suggested paprika.
-
October 6
- I have realized that the traditional omelet form (eggs and cheese)
is bourgeois. Today I tried making one out of a cigarette, some coffee,
and four tiny stones. I fed it to Malraux, who puked. I am encouraged,
but my journey is still long.
-
October 7
- Today I again modified my omelet recipe. While my previous attempts
had expressed my own bitterness, they communicated only illness to
the eater. In an attempt to reach the bourgeoisie, I taped two fried
eggs over my eyes and walked the streets of Paris for an hour. I ran
into Camus at the Select. He called me a pathetic dork; and told me
to go home and wash my face. Angered, I poured a bowl of bouillabaisse
into his lap. He became enraged, and, seizing a straw wrapped in paper,
tore off one end of the wrapper and blew through the straw propelling
the wrapper into my eye. "Ow! You lung sucking dog anus!" I cried.
I leaped up, cursing and holding my eye, and fled.
-
October 10
- I find myself trying ever more radical interpretations of traditional
dishes, in an effort to somehow express the void I feel so acutely.
Today I tried this recipe: Tuna Casserole.
Ingredients: 1 large casserole dish.
Directions: Place the casserole dish in a cold oven. Place a chair
facing the oven and sit in it forever. Think about how hungry you
are. When night falls, do not turn on the light.
While a void is expressed in this recipe, I am struck by its inapplicability
to the bourgeois lifestyle. How can the eater recognize that the food
denied him is a tuna casserole and not some other dish? I am becoming
more and more frustrated.
-
October 12
- My eye has become inflamed. I hate Camus.
-
October 25
- I have been forced to abandon the project of producing an entire
cookbook. Rather, I now seek a single recipe which will, by itself,
embody the plight of man in a world ruled by an unfeeling God, as
well as providing the eater with at least one ingredient from each
of the four basic food groups. To this end, I purchased six hundred
pounds of foodstuffs from the corner grocery and locked myself in
the kitchen, refusing to admit anyone. After several weeks of work,
I produced a recipe calling for two eggs, half a cup of flour, four
tons of beef, and a leek. While this is a start, I am afraid I still
have much work ahead.
-
November 15
- I feel that I may be very close to a great breakthrough. I had
been creating meal after meal, but none seemed to express the futility
of existence any better than would ordering a pizza. I left the house
this morning in a most depressed state, and wandered aimlessly through
the streets. Suddenly, it was as if the heavens had opened. My brain
was electrified with an influx of new ideas. "Juice, toast, milk"
I muttered aloud. I realized with a start that I was one ingredient
away from creating the nutritious breakfast. Loathsome, true, but
filled with existential authenticity I rushed home to begin work anew.
-
November 18
- Today I tried yet another variation: Juice, toast, milk and Cheetos.
Again, a dismal failure. I have tried everything. Juice, toast, milk
and whiskey, juice, toast, milk and chicken fat, juice, toast, milk
and someone else's spit. Nothing helps. I am in agony. Juice, toast,
milk, they race about my fevered brain like fire, like an unholy trinity
of cruel denial. And the fourth ingredient! What could it be? It eludes
me like the lost chord, the Holy Grail. I must see the completion
of my task, but I have no more money to spend on food. Perhaps man
is not meant to know...
-
November 21
- Camus came into the restaurant today. He did not know I was in
the kitchen and before I sent out his meal I loogied in his soup.
Sic semper tyrannis.
-
November 23
- Ran into some opposition at the restaurant. Some of the patrons
complained that my breakfast special (a page out of Remembrance of
Things Past and a blowtorch with which to set it on fire) did not
satisfy their hunger. As if their hunger was of any consequence! But
we're starving, they say. So what? They're going to die eventually
anyway. They make me want to puke. I have quit the job. It is stupid
for Jean- Paul Sartre to sling hash. I have enough money to continue
my work for a little while.
-
November 24
- Last night I had a dream. In it, I am standing, alone, on a beach.
A great storm is raging all about me. It begins to rain. Night falls.
I am struck by how small and insignificant I am, how the entire race
of Man is but a speck in the eye of God, and I am but a speck of humanity.
Suddenly, a red Cadillac convertible pulls up beside me. In it are
these two beautiful girls named Jojo and Wendy. I get in and they
take me to their mansion in Hollywood and give me a pound of cocaine
and make mad, passionate love to me for the rest of my life.
-
November 26
- Today I made a Black Forest cake out of five pounds of cherries
and a live beaver, challenging the very definition of the word cake.
I was very pleased. Malraux said he admired it greatly, but could
not stay for dessert. Still, I feel that this may be my most profound
achievement yet, and have resolved to enter it in the Betty Crocker
Bake-Off.
-
November 30
- Today was the day of the Bake-Off. Alas, things did not go as I
had hoped. During the judging, the beaver became agitated and bit
Betty Crocker on the wrist. The beaver's powerful jaws are capable
of felling blue spruce in less than ten minutes and proved, needless
to say, more than a match for the tender limbs of America's favorite
homemaker. I only got third place. Moreover, I am now the subject
of a rather nasty lawsuit.
-
December 1
- I have been gaining twenty-five pounds a week for two months, and
I am now experiencing light tides. It is stupid to be so fat. My pain
and ultimate solitude are still as authentic as they were when I was
thin, but seem to impress girls far less. From now on, I will live
on cigarettes and black coffee.
***
Sartre died in Paris in 1981. His last word is reputed to have been,
simply, "Trix".
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