It is ironic then, as Birchall points out in his introduction, that ‘Sartre’s critics fail to explain why, if he was in fact such an abject and sycophantic admirer of Stalinism, the PCF felt the need to launch such violent denunciations of him’.4 With this in mind, it becomes apparent that it is difficult to argue that Sartre held a consistently Stalinist position when he was under almost constant attack from French Stalinism. However, the most important criticism which Birchall discusses and which he also concludes is a ‘negative point’ for Sartre is Sartre’s 1952-1956 ‘four-year romance with the PCF’ (French Communist Party).3 The PCF was the largest left wing political party for the majority of Sartre’s lifetime and was also at least from its higher ranks Sartre’s most constant critic. For example, Birchall cites the author and philosopher Bernard Henri-Lévy’s recently translated Sartre: The Philosopher of the Twentieth Century as examining Sartre’s political record from an anti-revolutionary perspective alternatively, ‘many of Sartre’s sternest critics in recent years have come from the ranks of those who once shared his alleged illusions’.2 By switching their political allegiances, Sartre’s old allies became those who were quickest to condemn Birchall takes the ex-Maoists Claudie and Jacques Broyelle and the writer Michel-Antoine Burnier as cases in point. Ian Birchall’s primary aim in Sartre Against Stalinism is to critically reclaim Jean-Paul Sartre for the anti-Stalinist left, in response to a variety of criticisms levelled at Sartre both during and after his lifetime. It is these key events which provide the structure to Sartre Against Stalinism’s understanding of Sartre’s political development. After witnessing the early days of Hitler in power, he lived through the Popular Front, the German Occupation and the crisis years of France’s disastrous colonial wars in Indo-China and Algeria, before participating in the rebirth of the left in 1968.1 His life thus encompassed the rise and fall of Eastern Bloc Communism. One of Sartre’s earliest political memories was of the Russian Revolution in 1917 he died just before the rise of Solidarnosc in Poland in 1980. As Birchall points out in the introduction to Sartre Against Stalinism: Sartre (1905-1980) lived through many of the great events of the 20th century. However, Sartre was also a biographer (of Flaubert, Genet and Baudelaire), novelist, and author of many articles on an extensive array of subjects-from the Vietnam War to the meaning of literature. Jean-Paul Sartre is first and foremost known for his philosophical works, especially the seminal work of existentialism, Being and Nothingness. A review of Ian Birchall, Sartre Against Stalinism (Berghahn Books, 2004), £36.50
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