No Exit Suffering Quotes

How we cite our quotes: Citations follow this format: (Line). Every time a character talks counts as one line, even if what they say turns into a long monologue. We used the translation by S. Gilbert found in No Exit and Three Other Plays, published by Vintage International in 1989.

Quote #4

GARCIN: Whew! How hot it is here! Do you mind if – (134)

The stifling heat seems to be the one typical characteristic of traditional hell that Sartre maintains in his play. Why this one? What does the heat have to do with the suffering these characters experience?

Quote #5

INEZ: I only know they're waiting.
ESTELLE: I never could bear the idea of anyone's expecting something from me. It always made me want to do just the opposite.
INEZ: Well, do it. Do it if you can. You don't even know what they expect. (166-8)

This is a kind of torment, too –the thought that the three of them are stripped of free will, that "they" have planned out their every action and word.

Quote #6

GARCIN: That won't be difficult; each of us has plenty of material for self-communings. I think I could stay ten thousand years with only my thoughts for company. (203)

Garcin is trying to work through his guilty conscience by spending all this thinking time alone.