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1-Page Summary of Nausea

A historian named Antoine Roquentin begins a diary to explain the strange and sickening sensations he’s been feeling. He doesn’t know what exactly is wrong with him, but he feels like his mind is overworked. Nevertheless, he continues writing in his diary for a few days and becomes so overcome by these feelings that it seems as though they are taking control of him. He begins to list every insignificant detail occurring inside himself or outside of himself, such as touching wet paper on the street or holding a stone in his hand.

The author of the book has been researching the Marquis de Rollebon for ten years. He moved to Bouville, where Rollebon lived, to finish his research and write a book about him. However, he soon loses interest in the project because he feels like he is not understanding Rollebon as if he were still alive. The author decides instead to live in the present rather than be constrained by history or past events.

Roquentin realizes that he’s been using the past to justify his existence. He thinks about how everyone else is afraid of their own existence and tries to hide it with things such as objects or other people, but Roquentin decides not to do this anymore. When he looks at a chestnut tree, he sees its essence (its characteristics) rather than perceiving its existence. The truth is that the way we perceive things doesn’t reveal their true nature; rather, our perception creates an illusion for us because we think something exists in a certain way when really it doesn’t exist like that at all.

Anny is Roquentin’s ex-lover. He had hoped that they would get back together, but he finds out that she doesn’t understand him. They part ways and never see each other again. Back in Bouville, Roquentin decides to free himself from the past by embracing his existence in the present. He tries to explain his views to an acquaintance at a cafe, but he cannot persuade him of human love being just an essence or of there being no purpose in life except “nothingness.” Despite not finding any meaning or value in life, Roquentin chooses to move to Paris and write a novel about it all.

Section 1

The novel opens with an “Editors’ Note,” claiming that the following pages were found among the papers of Antoine Roquentin. The pages are presented in a diary format and include his thoughts about writing a biography on Marquis de Rollebon, whom he met in Bouville.

Roquentin begins by describing his intent to keep a diary. He’s experiencing odd feelings about objects, but he doesn’t know what they mean, so he wants to write it down in order to better understand them. However, after writing for a while and recounting an experience that unsettled him when holding a stone, he decides that the feeling was just “a passing moment of madness” and there is no longer any need for him to continue with his diary.

However, when Roquentin writes in his journal on January 29, 1932, he realizes that something has changed. He thought it was just a passing moment but soon finds out that it’s not. It is a permanent feeling of uneasiness around objects and people. He hopes that it is nothing but an “abstract change” or something like that; however, he begins to worry if he himself has changed little by little over time until the transformation came upon him suddenly.

The next day, the narrator is still trying to figure out what it is he wants. He’s resigned to his fate and realizes that living alone has changed him. When he looks inside himself for answers, he finds nothing. Even when he has sex with Francoise, a local barmaid, very little is said between them: Roquentin feels that he is purging himself of a “certain nostalgia” rather than feeling pleasure. Yet he does acknowledge that something new happened to him; when looking at beer or paper lying on the street, he can’t touch them despite wanting to do so. He doesn’t feel free either because of this inability to connect with objects around him in an affective way (even if they are just things).