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Chapter 16: 11.00 p.m.
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Nausea, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Existence vs. Essence
Time
Love and Sexuality
Art and Legacy
Summary
Analysis
Roquentin receives a letter from Anny. In it, she tells him that she will be in Paris in a few days’ time. She begs him to come see her while she’s there. Roquentin is not excited at the thought of reuniting with Anny. Still, he reminisces about Anny’s obsession with perfect moments. While Roquentin is having lunch at a restaurant, a small man named Achille comes in and begins to antagonize the waitress. Roquentin feels an uncomfortable kinship with Achille’s restless and lonely manner. To the relief of both the waitress and Roquentin, Doctor Rogé enters the restaurant. He sizes Achille up and calls him “crazy.” Even Achille seems relieved to be summed up so neatly, but the incident prompts Roquentin to reflect on how some men hide behind the authority of “experience.” He concludes that, in actuality, Achille is afraid of something, and Doctor Rogé will soon die.
Roquentin has been thinking about Anny for a while, but when things finally progress, it’s because of her action, not his. Again, Roquentin seems only capable of passively experiencing his life. At the restaurant, Achille joins the man with the neck tumor, Lucie, and the old woman walking by the statue on the list of people with whom Roquentin briefly identifies. Like the others, Achille is a bit of an outcast, immediately causing trouble with the waitress. Roquentin is frustrated with Achille’s contentment at being labelled by Doctor Rogé due to both the act of labelling itself (which privileges essence) and due to his apparent jealousy of the social ease that comes with Doctor Rogé’s experience.
Themes
