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Chapter 31: Tuesday, in Bouville
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 prefaces his entry by professing his sympathy for the Self-Taught Man, whom he says has now entered permanent solitude. Earlier that day, Roquentin went to the reading room and started to read a local newspaper. He saw the Self-Taught Man, but he didn’t seem to want to talk to Roquentin. As Roquentin read, two high school boys enter the room and sit next to the Self-Taught Man. Roquentin noticed that the boy sitting closest to the Self-Taught Man had an arrogant and mischievous expression. The Self-Taught Man began to whisper to the boys and stroke the arrogant-looking boy’s hand. Roquentin felt worried that the Self-Taught Man would be caught if he wasn’t careful, but the Self-Taught Man continued to touch the boy.
Roquentin wants his loyalty on record: despite the transgression and criminality of the Self-Taught Man’s actions, he seems to be on his side instead of the young student’s. In keeping with this position, Roquentin describes the student that the Self-Taught Man molests as goading the older man, as if the young boy is the pervert and the Self-Taught Man is the innocent. Roquentin’s evaluation of the situation recalls his description of the encounter between the little girl and the man in the cape, in which the little girl seems to challenge the flasher with her eyes before she runs away.
Themes
When the Self-Taught Man reached under the table to touch the boy further, the Corsican guard snuck up behind him and loudly threatened him. The Self-Taught Man tried to deny touching the boy, but a woman patron in the room backed the guard up, calling the Self-Taught Man a “monster.” The Corsican guard hit the Self-Taught Man in the face twice. Roquentin saw gentleness and fear in the Self-Taught Man’s eyes as he took the beating. Roquentin grabbed the guard and lifted him by the neck, but he let him go when the guard questioned him. Roquentin tried to help the Self-Taught Man tend to his wounds, but the Self-Taught Man fled into the city.
Popular opinion is against the Self-Taught Man, but Roquentin appears sympathetic with his unconventional, transgressive desires. He portrays the Self-Taught Man almost as a martyr, particularly as he describes his eyes as he’s being beaten. At this point, the Corsican guard’s observation of the Self-Taught Man, the Self-Taught Man’s reluctance to share the details of their conflict with Roquentin, and the Self-Taught Man’s gaze at a student early in the novel make sense. All along, the Self-Taught Man has sought experience and adventure through one particular outlet: pedophilic molestation.
Themes
