The Reprieve covers the eight days of intense anxiety in September 1938 during which Europe first mobilized on a large scale for war. Sartre makes us painfully aware of what it was to be a European at that time, and as his narrative gains momentum and speeds forward he never lets us forget the vital problems of man’s freedom and responsibility in this world. Sartre’s dramatic power and originality combine to produce one of the key literary achievements of today.

The Reprieve is the second novel of Sartre’s projected tetralogy, Roads to Freedom.