Adler and Sartre: comment.

I was very much interested in the article by Rom and Ansbacher entitled "An Adlerian Case or a Character by Sartre?" (4) not only because of its intrinsic value but also because I had myself analyzed the hero of Sartre's story "Erostratus" (5, pp. 41-58) and others of this author's characters from the angle of Adler's Individual Psychology some I 5 years ago (6, 7). Before quoting from this analysis I have to mention that the French existentialist distinguishes three n10des of being which he designates by the terms "being-in-itself," "being-for-itself" and "being-for-others." The being-in-its~lfis that of the inanimate objects, while the being-for-itself is that of human self-consciousness. Now, as Hegel tried to show, our self-consciousn~ssexists only becaus~ it exists for another person. Thus self-consciousness is basically "acknowledgn1ent" by another person (ein Anerkanntes), and our beingfor-others is a necessary condition for the development of our selfconsciousness, our being-for-ourselves. According to Sartre, our beingfor-others (l'etre-pour-autrui) is revealed to us by the other person's "gaze" (Ie regard). The gaze of the other person reveals to me not only that I am an object to him, but also that he is a subject. In my book on Sartre I tried to show that being-far-others is closely related to Adler's concept of vanity, by writing the following: