(Sitiv: 104 ). Indeed, this is a form of defense that Merleau-Ponty had
used in an analogous context in hisHumanism and Terror( 1947 ). But
Sartre was far less conciliatory and indeed, quite harsh andad hominem
in his lengthy response to Camus. Thus ended the loss of the man
whom Sartre would later identify as “probably the last good friend
I had” (L/S 64 ).
In a footnote to his response to Camus that distinguished Marxist
practices from Marxist philosophy, Sartre (seemingly oblivious of Marx’s
thesis regarding “unity of theory and practice”) made the following
telling observation: “I don’t have to defend Marx’s [ideas], but allow
me to say that the dilemma you have set before us (either its ‘prophecies’
are true or Marxism is merely a method) leaves unscathed the entire
Marxistphilosophyand all that, in my view (who am not a Marxist)
constitutes its deep truth” (Sitiv: 197 n.). So it seems important for
Sartre to distinguish between the admirable Marxist philosophy and
its sometimes “inadmissible” practices, even at the start of his shared
path with the PCF.
In the case of Merleau-Ponty, who had been in charge of the political
desk atLTM, the conflict was again political. This time it concerned
the Korean War, on which Sartre sided with the Communist north and
Merleau-Ponty with the anti-Communist south. Merleau-Ponty’s resig-
nation cost the journal one of its best minds and most balanced thinkers.
Sartre wrote an editorial favoring the north without even consulting him.
The journal continued to move increasingly toward the Left from then
on. However, as Ian Birchall correctly observes, one must not identify
the review with Sartre’s personal politics during this period of cordiality
with the Party. Any number of essays critical of Stalinist Communist
practices both in France and abroad appeared in its pages. But the
crisscross of Sartre’s and Merleau’s political paths was deeply grounded
in their respective philosophical styles and personalities.^24 The contrast
morphed into open conflict when Merleau-Ponty publishedAdventures
of the Dialectic ( 1955 ) that contained a chapter entitled “Sartre
and Ultra-Bolshevism.” As the title suggests, the piece was scarcely
conciliatory. It concentrated on The Communists and Peaceand BN,
as Beauvoir pointed out in “Merleau-Ponty and Pseudo-Sartreanism,”
(^24) See Anna Boschetti.Sartre et Les Temps modernes(Paris: E ́ditions de Minuit, 1985 ), 262.
302 Means and ends: political existentialism