subject from the inroads of “economism.”^52 He simply removes the
substance (in-itself) from subjectivity and is left with the “immanence
of self to itself ” (BNlvii; F 24 ). This, of course, is yet another descrip-
tion of prereflective consciousness as presence-to-self. But it adds
the distinctive note oflimitto reflective withdrawal. For Sartre describes
immanence as “the smallest recoil (recul) which can be made from self
to itself ” (BNlxv; F 32 ). He concludes that “from its first arising,
consciousness by the pure nihilating movement of reflection makes itself
personal: for what confers personal existence on being is not the posses-
sion of an Ego – which is only a sign of personality – but it is the fact
that the being exists for itself as a presence to self ” (BN 103 ;F 148 ).^53
Sartre concludes this section and the chapter with a refinement of the
foregoing, namely, a second reflective movement that he calls “selfness”
(ipse ́ite ́). This represents “a degree of nihilation carried further than
the pure presence to itself of the prereflectivecogito.” Sartre calls this a
relation ofabsent-presenceof the for-itself to itself “beyond its grasp,
in the far reaches of its possibilities down there (la`-bas). This free
necessity of being – down there – what one is in the form of lack
constitutes selfness or the second aspect of the person. In fact,” Sartre
asks, “how can the person be defined if not as a free relation to himself?”
(BN 104 ;F 148 ).
As for the world – the totality of beings as they exist within the
compass of the circuit of selfness – Sartre insists “this can be only what
human reality surpasses toward itself ” (BN 104 ;cf. 595 ). It surpasses
the world asmypossible. But this possible which, Sartre assures us, is
nontheticallyan absent-present to present consciousness is not present as
an object of a positional consciousness, which would make it the ter-
minus of reflective knowledge. Rather, this ontological possibility which
(^52) SeeSM 83.
(^53) Once another for-itself appears and our being-for others emerges, the issue of “person”
becomes more concrete: “The unreflective consciousness does not apprehend theperson
directly or as its object; the person is presented to consciousnessin so far asthe person is an
object for the Other. This means that all of a sudden I am conscious of myself as escaping
myself, not that I am the foundation of my own nothingness but in that I have my foundation
outside myself. I am for myself only as I am a pure reference to the Other” (BN 260 ). For a
further reflection on the nature and role of Sartrean “subjectivity without a subject,” see his
Gramsci lecture “Marxisme et subjectivite ́” delivered in 1961 (LTMno. 560 , 49 th anniver-
sary issue [March 1993 ]: 11 – 39 , discussed below inChapter 14.
194 The war years, 1939–1944