As a prisoner of World War II, Jean-Paul Sartre was able to write a realistic fictional story about Spanish anarchists being held as political prisoners. A member of the growing class of philosophers known as existentialists, Jean-Paul Sartre wrote about human existence as a series of blind choices. In "The Wall," three men sharing a cell receive the same sentence; death by shooting. As the story tracks the approximately twenty-four hours after the delivery of …showed first 75 words of 474 total…

…showed last 75 words of 474 total…style to convey his existentialist beliefs in "The Wall." The lack of emotion and feeling represents the existentialist belief that human life is a series of unfeeling reactions. Sartre offers the idea that instead of wasting energy explaining and contemplating human existence, people should just live with freedom and responsibility. Pablo Ibbieta is the hero of the story because he represents the existentialist ideal, in that he has an epiphany, realizing "no life had value" (242).