It concerns life in France during the eight days before the signing of the Munich Agreement and the subsequent takeover of Czechoslovakia in September 1938.

Their reluctance or eagerness, their fear and worry, and how, in general, they respond to this change in their lives provide the main substance of the novel.

Instead of following a major character, as he did in the first volume of the trilogy, The Age of Reason, by portraying and focusing on about a dozen men and women, he emphasizes the universality and social nature of events of this type.

He is eager to ensure that we are obliged to participate actively in the novel, rather than simply observing its action in a dispassionate and passive manner.

The importance of this particular device goes even further: it allows Sartre to emphasize that the identity of the particular individual he is alluding to is relatively insignificant, because the single dominating factor – the threat of war – exerts its power and influence over every person.