Summary

Marat revels in the torture and death of a man onstage, insisting that the Revolution is unstoppable and blaming everything on the selfishness and cruelty of the aristocracy. Coulmier objects to this type of speech, but Sade simply smiles, and the herald intervenes with an explanation that these are historical events. A conversation ensues between Marat and Sade regarding Sade’s view that the basis of all life is death, as death is a commonplace occurrence. Sade says that he hates Nature’s unreachable disinterest in human existence. He recalls the tortuous public deaths of the past, which he holds up as far more significant and important than the current impersonal slaughterings by the guillotine. Sade disagrees with Marat’s actions because of this lack of passion in his executions. Marat says that people must change themselves; there must be a revolution of the...