Jean-Paul Sartre dominated the cultural and literary life of post-war France, gathered a large following for his philosophy of existentialism and over-shadowed the work of his equally brilliant partner Simone de Beauvoir.
August, 1755. Newcastle, on the north bank of the Tyne. In the fields, men and women are getting the harvest in. Sunlight, or rain. Scudding clouds and backbreaking labour. Three hundred feet underground, young Charles Hutton is at the coalface. Cramped, dust-choked, wielding a five-pound pick by candlelight. ...