The Transcendence of the Ego (French: La Transcendance de l'ego: Esquisse d'une description phénomenologique) is a philosophical and phenomenological essay written by the philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre in 1934 and published in 1936. The essay demonstrates Sartre’s transition from traditional phenomenological thinking and most notably his break from the philosopher Edmund Husserl’s school of thought (phenomenology), and into his own.