Simone De Beauvoir, 1908-1986: History and Quotes

History
Simone De Beauvoir was a highly influential writer in her times and her work continues to be studied within anthropology and sociology today. Through her work, she positioned herself as a political activist, feminist and social theorist.

De Beauvoir was born in France in the year 1908; she was born to an upper-middle class bourgeoisie family and was the eldest child of her parents. Her father, George De Beauvoir, was a lawyer and her mother was a devout Catholic. As a child De Beauvoir attended the Catholic school Cours Désir. Between the years 1926 –1929 Simone De Beauvoir attended the University of Sorbonne in Paris and studied to obtain her baccalauréat with emphasis on philosophy and mathematics. De Beauvoir graduated from the Sorbonne in 1929 with her thesis on Leibniz.

During her time at the Sorbonne institution De Beauvoir became acquainted with another student at the university, Jean Paul Sartre, with whom she formed a life-long relationship and would later travel to many places in the world with, including Russia, China, Brazil and Cuba. These travels would help shape her understanding of political issues world-wide and became deeply influential in her writings.

In 1946 De Beauvoir published her novel Tous les hommes sont mortels, in which she tells the story of Raimon Fosca, a man cursed to live forever. In 1958 she published the first volume of her auto-biography titled Mémoires d’une jeune fille rangée. She published the second volume of her autobiogtaphy, titled La force de l’âge, in 1960 and the last volume in 1972 titled Tout compte fait.

Simone De Beauvoir wrote many other books during her life time, many of which described concepts of existentialism, although she did refuted the title of an existentialist. Through her writings, De Beauvoir described and explained a variety of ethical, gender and political issues.

One highly influential writing of De Beauvoir’s is “The Second Sex”, in which she presents the concept of women being defined as the ‘other’ to men due to the patriarchal system. De Beauvoir played a large role in the feminist movement in the 1970’s where she fought for women’s equal rights and their right to abortion. In 1974 De Beauvoir became the chair of the French Women's Rights League. Simone De Beauvoir died in Paris in the year 1986 at the age of 78.

Work
Simone de Beauvoir’s contribution to feminism is quite notable indeed. Although de Beauvoir only identified with being a feminist near the end of her life it remains clear that she was a very influential character within the feminist movement, bringing much to the table with her existential approaches.

Undoubtedly, her greatest contribution to feminism and philosophy is her most popular work Le Deuxième Sexe (1949). Some critics debate on whether or not “The Second Sex” is still relevant today, however, over 65 years later it is still being referenced and praised as a key work that was a key source that lead many to feminism. This work was so controversial that it was even listed under a prohibited books at the Vatican.

Notably, de Beauvoir brought attention to the concept of otherness, how everything can only be understood by contrasting it to its opposite, what it’s not. “The Other Sex” primarily focused on the woman being the other sex in order to define the male sex. She goes on to discuss how masculinity has always been seen and formed as the norm throughout past and present society, and correspondingly people’s social ideas are spoken of and defined in relation to it.

Through other of her works, de Beauvoir has brought attention to other theoretical trends as well. Within her Pour une morale de l’ambigüité (1947) she implies that only through the freedom of others may true human freedom be achieved. Also, in Pyrrhus et Cinneas (1944), one of her first works, she relays the existential investigation for motives of people’s actions and why people ultimately decide to act at all. Another key existential concept is depicted within Tous les hommes sont mortels (1946). De Beauvoir touches upon angst that invokes deep emotional responses motivating an individual to live up to his or her full emotional capacity and take meaning out of their lives in the anticipation of death.

Some of her other notable works are Les Mandarins (1954), her first notable work L’invitée (1943; Known as “She Came to Stay” in English), La femme rompue (1967), among others.

Influence
It is no secret that de Beauvoir’s biggest influence in her work was that of her lover, the existentialist Jean Paul Sartre. It has been said that Sartre greatly influenced her work “She Came to Stay” and she in return was said to have a big influence and supposedly even edited some of his greater works, notably L’être et le néant (1943). Sartre and de Beauvoir were often regarded as a power couple of sorts within the philosophical world, and combined, influenced their own society in regards to the struggles of nefarious influences of patriarchal oppression and imperialistic capitalism. Moreover, after the Second World War, along with Albert Camus and André Malraux, de Beauvoir and Sartre created the French journal Les temps modernes to convey their views on culture and social matters.

Friedrich Hegel also greatly influenced her work. This can be seen by her incorporation of his master-slave dialectic within her work “The Second Sex”. He also influenced her philosophy within her work “She Came to stay” as well as quoting Hegel in the latter as well.

As mentioned prior, she wrote her thesis on Leibniz before graduating from Sorbonne in 1929 suggesting that Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz did in fact influence her also.

Another key philosopher who influenced her was none other than the (debatable) father of existentialism, Søren Kierkegaard. In short, her system of ethics and existentialist ideas were influenced by this individual.

Analysis
As an existentialist, she had a strong focus on the question of what is free will, and more specifically the idea of free will in society. Whether it be her work on gender equality in “the second sex” or on the topic of ethics in “the ethics of ambiguity”, De Beauvoir always put an emphasis on the influence Society had on the individual. At the time in which she was writing these works, Western society was at a middle point between the social beliefs of the past, that is to say male dominated society, and one that would be more accepting of women and others that were once subjugated. It is for this reason that De Beauvoir's work was so influential, it put a spotlight one what was wrong with how society perceives certain individuals.

Furthermore it can also be said that De Beauvoir's work was important to her on a personal level. Because of the time at which she was writing, as a women her scholarly work was not taken into consideration as much as that of men who were working on existentialism. For that reason, De Beauvoir would have had a personal stake in making society change into one that is more gender accepting. This can also be seen in her work on ethics, in which she discusses the implications of doing certain things at the expense of one personal freedom.

Critique
Simone de Beauvoir is in influential character in the development of feminism and existentialism. De Beauvoir’s work on the quintessential “Other” gender developed feminist theories and became one of the hottest topics in the 20thcentury. She was the youngest philosophy teacher in France; inevitably bringing controversial dilemmas as the uprising of new ideas always spawns it’s cynics and doubters. She was reprimanded in Lycée Jeanne d”Arc for her explicit assessment on women’s positioning within the patriarchal system. Some of her other work was so controversial that the Vatican expelled a few of her published books, adding them to their Prohibited Books Index. Although she was controversial, she had many supporters, which is evident during her funeral, where five thousand people walked alongside her cortège to the cemetery in Paris, France. Today de Beauvoir’s work is highly studied and referenced for her contributions to the study of existentialism and feminism.

Conflicting theories are observed when comparing philosophers such as Thomas Nagel and Susan Wolf whom argue against existential freewill using a deterministic standpoint. They critique that to be free, an agent’s actions such as deciding one’s principles, must be made completely outside oneself. This is contrary to de Beauvoir’s philosophies, which suggest that one begins as “nothing” and creates themself through choice and freewill, becoming who they wish to be.

Simone de Beauvoir has been influenced by various philosophers such as Jean-Paul Sartre and Kierkegaard, devoting most of her career to existentialist theories and advocating against the oppressive patriarchal system to pursue the liberation of women. Simone de Beauvoir also examined feminist cultures with Luce Irigaray, sharing beliefs on matters such as social justice and the liberation of horizons in equality for women. Their ideas drift apart when Irigaray criticizes de Beauvoir as “antifeminine” for her work on women’s necessity to “emulate the masculine standard of transcendence”. De Beauvoir also worked with the Women’s Liberation Movement, which recognized sexism occurring in France and other areas around the world, helping the transformation of social norms and the development of feminist theories. Later on, she published “The Second Sex”, being another contribution to the revolutionizing perception and liberation for women then and to this day.

Quotes:
In her book titled The Second Sex, Simone De Beauvoir wrote of the inequalities women face within patriarchal societies. Although this book initially received heavy critique at the time of its publication, it is regarded as having played an important role in the feminist movement and is still studied throughout universities world-wide today. The following quotes are taken from this book and demonstrate some of her key ideas.

“When an individual (or a group of individuals) is kept in a situation of inferiority, the fact is that he is inferior. But the significance of the verb to be must be rightly understood here; it is in bad faith to give it a static value when it really has the dynamic Hegelian sense of "to have become." Yes, women on the whole are today inferior to men; that is, their situation affords them fewer possibilities. The question is: should that state of affairs continue?” (De Beauvoir, 1952).

“All oppression creates a state of war. And this is no exception. The existent who is regarded as inessential cannot fail to demand the re-establishment of her sovereignty.” (De Beauvoir, 1952).

“It is for man to establish the reign of liberty in the midst of the world of the given. To gain the supreme victory, it is necessary, for one thing, that by and through their natural differentiation men and women unequivocally affirm their brotherhood.” (De Beauvoir, 1952).

Sources:
Beauvoir, Simone de. (1989, c1952) The second sex /New York, Vintage Books

http://novaonline.nvcc.edu/eli/evans/his135/events/beauvoir86.htm

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_Men_Are_Mortal

http://othersociologist.com/otherness-resources/

http://www.iep.utm.edu/beauvoir/#SH3a

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/beauvoir/

http://www.iep.utm.edu/beauvoir/#SH2a

http://www.openculture.com/2013/06/philosophys_power_couple_jean-paul_sartre_and_simone_de_beauvoir_featured_in_1967_tv_interview_.html

http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Simone_de_Beauvoir

http://concept.journals.villanova.edu/article/view/318/281

https://www.umass.edu/complit/aclanet/DualFFem.html

http://joshuacarldavis.com/chapter25.htm

http://www.iep.utm.edu/beauvoir/

-The Lemmings; MCM