Simone de Beauvoir
Simone de Beauvoir | |
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 Beauvoir in 1967 | |
| Born | Simone Lucie Ernestine Marie Bertrand de Beauvoir 9 January 1908 Paris, France |
| Died | 14 April 1986 (aged 78) Paris, France |
| Resting place | Montparnasse Cemetery, Paris |
| Education | University of Paris (BA, 1928; MA, 1929[1]) |
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Notable work | The Second Sex (1949) |
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Philosophy career | |
| Era | 20th-century philosophy |
| Region | Western philosophy |
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| Part of a series on |
| Feminist philosophy |
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Simone Lucie Ernestine Marie Bertrand de Beauvoir (UK: /də ˈboʊvwɑːr/, US: /də boʊˈvwɑːr/;[3][4] French: [simɔn də bovwaʁ] (
listen); 9 January 1908 – 14 April 1986) was a French existentialist philosopher, writer, social theorist, and feminist activist. Though she did not consider herself a philosopher, and even though she was not considered one at the time of her death,[5] she had a significant influence on both feminist existentialism and feminist theory.[6]
Beauvoir wrote novels, essays, biographies, autobiographies, and monographs on philosophy, politics, and social issues. She was known for her 1949 treatise The Second Sex, a detailed analysis of women's oppression and a foundational tract of contemporary feminism; and for her novels, including She Came to Stay and The Mandarins. Her most enduring contribution to literature is her memoirs, notably the first volume, "Mémoires d'une jeune fille rangée" (1958), which has a warmth and descriptive power.[7] She won the 1954 Prix Goncourt, the 1975 Jerusalem Prize, and the 1978 Austrian State Prize for European Literature. She was also known for her open, lifelong relationship with French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre.[8]
Early years[edit]
Beauvoir was born on 9 January 1908[9] into a bourgeois Parisian family in the 6th arrondissement.[10][11][12] Her parents were Georges Bertrand de Beauvoir, a lawyer, who once aspired to be an actor,[13] and Françoise Beauvoir (née Brasseur), a wealthy banker's daughter and devout Catholic. Simone's sister, Hélène, was born two years later on June 6, 1910. The family struggled to maintain their bourgeois status after losing much of their fortune shortly after World War I, and Françoise insisted the two daughters be sent to a prestigious convent school.
Beauvoir was intellectually precocious, fueled by her father's encouragement; he reportedly would boast, "Simone thinks like a man!"[14] Because of her family's straitened circumstances, she could no longer rely on her dowry, and like other middle-class girls of her age, her marriage opportunities were put at risk. She took this opportunity to take steps towards earning a living for herself.[15]
She first worked with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Claude Lévi-Strauss, when all three completed their practice teaching requirements at the same secondary school. Although not officially enrolled, she sat in on courses at the École Normale Supérieure in preparation for the agrégation in philosophy, a highly competitive postgraduate examination that serves as a national ranking of students. It was while studying for it that she met École Normale students Jean-Paul Sartre, Paul Nizan, and René Maheu (who gave her the lasting nickname "Castor", or "beaver").[13] The jury for the agrégation narrowly awarded Sartre first place instead of Beauvoir, who placed second and, at age 21, was the youngest person ever to pass the exam.[16] Additionally, Beauvoir finished an exam for the certificate of "General Philosophy and Logic" second to Simone Weil.
Writing of her youth in Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter she said: "...my father's individualism and pagan ethical standards were in complete contrast to the rigidly moral conventionalism of my mother's teaching. This disequilibrium, which made my life a kind of endless disputation, is the main reason why I became an intellectual."[17]
Secondary and post-secondary education[edit]
Beauvoir pursued post-secondary education after completing her high school years at Lycée Fenelon.[18] After passing baccalaureate exams in mathematics and philosophy in 1925, she studied mathematics at the Institut Catholique de Paris and literature/languages at the Institut Sainte-Marie. She then studied philosophy at the Sorbonne and after completing her degree in 1928, wrote her Diplôme d'Études Supérieures Spécialisées (roughly equivalent to an M.A. thesis) on Leibniz for Léon Brunschvicg (the topic was "Le concept chez Leibniz" ["The Concept in Leibniz"]).[19] Her studies of political philosophy through university influenced her to start thinking of societal concerns rather than her issues.[citation needed]
Religious upbringing[edit]
Beauvoir was raised in a strict Catholic household. In her youth, she was sent to convent schools. She was deeply religious as a child, at one point intending to become a nun. At age 14, Beauvoir questioned her faith as she saw many changes in the world after witnessing tragedies throughout her life.[20] Consequently, she abandoned her faith in her early teens and remained an atheist for the rest of her life.[21] To explain her atheist beliefs, Beauvoir stated, "Faith allows an evasion of those difficulties which the atheist confronts honestly. And to crown all, the believer derives a sense of great superiority from this very cowardice itself."[22]
Middle years[edit]
From 1929 through 1943, Beauvoir taught at the lycée level until she could support herself solely on the earnings of her writings. She taught at the Lycée Montgrand (Marseille), the Lycée Jeanne-d'Arc (Rouen), and the Lycée Molière (Paris) (1936–39).[23]
Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre met during her college years. Intrigued by her determination as an educator, he intended to make their relationship romantic. However, she had no interest in doing so.[20] During October 1929, Jean-Paul Sartre and Beauvoir became a couple. After they were confronted by her father, Sartre asked her to marry him on a provisional basis: One day while they were sitting on a bench outside the Louvre, he said, "Let's sign a two-year lease".[24] Though Beauvoir wrote, "Marriage was impossible. I had no dowry", scholars point out that her ideal relationships described in The Second Sex and elsewhere bore little resemblances to the marriage standards of the day.[25] Instead, she and Sartre entered into a lifelong "soul partnership", which was sexual but not exclusive, nor did it involve living together.[26]
Sartre and Beauvoir always read each other's work. Debate continues about the extent to which they influenced each other in their existentialist works, such as Sartre's Being and Nothingness and Beauvoir's She Came to Stay and "Phenomenology and Intent".[27] However, recent studies of Beauvoir's work focus on influences other than Sartre, including Hegel and Leibniz.[6] The Neo-Hegelian revival led by Alexandre Kojève and Jean Hyppolite in the 1930s inspired a whole generation of French thinkers, including Sartre, to discover Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit.[28][29] However, Beauvoir, reading Hegel in German during the war, produced an original critique of his dialectic of consciousness.
Personal life[edit]
Beauvoir's prominent open relationships at times overshadowed her substantial academic reputation. A scholar lecturing with her[30] chastised their "distinguished [Harvard] audience [because] every question asked about Sartre concerned his work, while all those asked about Beauvoir concerned her personal life."[31] Beginning in 1929, Beauvoir and Sartre were partners and remained so for 51 years, until his death in 1980.[32] She chose never to marry and never had children. This gave her the time to advance her education and engage in political causes, write and teach, and take lovers.[33] She lived with Claude Lanzmann from 1952 to 1959.[34]
Perhaps her most famous lover was American author Nelson Algren. She met him in Chicago in 1947, she wrote to him across the Atlantic as "my beloved husband."[35] Algren won the National Book Award for <