On De Beauvoir

It is my firm belief that in so far as possible extravagant birth commemorations as well as the hagiography of famous authors must not besmirch these pages.  Nevertheless a short blog post on The Beaver who was born this day in 1908.

In a post not long back, I alluded to the influence of De Beauvoir and co. on my life.  I don’t know if I am the ardent feminist I was in my youth for time has the habit of eroding the idea that the world will be as you imagine it to be.  Still The Second Sex is the closest a book will ever get to being a Bible for me.  It is apparently ill served in translation, and the reviews of the new translation appear to be mixed.  If a few of its subtleties are lost in the English version, it still remains a cool, detached study of the feminine condition.  In fact I would hardly call it a “women’s book” for it is far more ambitious in scope. De Beauvoir’s other books and novels stand on their own and she was also politically active, nevertheless The Second Sex remains what she is best known for. 

The Second Sex is of course a bit dated given it was written in 1949. There is for example a lot of emphasis on Freud, which doesn’t always ring true to the modern mind.   Even this is important though for what distinguishes it from many other feminist books is that it no polemic but a reasoned study as it’s very introduction shows:

For a long time I have hesitated to write a book on woman. The subject is irritating, especially to women: and it is not new.  Enough ink has been spilled in quarrelling over feminism, and perhaps we should say no more about it.  It is still talked about, however, for the voluminous nonsense uttered during the last century seems to have done little to illuminate the problem. After all, is there a problem? And if so, what is it? Are there women, really?……..What has become of women? was asked recently in an ephemeral magazine. But first we must ask: what is a woman?

A question that is possibly still being asked for even if the lives of women have changed since 1949, the ways in which the world works to ensure compliance to a feminine ideal remains fairly unchanged.

De Beauvoir is of course also known for the company she kept, most notably Sartre.  Though it was the most important of De Beauvoir’s relationships, she was perhaps a bit ill-served by it for Sartre arguably remains better known.  There is also a mini-industry on the sordid aspects of their life together which appears to have been far more complicated than anything the Bloomsbury set thought of.  Then there is De Beauvoir’s relationship with Nelson Algren, which hews far more to the romantic template resulting in a book on their letters and a play.  Coincidence or otherwise, the affair seems to have taken place around the time The Second Sex was published.  Truth be told Sartre is far too much the intellectual and there is a lack of the kind of passion found in De Beauvoir's correspondence to her other lovers. And there is admittedly something enticing in the juxtaposition of De Beauvoir the female intellectual and Algren the decidedly earthier author. 

How enticing can be seen from the rumours of a film on their affair starring Depp and Paradis.  If true, one can only borrow from the young and say “facepalm ”.