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CHAPTER I

A. Personal Background

The work of Simone de Beauvoir, a French writer, became the basis of the modern women's

movement. Her writing dealt with the struggles of women in a male-controlled world. The first

of two daughters of Georges and Francoise de Beauvoir, a middle-class couple, Simone de

Beauvoir was born in Paris, France, on January 9, 1908. Her father was a lawyer and had no

religious beliefs; her mother was a strong believer in Catholicism. Simone was educated at a

strict Catholic school for girls. At the age of 14, the intellectually curious De Beauvoir had a

crisis of faith and declared herself an atheist. She thus dedicated herself to the study of existence,

shifting her focus instead to math, literature and philosophy. After World War I (1914–18), her

father suffered money problems, and the family moved to a smaller home. In 1926, De Beauvoir

left home to attend the prestigious Sorbonne, where she studied philosophy and rose to the top of

her class. She completed her exams and a thesis on German mathematician and philosopher

Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz in 1929. That same year De Beauvoir met another young student,

budding existentialist philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre, with whom she would soon form a lasting

bond that would profoundly influence both of their personal and professional lives. Impressed by

De Beauvoir’s intellect, Sartre had asked to be introduced to her. In a short time, their

relationship became romantic but also remained wholly unconventional. De Beauvoir rejected a

proposal of marriage from Sartre early on. The first installment of Beauvoir's autobiography (the

story of her life), Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter, describes her rejection of her parents' middle-

class lives. The second volume, The Prime of Life, covers the years 1929 through 1944, a time

when she and Sartre were both teaching in Paris and she was, she said, too happy to write. After
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the marriage rejection, the two would never live under the same roof and were both free to

pursue other romantic outlets. They remained together until Sartre's death decades later in a

relationship that was at times fraught with tension and, according to biographer Carole Seymour-

Jones, eventually lost its sexual chemistry. The individual liberties their relationship structure

granted the couple allowed De Beauvoir and Sartre to part ways for a time, with each accepting

teaching jobs in different parts of France. De Beauvoir taught philosophy and literature

throughout the 1930s, but during World War II was dismissed from her post by the Vichy

government after the German army occupied Paris in 1940. Meanwhile, Sartre, who was drafted

into the French army at the start of the war, was captured in 1940 but released the following year.

Both De Beauvoir and Sartre would work for the French Resistance during the remainder of the

war, but unable to teach, De Beauvoir soon launched her literary career as well. She continued

doing her passions, writing and teaching, after her partner, Jean Paul, died and made some

relationships with other people, men and women, along the way.

B. Schools

 Institut Adeline-Désir- a Roman Catholic school for girls, among other private

institutions Simone attended. Here she was taught Catholic teachings.

 Institut Catholique de Paris-she studied mathematics

 Institut Sainte-Marie- literature/languages

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 Sorbonne- in 1929, she passed her agrégation in philosophy and met Jean-Paul Sartre,

beginning a lifelong association with him.

C. Influences

 Jean Paul Sartre- influenced each other in their existentialist works, such as Sartre's Being

and Nothingness and de Beauvoir's She Came to Stay and "Phenomenology and

Intent". Sartre develops a philosophical account in support of his existentialism, dealing

with topics such as consciousness, perception, social philosophy, self-deception, the

existence of "nothingness", psychoanalysis, and the question of free will.

 Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel-In his work, The Phenomenology of Spirit, for example,

Hegel presents a history of human consciousness as a journey through stages of

explanations of the world.

 Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz-

Monadology

This theory leads to:

1. Idealism, since it denies things in themselves (besides monads) and multiplies them in

different points of view. Monads are "perpetual living mirrors of the universe."

2. Metaphysical optimism, through the principle of sufficient reason, developed as

follows:
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a) Everything exists according to a reason (by the axiom "Nothing arises from nothing");

b) Everything which exists has a sufficient reason to exist;

c) Everything which exists is better than anything nonexistent (by the first point: since it

is more rational, it also has more reality), and, consequently, it is the best possible being

in the best of all possible worlds (by the axiom: "That which contains more reality is

better than that which contains less reality").

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CHAPTER II

I. Works

A. Philosophical theories

Simone de Beauvoir focuses on these philosophies:

 Existential Phenomenology-subjective human experience as it reflects

people's values, purposes, ideals, intentions, emotions, and relationships.

 Feminist ethics-is an attempt to revise, reformulate, or rethink those

aspects of traditional western ethics that depreciate or devalue women's

moral experience.

 Ethics of Ambiguity-to develop both one's own ontological freedom and

the ontological freedom of others – to engage with others as if they

too are for-itself, or transcendent – which they are.

B. Main Argument

Feminism

Her central argument is that women have been forced to take a secondary role to men

since the earliest times, and that the whole human condition is viewed in male terms and is

described in language that excludes women.

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Existentialism

The emphasis on freedom, responsibility, and ambiguity permeate all of her works and

give voice to core themes of existentialist philosophy. Her philosophical approach is notably

diverse.

C. Philosophical Relations

 Politics

Theorizing concrete conditions of freedom as constituted in and through collective life,

Beauvoir’s work draws our attention to the impact on individuals of different political realities

and contexts (capitalism, patriarchy, communism, occupation, colonialism, socialism), the

harm in political meanings of various forms of embodiment (race, age, gender), and the direct

and indirect effects of oppression and domination on individuals in multiple political contexts.

Her oeuvre reveals that she was, in fact, preoccupied with politics broadly understood, or we

might say that Beauvoir helps us recognize certain events, situations and ideas, as well as

forms of speech, address and language as political even when we do not recognize them as

such at first glance.

Highlighting the significance of the concept of ambiguity, Beauvoir’s political thought

from a philosophical perspective emphasizes paradox, failure and the antinomies of action in

politics. Her distinct contributions within contemporary philosophical also debates on

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humanism and post-humanism, oppression, privilege, judgment and the affective dimensions

of the desire for revenge.

 Religion

Simone de Beauvoir theorized that religion oppresses women in much the same way as it

oppresses the proletariat in Marxist theory.

‘There must be a religion for women as there must be one for the common people, and

for exactly the same reason’ (Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1949).

According to de Beauvoir, religion is used by men to oppress women and to compensate

for them for the second-class status. De Beauvoir argued that historically, men, who have

traditionally controlled most institutions in society, also control religion. It is men who control

religion beliefs, and they use God to justify their control of society.

De Beauvoir writes:

‘For the Jews, Mohammedans, and Christians, among others, men is master by divine

right; the fear of God will therefor repress any impulse towards revolt in the downtrodden

female.’

 Human Nature

Beauvoir's Existentialism is scattered through her many works, both literary and

theoretical, including her classic feminist text The Second Sex. She accepts Sartre's Existentialist
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tenets that there is no human nature and that human freedom is absolute, i.e. that in any situation

whatever we always have a choice. This is exactly as Beauvoir intended. She accepts Sartre’s

Existentialist tenets that there is no human nature and that human freedom is absolute, i.e. that in

any situation whatever we always have a choice. In other words, human life is not on autopilot,

nor is there an instruction manual telling us how to make the right decisions. This means that

there is a good deal of ambiguity, and, in short, Beauvoir tells us to face up to it and live with it.

Given this ambiguity there would seem to be very little opportunity for moral theorizing. Not so,

objects Beauvoir to this standard Existentialist conclusion. We must not expect absolute

solutions and lasting answers: “Man fulfils himself in the transitory or not at all.” But this

doesn’t mean that all ways of living, and all courses of action, are equally good. The way

forward is to look at the nature of our relationship to other people.

 Society

Beauvoir’s most famous work was The Second Sex from 1949, a hugely influential book

which laid the groundwork for second-wave feminism. Where first-wave feminism was

concerned with women’s suffrage and property rights, the second wave broadened these

concerns to include sexuality, family, the workplace, reproductive rights, and so on. All that

started with Beauvoir’s The Second Sex, where Beauvoir outlines the ways in which woman is

perceived as “other” in a patriarchal society, second to man, which is considered—and treated

as—the “first” or default sex.

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CHAPTER III

Summary

Simone de Beauvoir was one of the most influential feminist thinkers of the 20th century.

A novelist, political activist, memoirist and philosopher, she is most well-known for writing the

1949 text ‘The Second Sex’ which was revolutionary in its discussions on the role of women in

society. In addition to her work, de Beauvoir had a lifelong polyamorous relationship with fellow

existentialist philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre. Born in 1908 to a Catholic bourgeois family in Paris,

the de Beauvoir family lost the last of their wealth after World War One. Whilst at the Sorbonne

in 1929, she met Jean-Paul Sartre when they were studying for a postgraduate examination in

philosophy. De Beauvoir became the ninth woman to pass the exam and the youngest ever to

pass. She ranked second overall in the examination with Sartre, who, in re-sitting the exam, beat

her to first place.

Following her graduation, de Beauvoir worked as a teacher, and she and Sartre began a

relationship which would last until his death in 1980. Based on their belief in radical freedom, de

Beauvoir characterized their love as ‘essential’ with an emphasis on emotional honesty. Both

engaged in romantic relationships with men and women throughout their relationship and

although they saw each other daily, they never lived together and did not have any children .De

Beauvoir and Sartre’s relationship was also based on a profound admiration of each other’s

philosophy and intelligence, with de Beauvoir believing that she’d found her intellectual equal in

Sartre. Indeed, following the publication of Sartre’s ‘Being and Nothingness’ in 1943, de

Beauvoir published ‘The Ethics of Ambiguity’ in 1945 which developed the ideas in Sartre’s
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work and outlined existentialist ethics. ‘She Came To Stay’ was de Beauvoir’s literary debut and

was published in 1943. Influenced by her relationship with Sartre, and the sisters Olga and

Wanda Kosakiewicz, the novel explores what happens to a couple in an open relationship when

they form a ménage à trois. Characterized as a metaphysical novel, it explores the fundamental

existentialist belief that humans are ultimately responsible for themselves – a theme which would

recur throughout de Beauvoir’s work. In 1949, ‘The Second Sex’ was published in France.

Presented in two parts, the first part looks at history through a feminist lens and explores how

women came to occupy a subordinate place in society. Simone de Beauvoir continued to publish

fiction and nonfiction throughout her life. She won the Prix Goncourt for her novel ‘The

Mandarins’ in 1954 which satirised the lives of Sartre, Camus and other leading French

intellectuals. Her other novels included ‘The Blood of Others’, ‘All Men Are Mortal’, ‘Les

Belles Images’ and ‘The Woman Destroyed’. She also published four memoirs which examined

her life with great intellectual insight, including ‘Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter’, ‘Force of

Circumstance’, ‘The Coming of Age’ and ‘All Said and Done’. After Sartre’s death in 1980, she

published ‘Adieux: A Farewell to Sartre’ which poignantly discussed the last years of her

beloved’s life.

Throughout her life, de Beauvoir continued to speak out on political issues. She was a

great champion of women’s rights and supported the abortions laws in France and Algeria and

Hungary’s battles for independence. De Beauvoir also condemned the Vietnam war. She died on

14 April 1986 at the age of 78. She is buried next to Jean-Paul Sartre in the Montparnasse

Cemetery in Paris. Upon her death, her fellow feminist writers Gloria Steinem and Betty Friedan

both praised her influence, with Steinem proclaiming that “if any single human being can be

credited with inspiring the current international women’s movement, it’s Simone de Beauvoir.”
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Conclusions

Simone de Beauvoir works in relation of existentialism, phenomenology, feminism, and

ethics of ambiguity placed an important role in terms of religion, society, and self-decision. It

also opened the eyes of the people who has mainstream look of women. Through her books, she

elaborated the character, attributes, and the necessary qualities of a woman that breaks down the

old mentality. It talked about the inequality women encountered again in terms of work, family,

society, etc. Lastly, her works motivates people to make decisions in life with the guidance of

the past experience that can really shape one’s character and life. De Beauvoir is a strong woman

who stands for what is right. She might commit some controversial acts in her life but still she

made a mark in terms of women’s rights and self-development.

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CHAPTER IV

Abstract

This paper presents the life Simone de Beauvoir, a feminist, professor, and an

existentialist with a wide expertise of self-interpretation and women rights. The content includes

her personal background, works, influences, schools, philosophical relations to politics, religion,

society, and human nature. This research depicts in her life, achievements, and the way she lived

her life according to her passions, belief, and philosophical stand. This Philosophical research is

not just a compliance of my requirement, but also a tribute to my philosopher, Simone de

Beauvoir who share her wisdom through her books and never stopped doing it until she died

because it was her dream, passion, and legacy.

Arguments/Remarks

Simone de Beauvoir, as a philosopher and writer, made works that marked in the history

of women’s right and free interpretation of oneself. Everything on her work is favorable because

through it, everyone may become free from the mainstream norms and believe in themselves

(Existentialism). They will also understand the equality of all genders especially women’s right

(Feminism) and lastly, everyone will realize that in everything they do, they should never forget

their past because it will guide them through their future (phenomenology). She used her books

to relay messages to everyone of what is happening right now in our world.

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Remarks

 Simone de Beauvoir was graduated from private schools: Institut Adeline-Désir, Institut

Catholique de Paris, Institut Sainte-Marie, and Sorbonne.

 She passed her agrégation in philosophy

 She then met Jean Paul Sartre and began writing while teaching.

 She made several books including She Came To Stay and The Second Sex which were hits

that time because it talks about women qualities and character in different situations and

scenarios

 She also made a mark in politics and became part of the resistance in WWII.

 She became a voice of feminism and gave everyone awareness through her books.
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Reference

https://www.biography.com/scholar/simone-de-beauvoir

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

https://www.britannica.com/biography/Simone-de-Beauvoir

https://revisesociology.com/2018/07/20/simone-beauvoir-religion-second-sex/