Update on Simone de Beauvoir

Abstract

Klaw253 Reviews Update on Simone de Beauvoir Barbara Klaw Where does Beauvoir's reputation now stand 15 years after her death? Once seen primarily as Sartre's companion and chief imitator, she is at last being established as a person, artist, philosopher, and political activist in her own right.She is the Paris-born author of five novels, one play, two collections of short stories, numerous volumes of autobiography, lengthy volumes of correspondence with two men, a war diary, and a wide variety of philosophical and political essays.Her most revolutionary sociopolitical essay, Le Deuxième Sexe [The Second Sex], which concerns the mythical and real relationships existing between men and women in society, laid the foundation for twentieth-century discourses concerning sexuality and gender relations, and feminism after 1949. Since her death, her scholarship, political activities, fictional and autobiographical works, letters, diaries, and personal life have all undergone intent scrutiny and continue to be analyzed. Yet, the posthumous publication ofher letters to Sartre and her war diary in 1990 caused her French and American public to re-evaluate her on many levels.' No longer could her admirers keep her hoisted on the golden pedestal offeminism, political activism , altruism, and an unequaled loving relationship of more than 50 years with Sartre who gave her everything and to whom she was always true. It was henceforth evident that Beauvoir had had a variety ofmale and female lovers during her years with Sartre.The publication ofher letters written in English to Nelson Algren, the Chicago-born author who was Beauvoir's lover for many years, and their translation into French endeared her to a public who saw a new softer side of Beauvoir.2 Critics who studied the manuscripts ofher unpublished diaries from 1926-1930, a period that partially predates her acquaintance with Sartre, toiled to portray the inaccuracies in Beauvoir's autobiographical sketch.3 New controversies developed and old ones were reworked . Was Beauvoir misogynist or feminist, victim or torturer, male or female -identified, homosexual, bisexual, or heterosexual? Do her writings and activities prove her to be frigid, frustrated, or sexually fulfilled, an innovator or imitator of ideas, a philosopher or a novelist, a great or a poor writer? Finally, was she significantly influential or oflesser consequence as a twentieth -century writer and historical persona? A variety of biographies appeared to answer these questions. Some scholars wrote innovative biographical and fictional works imagining Beauvoir's life with Sartre. Recently published letters to her or diaries with passages concerning her showed new portrayals of Beauvoir.4 More and more critics produced genetic studies of her work, psychological readings ofher autobiographical writings, analyses ofher sexuality , interpretations of her fiction, philosophy, and The Second Sex. In fact, scholarship on Beauvoir has expanded to such an extent since her death that 254Women in French Studies one short article intending to provide an overview to the general public and to offer one or two unknown gems to tested Beauvoirians cannot do justice to all ofthe commendable studies available. It is my hope only that this briefupdate will offer a useful tool for teachers and scholars alike. There have been about a dozen biographical works on Beauvoir written in the past years, each unique in its own way. In chronological order ofpublication , these studies are by Françoise d'Eaubonne, Judith Okely, Renée Winegarten, Deirdre Bair, Margaret Crosland, Bianca Lamblin, Kate and Edward Fullbrook, Toril Moi, Claudine Monteil, Barbara Klaw and a second volume by Claudine Monteil. In 1986, shortly after Beauvoir's death, Françoise d'Eaubonne published a biographical homage to the woman with whom she had been friends for more than 30 years. As Beauvoir's friend, d'Eaubonne offers the reader a unique portrait of Beauvoir through a combination of the recounting of personal experiences with Beauvoir, the woman, and an analysis ofher writings and life. She explains Beauvoir's life as an effort to fill in the void called life at all costs (55-59). She views Beauvoir's anger at society, that informed so much of her writing and political action, as a transference of her hostility to her parents' treatment ofher (77). Similarly, Beauvoir's errors injudging herself , her...