All Simone de Beauvoir Quotes
- Retirement may be looked upon either as a prolonged holiday or as a rejection, a being thrown on to the scrap-heap. Heap
- The most mediocre of males feels himself a demigod as compared with women. Compared
- To make oneself an object, to make oneself passive, is a very different thing from being a passive object. Acceptance
- The writer of originality, unless dead, is always shocking, scandalous; novelty disturbs and repels. Always Shocking
- It is not in giving life but in risking life that man is raised above the animal; that is why superiority has been accorded in… Accorded
- It is old age, rather than death, that is to be contrasted with life. Old age is life's parody, whereas death transforms life into a… Absolute
- Why one man rather than another? It was odd. You find yourself involved with a fellow for life just because he was the one that… Fellow
- I cannot be angry at God, in whom I do not believe. Angry
- It was easier for me to think of a world without a creator than of a creator loaded with all the contradictions of the world. All
- When women act like women, they are accused of being inferior. When women act like human beings, they are accused of behaving like men. Accused
- When we abolish the slavery of half of humanity, together with the whole system of hypocrisy it implies, then the "division" of humanity will reveal… Abolish
- Woman is shut up in a kitchen or in a boudoir, and astonishment is expressed that her horizon is limited. Her wings are clipped, and… Astonishment
- A man would never get the notion of writing a book on the peculiar situation of the human male. Book
- The torment that so many young women know, bound hand and foot by love and motherhood, without having forgotten their former dreams. Bound
- You can't assume the responsibility for everything you do or don't do. Assume
- Those interested in perpetuating present conditions are always in tears about the marvelous past that is about to disappear, without having so much as a… Change
- If her functioning as a female is not enough to define woman, if we decline also to explain her through "the eternal feminine," and if… Admit
- The curse which lies upon marriage is that too often the individuals are joined in their weakness rather than in their strength -each asking from… Asking
- Few tasks are more like the torture of Sisyphus than housework, with its endless repetition: the clean becomes soiled, the soiled is made clean, over… Ahead
- I don't want to be just another blade of grass. Another Blade
- Self-knowledge is no guarantee of happiness, but it is on the side of happiness and can supply the courage to fight for it. Courage
- Each of us is responsible for everything and to every human being. Each
- We must not confuse the present with the past. With regard to the past, no further action is possible. Action
- There is only one good. And that is to act according to the dictates of one's conscience. According
- To emancipate woman is to refuse to confine her to the relations she bears to man, not to deny them to her; let her have… Abolish