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Memoriile unei fete cuminți

Simone de Beauvoir,

Ioana Ilie (Translator)

4.11 · Rating details · 10,941 ratings · 798 reviews

Primul şi cel mai celebru dintre volumele autobiografice ale lui Simone de Beauvoir apare într-o nouă versiune românească. Memoriile unei fete cuminți, povestea vieții autoarei (născută în 1908) din copilărie până la 21 de ani, când, devenită studentă la Sorbona, îi întâlnise pe Sartre și pe alți tineri intelectuali de viitor, e socotită o operă clasică a genului și ilustr ...more

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1st, 408 pages

Published 2011 by Humanitas (first published January 1st 1958)

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Feb 02, 2017 Steven Godin rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: france, history, non-fiction, memoir-autobiography, feminism, paris

“…but all day long I would be training myself to think, to understand, to criticize, to know myself; I was seeking for the absolute truth: this preoccupation did not exactly encourage polite conversation.”

Paris, 1908, and Simone de Beauvoir enters the world.
Born into a bourgeois family this beautifully deep and intimate account of one girls journey into early womanhood is both a fascinating and intelligent read. From her young spirited days as a child, to an intricate student life where literat “…but all day long I would be training myself to think, to understand, to criticize, to know myself; I was seeking for the absolute truth: this preoccupation did not exactly encourage polite conversation.”

Paris, 1908, and Simone de Beauvoir enters the world.
Born into a bourgeois family this beautifully deep and intimate account of one girls journey into early womanhood is both a fascinating and intelligent read. From her young spirited days as a child, to an intricate student life where literature and philosophy would play a pivotal role in shaping the future, to the beginnings of a blossoming friendship with Jean-Paul Sarte, Simone would become a leading figure in the roots of both feminism and existentialism, a true independent voice the the 20th century.

The early years.

Having the same attributes as any girl should have, Simone looked at the world even at a very young age with eyes wide open, she had the characteristics that any parent would wish for in their child, intelligent, pleasant to be around, willing to learn, listen, and play happily with sister Louise.
But she was also an independent thinker, ahead of her years, asking questions that someone of this age shouldn't even be interested in. Her education was a top priority, and Simone was always thinking ahead, deeply passionate for her Mama and Papa, they were her salvation, but the overly protected nature they showed had both good and bad points regarding her development. A family of devout Catholics, the de Beauvoir household was certainly a strict one, I guess it's easy to say that where today's young learn about things they shouldn't from the internet and so forth, back then books made a huge difference in ones self-discovering and learning about life, her mother would reiterate there are books for you and there are books for us, and was constantly keeping an eye on what she was reading. Reading was a big deal for Simone, spending weekends and evening with her head in book. There were two books in particular that had a lasting impression, 'Little Women' and 'The Mill on the Floss', both featuring female characters that Simone felt so strongly about she was driven to tears. It's safe to say that from the age of about twelve Simone's perception of women was changing, her father, a hard working banker believed a women's place in this world was either in the kitchen or the bedroom, and over the early teenage years the relationship with her parents would often bring conflict, but she remained very close to her sister, and had a good friend in Zaza who she spent plenty of time with. Females were definitely her comfort zone.
And there was one question she just couldn't figure out, "how can a women fall in love with a man, whom she may have only known briefly, and replace Papa who had been loved for her whole life"?.
This would constantly be a problem she just couldn't comprehend, Simone had no plans to fall in love, to wed, to have children, to live a wife's life. She just wanted her own, on her own terms.
In the later teen years, when a student, this thought process would change, well only slightly.

The Student.

Having excelled at school but also battling adolescent insecurity, her loss of faith, and the drive for her independence, Simone was very clear she wanted to be a writer, and took to start writing a novel as well as studying deep and philosophical work at the Bibliothèque Sainte Geneviève.
She would remain close friends with Zaza, fall in love with a charming young man in Jacques,
and make many new student acquaintances at the Sorbonne. She became fascinated with Robert Garric, a speaker of French Literature trying to bring culture to the lower classes after apparently giving up a promising career at the university, this she felt so strongly about and regularly sat in on some of his talks. Here Simone fell in with Jean Pradelle and Pierre Cairaut, dedicated left-wingers and a small group was set up to discuss various important matters concerning the social classes, possible war looming, as well as Philosophy. This would eventually lead her to cross paths with Jean-Paul Satre, and possibly the biggest moment in her life.
Taking Simone under his wing, Sarte always said he prefered the friendship with that of women more than men, and it's as if the two where just destined to meet. Something great was building, they could both feel it, a new direction was taking shape, which would lead to the birth of existentialism, and the rest, as they say, is history.

Superbly written, and classed as autobiographical, which it is, but the grandest thing of all is it kind of reads like a coming-of-age novel, and it's so personal and heartfelt, you start to think it's an intellectual story rather than an actual real life, but a real life it is, a courageously defiant account of a woman breaking free, and showing a determination to follow her own path, not one already mapped out for her. ...more

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May 02, 2019 Joe Valdez rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: memoirs

My introduction to the writing of Simone de Beauvoir is the first of several memoirs she wrote. Published in 1958, Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter takes place during the Great War and the postwar years, with de Beauvoir an intellectually ravenous, morally prudish and eternally questioning teenage daughter of a bourgeois family in Paris. Lit with tremendous desire, but, as a child of privilege, very little drama, I related to her life immediately. My childhood in suburban Houston of the 1980s was f My introduction to the writing of Simone de Beauvoir is the first of several memoirs she wrote. Published in 1958, Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter takes place during the Great War and the postwar years, with de Beauvoir an intellectually ravenous, morally prudish and eternally questioning teenage daughter of a bourgeois family in Paris. Lit with tremendous desire, but, as a child of privilege, very little drama, I related to her life immediately. My childhood in suburban Houston of the 1980s was filled with great anticipation but very little in the way of anything actually happening. The author relates all of this in writing that is absolutely jeweled.

-- One day in the place Saint-Sulpice, walking along hand-in-hand with my Aunt Marguerite who hadn't the remotest idea how to talk to me, I suddenly wondered: 'How does she see me?' and felt a sharp sense of superiority: for I knew what I was like inside; she didn't. Deceived by outward appearances, she never suspected that inside my immature body nothing was lacking; and I made up my mind that when I was older I would never forget that a five-year-old is a complete individual, a character in his own right. But that was precisely what adults refused to admit, and whenever they treated me with condescension I at once took offence.

-- One evening, however, I was chilled to the marrow by the idea of personal extinction. I was reading about a mermaid who was dying by the sad sea waves; for the love of a handsome prince, she had renounced her immortal soul, and was being changed into sea-foam. That inner voice which had always told her 'Here I am' had been silenced for ever, and it seemed to me that the entire universe had foundered in the ensuing stillness. But--no it couldn't be. God had given me the promise of eternity; I could not ever cease to see, to hear, to talk to myself. Always I should be able to say: 'Here I am.' There could be no end.

-- In the afternoons I would sit out on the balcony outside the dining-room; there, level with the tops of the trees that shaded the boulevard Raspail, I would watch the passers-by. I knew too little of the habits of adults to be able to guess where they were going in such a hurry, or what the hopes and fears were that drove them along. But their faces, their appearance, and the sound of their voices captivated me; I find it hard now to explain what the particular pleasure was that they gave me; but when my parents decided to move to the fifth-floor flat in the rue de Rennes, I remember the despairing cry I gave: 'But I won't be able to see the people in the street any more!'

-- Papa used to say with pride: 'Simone has a man's brain; she thinks like a man; she is a man.' And yet everyone treated me like a girl. Jacques and his friends read real books and were abreast of all current problems; they lived out in the open; I was confined to the nursery. But I did not give up all hope. I had confidence in my future. Women, by the exercise of talent or knowledge, had carved out a place for themselves in the universe of men. But I felt impatient of the delays I had to endure. Whenever I happened to pass by the Collège Stanislas my heart would sink; I tried to imagine the mystery that was being celebrated behind those walls, in a classroom full of boys, and I would feel like an outcast.

-- My father, the majority of writers, and the universal consensus of opinion encouraged young men to sow their wild oats. When the time came, they would marry a young woman of their own social class; but in the meanwhile it was quite in order for them to amuse themselves with girls from the lowest ranks of society--women of easy virtue, young milliners' assistants, work-girls, sewing-maids, shopgirls. This custom made me feel sick. It had been driven into me that the lower classes have no morals: the misconduct of a laundry-woman or a flower-girl therefore seemed to me to be so natural that it didn't even shock me; I felt a certain sympathy for those poor young women whom novelists endowed with such touching virtues. Yet their love was always doomed from the state; one day or other, their lover would throw them over for a well-bred young lady. I was a democrat and a romantic; I found it revolting that, just because he was a man and had money, he should be authorized to play around with a girl's heart.

Much of Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter is devoted to Simone de Beauvoir's best friend Elizabeth "Zaza" Mabille, a bookworm whose mother grows to fear that Simone's preference for a ideals will corrupt daughter. The girls grow closer, pull apart and come together again as they move through college. The same goes for Simone's cousin Jacques, who she alternatively detests, loves and decides she'd be grossly incompatible with as a wife. The book is absent of drama and those hoping for a pageant of sex, drugs and rock 'n roll are encouraged to look elsewhere, but de Beauvoir's prism of introspection, intellectual curiosity, virtue, integrity and honesty are an intoxicating read.

Translation by James Kirkup. ...more

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Nov 20, 2008 Manny rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: french, history-and-biography

Be careful of those quiet, nerdy-looking teenage girls, they may grow up to become famous authors. Here's Simone listening to her parents' friends (my translation):

Ils lisaient et ils parlaient de leurs lectures. On disait: "C'est bien écrit mais il y a des longueurs." Ou bien: "Il y a des longueurs, mais c'est bien écrit." Parfois, l'œil rêveur, la voix subtile, on nuançait: "C'est curieux" ou d'un ton plus sévère: "C'est spécial."

They read, and they talked about what they'd been reading. They

...more

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Aug 22, 2017 Jan-Maat added it · review of another edition

Shelves: france, 20th-century, autobiography-memoir

I was reading Simon Schama's Citizens about the French revolution, I had got up to the storming of the Bastille, and I thought I'd step back and take a break by reading de Beauvoir's memoirs of her childhood. Goodness what a shock, Schama paints a picture of France on the eve of revolution in which you might struggle to find a priest who believes in God, where disrespect for the royal family is near universal, the ideas of Rousseau and the classical world as an ideal were on all minds, here de B ...more

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May 04, 2011 Kristen rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: biography, favorites, own

I loved this book so much any review will be wholly inadequate. I loved is how she captures the innocence of childhood and the pains her parent took to maintain that innocence far beyond what seems right. I loved the confusion, despair and vanity of adolescences and how she could feel so strongly about ideals that themselves constantly changed. I loved how her idea of self was in constant flux and the richness of her inner life. I love how books meant just so much to her, and all those descripti I loved this book so much any review will be wholly inadequate. I loved is how she captures the innocence of childhood and the pains her parent took to maintain that innocence far beyond what seems right. I loved the confusion, despair and vanity of adolescences and how she could feel so strongly about ideals that themselves constantly changed. I loved how her idea of self was in constant flux and the richness of her inner life. I love how books meant just so much to her, and all those descriptions of her spending day after day of her youth reading outdoors in some lovely garden just demands the reader should enjoy this book in the same way. Even the smell of this book was intoxicating.

"I loved those evenings when, after dinner, I would set out alone on the Metro and travel right to the other side of Paris, near Les Buttes Chaumont, which smelled of damp and greenery. Often I would walk back home. In the Boulevard de la Chapelle, under the steel girders of the elevated railway, women would be waiting for customers; men would come staggering out of brightly lit bistros; the fronts of cinemas would be ablaze with posters. I could feel life all around me, an enormous, ever-present confusion. I would stride along, feeling it's thick breath blow in my face. And I would say to myself that, after all, life is worth living."

I place this above 'Speak, Memory' on my list of favorite memoirs, and there isn't any higher praise I offer then that! It's absolutely beautiful. If, just once, while reading a book I become so enamored that I gasp it to my chest uttering uncontrollable signs; then that, for me, is an automatic five stars. I probably did that a dozen times or more throughout this book; just utterly lost in the ethereal dreaminess of her passions or shattered by her despairs; especially the end, I sat at work for nearly a half hour, completely still, completely moved.

"At night I would climb the steps to the Sacre-Coeur, and I would watch Paris, that futile oasis, scintillating in the wilderness of space. I would weep, because it was so beautiful, and because it was so useless."
...more

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Feb 07, 2018 Cheryl rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: favorite, memoir, france, interior-life, first-edition-hardback-1959-own

"I was born at four o'clock in the morning on the ninth of January 1908, in a room fitted with white-enameled furniture and overlooking the Boulevard Raspail. In the family photographs taken the following summer there are ladies in long dresses and ostrich feather hats and gentlemen wearing boaters and panamas, all smiling at a baby: they are my parents, my grandfather, uncles, aunts; and the baby is me. My father was thirty, my mother twenty-one, and I was their first child."

And later, there wa ...more

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Jan 04, 2021 Théodore added it · review of another edition

" I was proud to combine in my person a woman's heart and a man's brain ".

What happens when you learn to see the conflicts between what you are, what you believe, and what is around you, and these become unbearable ?
I think that is the question that is being answered in de Beauvoir book.
For me, beyond the pleasure of reading, ( because SB knows how to describe and make the atmosphere ) - it was an instructional book. Especially because it sets out clearly enough the development of a woman's co " I was proud to combine in my person a woman's heart and a man's brain ".

What happens when you learn to see the conflicts between what you are, what you believe, and what is around you, and these become unbearable ?
I think that is the question that is being answered in de Beauvoir book.
For me, beyond the pleasure of reading, ( because SB knows how to describe and make the atmosphere ) - it was an instructional book. Especially because it sets out clearly enough the development of a woman's consciousness in an oppressive bourgeois environment, and the ways in which this woman learns to avoid conflicts and to live under pressures that she did not recognize as such.
One of these ways is " partial blindness " , which I think is a somewhat common phenomenon for women who grow up in close contact with a culture created almost exclusively by men. They learn to identify with the male court, to take its way of thinking, and, if they remember, however, that they are women, to see themselves as " exceptions ". To consider that they have been " blessed " with a " masculine intelligence ".

The impression that you are an " exception " , I think - is due to that " partial blindness ", which you do not realize at all, and to live in peace into a world in which you could not find your place, otherwise. The burgeois society of France at the beginning of the last century, considered sexual relations outside or before marriage - to be perfectly normal, of course, only for men. Simone is not interested in women's right to vote, she reads Plato, Leibniz, Nietzsche, and philosophy makes her believe that she has discovered the truth of the world itself, but her confidence cracks when this claim confronts reality, her so-called " privilege " being based on the most flawed of morals.
The book has many interesting passages to discuss.
It made me smile, for example, a phrase that indicates how the mechanisms of an absurd guilt are constructed, which can make a woman's life an ordeal :
" At the age of 5, it was explained to me that if I was wise and godly, God would save France ".. It also made me laugh the way Simone's mother - a fervent Catholic - caught with a needle the " dangerous " pages of the novels her daughter was allowed to read...And she, even though being alone in her room, did not detached them. Why ?
Even from here, a long discussion could begin.. ...more

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Apr 21, 2019 Gabrielle rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: feminist, french, philosophy, je-suis-snob, own-a-copy, favorites, biographies-and-memoirs, used-bookstore-finds, reviewed, read-in-2019

The other day, I was waiting for my husband to meet me for dinner, and I had plenty of time to kill so, I went to read at a nearby coffee shop. I had been sitting there for a few minutes when it hit me that I was drinking espresso whilst reading Simone de Beauvoir (in French!!) and listening to Bob Dylan on my iPod. This moment couldn’t have been any snootier if I had tried… that is, until I started laughing – at myself – out loud, to the other patrons’ confusion. I felt I was only missing a ber The other day, I was waiting for my husband to meet me for dinner, and I had plenty of time to kill so, I went to read at a nearby coffee shop. I had been sitting there for a few minutes when it hit me that I was drinking espresso whilst reading Simone de Beauvoir (in French!!) and listening to Bob Dylan on my iPod. This moment couldn’t have been any snootier if I had tried… that is, until I started laughing – at myself – out loud, to the other patrons’ confusion. I felt I was only missing a beret and a cigarette, and the picture would have been perfect (note to self: carry emergency beret and cigarette in purse, to maximize future poser moments).

But really, reading Beauvoir shouldn’t be considered a snobby read, especially her memoirs! They are very elegantly written, but show a candor and honesty few people are brave enough to have when looking back at their own lives. They are also a fascinating account of how a relatively ordinary young girl grew up to become one of the 20th century’s luminaries of philosophy and feminism; so you know, it's really interesting!

The title is a bit tongue-in-cheek, as Beauvoir was certainly not always a picture-perfect daughter: she isn’t shy to admit she was a brat who threw public tantrums and who was perfectly happy to make herself throw up rather than eat things she did not like. I admit I was surprised to learn how deeply religious she was throughout her childhood and early adult life: considering her intellectual work and the lifestyle she later cultivated, I had not expected her to have contemplated becoming a nun!

Since this book covers mostly her childhood, adolescence and early adulthood, it focuses a lot on her family, her childhood friend Zaza, her love of books, her studies... and her crushes! The very lucid way she remembers the pangs of puberty, the strange and mysterious agonies of trying to understand oneself and others as you grow up were fascinating and moving.

I felt a certain kinship with Beauvoir as I was reading this: her discovery of the complexity of the adult world and refusal to be treated as a child who did not belong to it, her struggle with the loss of faith and her precocious intellectual interests were things I related to deeply. I loved reading her thoughts about the effect "Little Women" had on her, not only because I also love Jo March, but because she thought Jo's relationship with Professor Bhaer to be more desirable than a more romantic alternative, because they have a greater intellectual connection. I simply couldn't agree more.

In fact, the way she saw her relationships with men was amazing: never could she conceive of being with a man who would not consider her an equal and a partner. When she learns that her cousin Jacques, whom she pinned for when she was a teenager, had a working class mistress he pushed aside when came time for him to make a reasonable marriage, she was most mad at him, not for having had a mistress, but for being a cliché. That lack of originality inspired nothing but disdain in her, she simply could not abide the mediocrity.

Her relationship with Sartre is only just beginning when "Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter" concludes, but she knew he'd always be a part of her life because she felt like she had finally found an intellectual equal, who values her mind and her intelligence. Can I just say: "YAS!!!!".

The amazing story of an absolutely amazing woman. I will be looking for the rest of her autobiography! ...more

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Sep 01, 2010 Emily rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: read-in-2010, favorites

The short of it: From the opening pages I fell head over heels for Memoires d'une jeune fille rangée (translated into English as Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter but more literally "Memoirs of a well-behaved girl"), the first of four volumes in de Beauvoir's autobiography. It's been a long time since I connected with a book at such a level of visceral sympathy—since I had the feeling "Yes! That's what it's like for me too!," since I felt such a sense of loss upon turning a final page. So there may ...more

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Jun 13, 2018 M.rmt rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

great great lifestory of a great great writer

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May 09, 2015 Jonfaith rated it really liked it · review of another edition

I would crack between my teeth the candied shell of an artificial fruit, and a burst of light would illuminate my palate with a taste of blackcurrant or pineapple: all the colours, all the lights were mine, the gauzy scarves, the diamonds, the laces; I held the whole party in my mouth.

Living in Indiana, mass transit remains a topic left of center. Sure we have a bus system but nothing further. Such is dreams of those elites who want to undermine something core, something both pure and competiti ...more

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Dec 05, 2011 Aubrey rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: 5-star, translated, french, reality-check, antidote-translated, reviewed, reality-translated, non-fiction, authorness, r-goodreads

Well written discourses on growing up are amazing. The clarity with which the author described her years from infancy to childhood and beyond was astonishing; it was as if the babies in Mary Poppins had retained the eloquent speech which they used to discourse with birds and other nonhuman entities. It made for some serious misunderstandings on my part at the beginning though, as I was originally very annoyed with Simone at the beginning of her life. Her tantrums and her taking of her blessed li Well written discourses on growing up are amazing. The clarity with which the author described her years from infancy to childhood and beyond was astonishing; it was as if the babies in Mary Poppins had retained the eloquent speech which they used to discourse with birds and other nonhuman entities. It made for some serious misunderstandings on my part at the beginning though, as I was originally very annoyed with Simone at the beginning of her life. Her tantrums and her taking of her blessed life for granted were very frustrating, at least until I realized that the way she was conveying her emotions and thought processes made her seem much older than she actually was. It was easier to forgive her then, and actually made the reasons behind her outbursts as a child fascinating instead of insufferable.

Once my annoyances with her cleared up, her life was one of the more intellectually stimulating autobiographies that I have had the pleasure of reading, to the extent that I will have to find more works by the deep thinkers of the period. I'm especially looking forward to reading Jean-Paul Sartre; the way she describes him makes me wish I had met him, and if given the chance I would gladly give my right arm in order to do so.

Many of the people she interacted with were interesting, but what shone clearest through her time with them is how it was normal for her to quickly fall in with them, discourse for a while, and then fall out just as quickly. This resonated deeply with my own experiences with others, along with the fact that she had multiple periods of stagnancy that overwhelmed her body and soul. To want for everything, yet be limited to a repeating daily life barred on all sides by both physical walls and ignorant people! There is no greater torture than this. Reading this book doesn't help my own dissatisfaction with my short term goal of settling down to a career, but it was satisfying in my long term goal of figuring out exactly what my existence is supposed to consist of.

I think there's a little too much personal reflection in here. Darn. Going back to the book, it was a heady mix of descriptive elegance and intellectual stimulation in a never ending journey of self-discovery, and Simone honed the process of its creation down to a science. Not sure if I'll ever look into any of the books that she devoured in the course of the novel, but as said previously, I definitely need to read Sartre. Someone who was described as always thinking definitely deserves some attention. ...more

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May 30, 2018 Ophelia.Desdemona rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

I have developed a crush on Simone. What an incredible woman. What a brain. Even from early childhood her intelligence shows. Her courage, her strength. I truly find her so interesting.

Also, at times, she made feel like a useless shit. I think of her struggles she had to go through to get her knowledge and independence and I have all of that for free and what have I done with my life?
But of course she also inspires a great deal.

I didn't know she was so religious actually, that came as a shock. I ...more

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Jul 22, 2017 El rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: 20th-centurylit-late, put-it-in-your-journal, cultural-studies-and-other, hear-me-roar-and-gender

A little over a year ago, I read Simone de Beauvoir's 1949 tome, The Second Sex. The feminist text covers so much ground from biology to philosophy, and it's not a book for the weak. It's a commitment, but one I feel everyone should make at some point in their lives.

I've had Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter on my shelf for years, after having picked it up in a used bookstore in Baltimore several moons ago. It's the first book in her autobiographical series and thus covers her early years - her youn ...more

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Jul 16, 2018 Justine rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: memoirs

Update 23/5/19

More 4.5 stars

Still moved by the end, and still kind of "strange" to feel close to Simone, to see similitudes between the two of us!
__________________

I thought this book was more like the beginning of an autobiography than a memoir. For me, a memoir implies historical events, and thoughts about them; here, Simone de Beauvoir focuses on herself, her life, her studies, her friends, and doesn't really "speak" about her political thoughts.

I love Zaza, and could really feel the love o ...more

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Nov 20, 2008 Sam rated it really liked it · review of another edition

I literally picked this book up after seeing it fall (get thrown?) out of a second story apartment window on Farwell. I wish more books would get thrown out of windows and land at my feet...

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Jun 23, 2011 Judy rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Recommends it for: Smart women and open minded men

Shelves: books-from-1958, memoir

I looked forward to this first volume of Simone de Beauvoir's autobiography with much anticipation, but had no idea how wonderful it would be. Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter covers the first twenty-three years of her life beginning with her earliest childhood memories. I loved the way she explained the early tantrums that came over her whenever adults attempted to block her efforts to act in an independent, self-realized fashion. Apparently she was born with the sense that she was an individual w I looked forward to this first volume of Simone de Beauvoir's autobiography with much anticipation, but had no idea how wonderful it would be. Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter covers the first twenty-three years of her life beginning with her earliest childhood memories. I loved the way she explained the early tantrums that came over her whenever adults attempted to block her efforts to act in an independent, self-realized fashion. Apparently she was born with the sense that she was an individual who mattered and had the right to follow her own ideas.

Her upbringing was bourgeois Catholic, though her family was by no means wealthy. She went to Catholic schools, was trained and guarded as a young girl by a devout, socially conservative mother, yet stimulated by her father's love of the theater. Although she was kept close to home and inculcated with fears about bodily functions, passion, men and sex, Simone had always a brilliant inquiring intellect. She read and studied incessantly all throughout grade school, high school and college, entering the Sorbonne as one of the few female philosophy candidates. Every drive she had was sublimated into mental activity. She was almost twenty before she went out on her own to bars, plays, movies, at which point she went a bit wild but never experienced more than a kiss from a male.

As she relates her female friendships, her infatuation with her cousin Jacques, her quest to understand life through philosophy, I was enthralled by the combined emotional, spiritual and intellectual fervor which imbued every minute of her coming of age. The loss of her Catholic faith and her attempts to understand her own mind, passions and aspirations were as exciting to me as her tortured relationship with her best friend Zaza.

I doubt that I will ever reach the intellectual heights of this amazing woman, but I have always dreamed of doing so. As I mentioned in my review of The Second Sex, it blows my mind that Simone de Beauvoir was of my own mother's generation yet our mothers were so much alike. It is almost true that she went through my life a generation earlier in another country, in Paris of all places. I am lucky that she always kept a journal and could write so movingly about her life. ...more

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Jun 25, 2020 Luís rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: favorites, female-writers, philosophy, biography, classics, france-algeria

Let's say it right away, every morning in every week, when I had to put this book in my bag because the train was entering the station, was painful. The only thing left for me to do, as I walked, was to go over what I had just read, to relate it to me, to my childhood possibly, and to associate these memories with what I knew about Simone de Beauvoir.
How some autobiographies I have read recently seem bland and empty to me now, in the face of this one! Simone de Beauvoir jumps on each evocation o Let's say it right away, every morning in every week, when I had to put this book in my bag because the train was entering the station, was painful. The only thing left for me to do, as I walked, was to go over what I had just read, to relate it to me, to my childhood possibly, and to associate these memories with what I knew about Simone de Beauvoir.
How some autobiographies I have read recently seem bland and empty to me now, in the face of this one! Simone de Beauvoir jumps on each evocation of her childhood to dissect it, explain it, draw from it the substance of what will build her over the years.
As well her enthusiasm as a precocious little girl as her tantrums when she tore off at a captivating moment, her ungrateful adolescence, her questions about faith, yet young emotional in the first years of her life. Then her fierce desire free herself from the bourgeoisie in which she entangled up to the neck just like many of her friends, these meetings which will forge her, will direct her unceasingly towards discoveries and reflections always in motion.
We will keep in mind his friendship with his sister Poupette and Zaza, his childhood friend, his love for his cousin Jacques, his admiration for Herbaud and finally, Sartre, who will prove to be the one who will remain in his life forever.
Simone de Beauvoir never judges herself, she analyzes and describes the development of her thoughts as a child and adolescent, sometimes resorting to her newspapers from the time and letters received at the time.
This correspondence, let's talk about it, revolves around an aspect of the upper bourgeoisie forgotten today, which is that of marriages arranged around dowries and the respectability of families. Young girls suffering from thwarted and impossible loves, boys encouraged to get their hands on low-income young women before entering into marriage. In the 1920s, however relatively independent, passing aggregation, already a teacher, Simone still asking her parents permission to go to the theatre. Losing her virginity before marriage, of course, is unthinkable, and a girl who is still studying at 20 is wasting her time. Who will want her?
It was the whole bourgeois context of this time that gradually gave birth to De Beauvoir's feminist ideas, whose ambition to be someone was commensurate with his intelligence.
Finally, we discover a young Jean-Paul Sartre philosopher to the end and very endearing.
A key reading. ...more

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Jul 03, 2011 gwayle rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: favorites, france

I don't think I've ever read anything that so wonderfully captures the intellectual development of a smart young woman, especially that period when you simultaneously overestimate and underestimate yourself, when the stakes are so high that a word of praise will inflate your ego to monstrous proportions and a word criticism--even if it's well-meant and constructive--will fling you into paroxysms of despair. One moment you think you're the smartest person ever to walk the face of the earth; from ...more

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Mar 29, 2012 Geoff marked it as to-read · review of another edition

There are times I'm out with the significant other, and we're meeting people, other couples, in social-type situations, and we do the rounds, and I find myself in conversation with another couple or sets of couples, people I'm just meeting, and when I walk away I find myself thinking "how can that elegant, intelligent, beautiful woman be with such a boring, boorish, douche of a man?" I'm fairly confident that is how I'm going to feel about de Beauvoir and Sartre. ...more

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Apr 01, 2019 Domhnall rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: philosophy

This autobiography of a remarkable woman takes her through her childhood and up to the completion of her education. It is populated with a cast of characters for whom we learn to care, providing a lively story and a sense of unfolding progress towards a close in which many plot lines are resolved with great style. Along the way, beautiful descriptive writing and excellent narrative skills sustain interest and contain more than enough tension, surprise and suspense to make this a most enjoyable r This autobiography of a remarkable woman takes her through her childhood and up to the completion of her education. It is populated with a cast of characters for whom we learn to care, providing a lively story and a sense of unfolding progress towards a close in which many plot lines are resolved with great style. Along the way, beautiful descriptive writing and excellent narrative skills sustain interest and contain more than enough tension, surprise and suspense to make this a most enjoyable read.

It can be read on face value as a nice example of the genre – a portrait of the artist – and stand comparison with the best in its class. It is unavoidably a commentary on the position of women in this society and an account of one woman’s rejection of her assigned status, with cutting asides on the sheer hypocrisy of male values and Catholic sexual morality, though it really cannot be accused of stridency. It can be read as a description of a particular social class – the wealthy elite of French society, for whom marriage and family are integral to the networks of power, while parenting and education are a process of socialisation which forcefully impels its subjects towards their predestined responsibilities in a system of privilege which is as restrictive for its elite as it is exclusive towards lower social orders. On its margins, casual references to a disappointed woman seeking a civil-service position in Saigon, young men doing their military service in Algeria, a difficult character disappearing to Togoland, place the French empire in the background as an ever present source of opportunity and challenge, part of the natural state of affairs which requires no explanation.

Yet it has few lectures and no harsh tones; it can be enjoyed as a well constructed novel in which the adult world is made strange when viewed from the perspective of an imaginative child. It is a book that might change you, but only if you want it to.

Quotes

I loved the red curtain, the lights, the scenery, and the flower ballet; but the adventures taking place on stage were of only minor interest to me. The actors were too real, and at the same time not real enough. The most sumptuous finery had not an iota of the brilliance of a carbuncle in a fairy tale. I used to clap my hands and gasp with wonder, but in my heart of hearts I preferred a quiet afternoon alone with my books. [p53]

I liked those moments when, pretending to be busied with some easy exercise, I let my ear be beguiled by the sounds of summer: the fizzing of wasps, the chattering of guinea-fowls, the peacock’s strangulated cry, the whispering of leaves,; the scent of phlox mingled with the aromas of caramel and coffee and chocolate that came wafting to me from the kitchen; rings of sunlight would be dancing over my exercise book. I felt I was one with everything: we all had our place just here, now, and for ever. [p80]

I contented myself with the announcement that I did not intend to marry. My father smiled: ‘We’ll have plenty of time to think about that when you’re fifteen years old.’ [p75]

The grown-ups did not share our games or our pleasures. I didn’t know a single grown-up who appeared to enjoy life on earth very much: life’s no joke, life’s not what you read about in novels, they all declared. I had always been sorry for the grown-ups’ monotonous existence; when I realized that, within a short space of time, it would be my fate too, I was filled with panic. One afternoon I was helping Mama to wash up; she was washing the plates, and I was drying; through the windows I could see the wall of the barracks, and other kitchens in which women were scrubbing out saucepans or peeling vegetables. Every day lunch and dinner; every day washing-up; all those hours, those endlessly recurring hours, all leading nowhere: could I live like that? An image formed in my mind, an image of such desolate clarity that I can still remember it today: a row of grey squares, diminishing according to the laws of perspective, but all flat, all identical, extending away to the horizon; they were the days and weeks and years. Since the day I was born I had gone to bed richer in the evening that I had been the day before; I was steadily improving myself, step by step; but if, when I got up there, I found only a barren plateau, with no landmark to make for, what was the point in it all? [pp103, 4]

My mother’s whole education and upbringing had convinced her that for a woman the greatest thing was to become the mother of a family; she couldn’t play this part unless I played the dutiful daughter. [p106]

Not one of these novels evoked an image of human love or of my own destiny which afforded me the slightest satisfaction; I did not look to them for a foretaste of my own future; but they gave me what I wanted: they took me out of myself. Thanks to them I broke free from the bonds of childhood and entered a complicated, adventurous, and unpredictable world. When my parents went out in the evening, I would prolong far into the night these surreptitious delights; while my sister slept, I, propped up on my pillow, would be reading; as soon as I heard the key turning in the door, I would put out the light. In the morning, as I made my bed, I would slip the book under the mattress until I got the chance to put it back in its place on the bookshelf. It was impossible for Mama to catch me out... [p110]

Up to a certain point I was the victim of a mirage; I felt myself from within, and I saw her from without: it wasn’t a fair contest. [p114]

I lost myself in the infinite and at the same time remained myself. .. The wind went whirling round the poplars; it came from elsewhere, from everywhere; it went hustling through space, and I, too, was whirled away with it, without stirring from where I stood, right to the ends of the earth. When the moon rose in the heavens, I would be in touch with far-off cities, deserts, oceans, and villages which at that moment were bathed, as I was, in its radiance. I was no longer a vacant mind, an abstracted gaze, but the turbulent fragrance of the waving grain, the intimate smell of the heather moors, the dense heat of noon or the shiver of twilight; I was heavy; yet I was as vapour in the blue airs of summer and knew no bounds. / My experience of humanity was small; lacking insight and the appropriate words, I could not comprehend it at all. But nature revealed to me a host of visible, tangible modes of existence which my own had never remotely resembled. I admired the proud isolation of the oak that dominated the landscaped garden; I felt sorry for the communal solitude of blades of grass. ... Here, once again, I became unique and I felt that I was needed: my own eyes were needed in order that the copper-red of the beech could be set against the blue of the cedar and the silver of the poplars. When I went away, the landscape fell to pieces, and no longer existed for anyone; it no longer existed at all. [p125]

“I no longer believe in God,” I told myself, with no great surprise... I was not denying Him in order to rid myself of a troublesome person: on the contrary, I realized that He was playing no further part in my life and so I concluded He had ceased to exist for me... However little you withheld from Him, it would be too much if God existed; and however little you gave to Him, it would be too much again if He did not exist. [p137]

Literature took a place in my life that had once been occupied by religion; it absorbed me entirely and transfigured my life. The books I liked became a Bible from which I drew advice and support; I copied out long passages from them; I learnt by heart new canticles and new litanies, psalms, proverbs and prophecies and I sanctified every circumstance in my existence by the recital of these sacred texts. My emotions, my tears and my aspirations were no less sincere on account of that: the words and the cadences, the lines and the verses were not aids to make-believe: but they rescued from silent oblivion all those intimate adventures of the spirit that I couldn’t speak to anyone about; they created a kind of communion between myself and those twin souls which existed somewhere out of reach; instead of living out my small private existence, I was participating in a great spiritual epic. [p187]

If she questioned me, it was not in order to come to an understanding with me on some common ground; she was simply making an investigation. I always had the feeling, whenever she asked me a question, that she was spying on me though a keyhole... The most innocent conversations were full of hidden traps; my parents construed my words in their own idiom and ascribed to me ideas that had nothing in common with what I really thought. I had always fought against the tyranny of language, and now I found myself repeating Barres’ phrase? ‘Why have words, when their brutal precision bruises our complicated souls?’ [p192]

My poverty and helplessness would have worried me less if I had had the least suspicion of how ignorant and narrow-minded I still was ... But the worst of living in a prison without bars is that you aren’t even aware of the screens that shut out the horizon; I was wandering through a thick fog, believing it to be transparent. [p229]

The incomprehensible uproar going on in the world might be of interest to specialists; it was not worthy of the philosopher’s attention, for, when he had got to the point where he knew that he knew nothing and that there is nothing worth knowing, he knew everything. That is why I was able to write in January: ‘I know everything; I've gone all the rounds.’ [p230]

I wanted to write about the vanity of things; but the writer is a traitor to his despair as soon as he writes a book [p252]

Whenever other people made attempts to analyse me, they did so from the standpoint of their own little worlds, and this used to exasperate me. But Sartre always tried to see me as part of my own scheme of things, to understand me in the light of my own set of values and attitudes. [p340]

I couldn’t imagine living and not writing: but he only lived to write .... Sartre held that when one has something important to tell the world, it is criminal to waste one’s energies on other occupations. [p341] ...more

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Jan 12, 2010 Carolyn rated it did not like it · review of another edition

Another bargain basement find, this book was painfully boring. Most memoirs I've read are full of personal anecdotes, colorful characters, and a broad spectrum of emotion while this was like reading 300 pages of which authors Simone de Beauvior liked and disliked. Perhaps I would have gleaned more from this memoir had I had any inkling as to who de Beavior was before buying this book, but even after doing some biographical research, I found this memoir to be nothing but dry personal facts. If I ...more

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Jun 08, 2016 cansu m rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: favs

life changing tbh. this memoir is about simone de b's adolescent life, which means it's full of #relatablecontent. except she's a super genius feminist trailblazer and her brain and zest for knowledge frightens me. this book also contains: youthful crushing on garbage boys, walking around paris and that bit where she can't stop talking about how much she ships jo and laurie. i've already started the second volume of her memoirs and tbh i'm hopeful that she'll give an explanation as to why she fi ...more

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Nov 29, 2014 Richard Lowenstein rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: favorites

Absolutely vivid and engrossing account of how growing up amongst constant oral & literary stimulation creates minds & characters the likes of which we may never see again.. Instead of handing kids iPads so they can play Angry Birds, we used to hand them books.. An important prelude to the world that led her to the writing of the Second Sex..

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Oct 15, 2009 Eleanor rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Simone de Beauvoir is an original bad ass motherfucker.
I want her and Satre. Polygamously.

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Aug 15, 2014 Shoug rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: own, 2015, female-authors, biographies-diaries-memoirs

Any woman can relate to Simone's diaries! ...more

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Aug 21, 2014 Claire rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: france, memoir, french-literature, translated, nonfiction

Though it took me more than a month to finish this, I enjoyed DeBeavoir's incredibly clear perceptions of her own childhood, adolescence and early adulthood, as she first becomes the little girl her parents and society expect her to be, then struggles in the discomfort of coming to understand her own discordant views that don't always fit and increasingly are the opposite to that which she has tried to be to please others, until the latter pages when she begins to find her like-minded others, th ...more

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Nov 04, 2018 Megha Chakraborty rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Reading Beauvoir was always on my wishlist, this is my first time reading her and I am spellbound. In Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter, the feminist philosopher and author Simone de Beauvoir eloquently writes about so many feelings and experiences that seem beyond words. She will make you think hard, she will make you ask questions about such basic beliefs which we take for granted.
For me, her transition from a God-fearing young girl to an atheist beautiful woman is just beautiful.
The book is rel ...more

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Aug 02, 2018 Andrew added it · review of another edition

Shelves: french-existentialists, memoir

A bejeweled memoir by one of the brightest minds of the 20th Century, from her youth to her meeting of Jean-Paul Sartre, whom she clearly considered to be OMG-that-guy at the party when she was younger, and her slow, steady exit from the bullshit expectations of bougie prewar French society. Don't expect anything groundbreaking here -- it's not -- but it is an exceptional look into the life of an exceptional person (BTW, the bits about her parents are very shady and very funny). ...more

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Feb 01, 2019 Joshie rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: own, women-writers, biographies-and-memoirs, non-fiction, favourites, 5-star, literature-french

The first volume of de Beauvoir's memoir, Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter, is both distressing and fascinating. An account of her childhood to early adulthood: from her Catholic upbringing to her abandonment of religious sentiments and confinements ad nauseam in exchange of at times depressing, second-guessing journey to the eye-opening comforts of Philosophy.

Brought up in a bourgeois family restricted both by religion and expected gender roles, de Beauvoir was perceptive and insightful, her ques The first volume of de Beauvoir's memoir, Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter, is both distressing and fascinating. An account of her childhood to early adulthood: from her Catholic upbringing to her abandonment of religious sentiments and confinements ad nauseam in exchange of at times depressing, second-guessing journey to the eye-opening comforts of Philosophy.

Brought up in a bourgeois family restricted both by religion and expected gender roles, de Beauvoir was perceptive and insightful, her questions challenging in nature. As a child, she pondered about her easy acceptance of the truth after finding out Santa Claus was not real and their Christmas presents came from their parents, 'is this because we still get what we wanted that even if it's a deception it matters not?' and a budding scepticism towards adults' intent whenever they express concern and kindness, 'are they doing this to make me obey them?'. Towards her adolescence, amidst her parents' literary censorship and avoidance on conversations about sex (babies came from the anus, her mother stated), she acquired her own set of beliefs and discarded those which were stifling to her until she had to prove herself from her parents' disappointments regarding her choices (especially her choice to teach and refusal to adopt the common female role of that era).

Her literary undertakings greatly contributed on her growth both as an author and a thinker, ** "Literature took the place in my life that had once been occupied by religion: it absorbed me entirely, and transfigured my life." (p204) Nobody managed to stop her. They called her thirst for knowledge corruption, her influence evil. Her rebellious attitude often coincided with her ambivalent feelings towards marriage and family. It's a tug-of-war between her intellectual and spiritual lives, ** "The consequence was that I grew accustomed to the idea that my intellectual life — embodied by my father — and my spiritual life — expressed by my mother — were two heterogeneous fields of experience which had nothing in common." (p41). By her early 20s, though struggling, she had made peace with her inner desire, opting for the rewarding and difficult intellectual path in spite of her relatable, terrible longing for a romantic relationship. She was obviously head over heels with her cousin Jacques which she eventually learnt to move on from. However, a series of disillusionment can still be sensed with her string of platonic and ambiguous friendships which lasted years. She mused that it was easy for men to form a platonic friendship with her because she had a "female appearance and a male brain". Curiously, she didn't scare men off. However, most often than not, she saw herself as alien, different, never fitting anywhere. This was until she met Sartre and found in him her intellectual and romantic match; Sartre supported and took her under his wing, his respect and support for her choices was a breathe of fresh air; an enlightenment in itself. He did not put her inside The Gender Box: that women ought to marry and make herself a wife, nothing else. de Beauvoir's admiration for Sartre transcended the pages of this book and it was such a delight to read. I personally wanted more. Amusingly, it took 300 pages before she finally mentioned Sartre and his failure on a written exam.

What was deeply moving in de Beauvoir's memoir was how the people in her life, as she developed as a person, also developed for better or for worse. Vividly, we read and, to an extent, relate to the sudden estrangements, changes, and pleasant closeness she had with people beloved to her. It took years, at times it took only words. It depicted the loss of innocence and the fears of adulthood. Her longing for solitude both anguished and comforted her. She was a contradictory we all could find ourselves in.

Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter was surprisingly painful by the end. A reflection of how remorse and guilt impact the conscience more so when they're without logic. It reminded me of what Winterson said regarding religious upbringing that one cannot completely eradicate it from one's inner self. However tiny, there'll always be a remnant of it left. We only have to try our best to silence it to a mere whisper of nonsense. This was a spectacular memoir. It's something that will certainly stay with me for a while. I honestly can't wait to get my hands on the second volume then surround myself with her fiction and hardcore philosophical works. ...more

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About Simone de Beauvoir

Simone de Beauvoir

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Simone de Beauvoir was a French author and philosopher. She wrote novels, monographs on philosophy, political and social issues, essays, biographies, and an autobiography. She is now best known for her metaphysical novels, including "She Came to Stay" and "The Mandarins", and for her 1949 treatise "The Second Sex", a detailed analysis of women's oppression and a foundational tract of contemporary Simone de Beauvoir was a French author and philosopher. She wrote novels, monographs on philosophy, political and social issues, essays, biographies, and an autobiography. She is now best known for her metaphysical novels, including "She Came to Stay" and "The Mandarins", and for her 1949 treatise "The Second Sex", a detailed analysis of women's oppression and a foundational tract of contemporary feminism.

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Simone de Beauvoir est née à Paris le 9 janvier 1908. Elle fit ses études jusqu'au baccalauréat dans le très catholique cours Désir. Agrégée de philosophie en 1929, elle enseigna à Marseille, à Rouen et à Paris jusqu'en 1943. C'est L'Invitée (1943) qu'on doit considérer comme son véritable début littéraire. Viennent ensuite Le sang des autres (1945), Tous les hommes sont mortels (1946), Les Mandarins (prix Goncourt 1954), Les Belles Images (1966) et La Femme rompue (1968).
Simone de Beauvoir a écrit des mémoires où elle nous donne elle-même à connaître sa vie, son œuvre. L'ampleur de l'entreprise autobiographique trouve sa justification, son sens, dans une contradiction essentielle à l'écrivain : choisir lui fut toujours impossible entre le bonheur de vivre et la nécessité d'écrire ; d'une part la splendeur contingente, de l'autre la rigueur salvatrice. Faire de sa propre existence l'objet de son écriture, c'était en partie sortir de ce dilemme.
Outre le célèbre Deuxième sexe (1949) devenu l'ouvrage de référence du mouvement féministe mondial, l'œuvre théorique de Simone de Beauvoir comprend de nombreux essais philosophiques ou polémiques.
Après la mort de Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir a publié La Cérémonie des adieux (1981) et les Lettres au Castor (1983) qui rassemblent une partie de l'abondante correspondance qu'elle reçut de lui. Jusqu'au jour de sa mort, le 14 avril 1986, elle a collaboré activement à la revue fondée par Sartre et elle-même, Les Temps Modernes, et manifesté sous des formes diverses et innombrables sa solidarité avec le féminisme.

...more