Although all three stories in this collection are about women between 40 and 65 facing some kind of crisis, and all of them are exquisitely written, they are otherwise very different. In the first story, the narrator, a successful literary analyst, must come to terms with the fact that her son does not really share the dreams she has for him and is no longer under her influence. At the same time, her latest book bombs, and begins to doubt everything in her life. The story ends on an uplifting no...

*Note – This review only concerns “The Woman Destroyed”, the third and longest story in this book.Several years ago, shortly after finishing “The Mandarins”, Simone De Beauvior's tour de force novel, I came across an article titled: “Are Good Books Bad for You?” I immediately thought of De Beauvior’s fiction. Like nothing else I’ve ever read, her fiction has the ability to influence my emotions and my opinions in a deep and powerful way. It’s nearly dangerous, I think, the depth at which she str...

"All around me the world lies like an immense hypothesis that I no longer verify."I found myself in a reading slump, so I left my personal library and wandered into the public library of my new city; there, I ran across this collection. I enjoyed reading these cleverly worded paragraphs, the shape of Beauvoir's sentences, the intensity wrapped in lucid lines. Her characters make sense of life on the page and when they discover the why in the actions of others, the reader is invited along for the...

loved reading about depressed french women

Reading this book feels like a smaller death. I decided to start with the title story, though I don't know that I can go on. It's so intimate and enraging and powerful and devastating. It's probably a bad choice, given the time in my life, to suffer through this honest little bit of literature, however now that I've started it's hard to stop. I hope it doesn't ruin me. Read this story when you feel stable.

Once upon a time, I was on the train and this old woman (perhaps seventy years of age) started sharing her life experience with me. She said, "Girl, I realized early on that no matter how sweet and caring and loving a man is, when it comes to sex, they're all brutes. They can't control themselves, they have no finesse, they're brutal. My husband, he loved me so much and he was the kindest man, but in bed he was an animal. I was afraid of him."It was heart-breaking. You can tell a woman in her tw...

Reading devastating French literature on public transport is my fave pastime

It is not my habit to give books, or anything else, star ratings, but looking though other reviews I saw that four was a popular choice for this collection of short stories, and that felt about right. So went with four and indeed further reading confirmed that despite one trip to Rome, there is nothing in this book about post-war Italian politics or curly haired comedians. So four star indeed, and no movement on that.What we have is a collection of three short stories The Age of Discretion, The

about to become intolerable

Three stories, 'The Age of Discretion', 'Monologue' and 'The Woman Destroyed' make up this volume. 'The Age of Discretion' deals with ageing, loss, and a woman's refusal to accept her son's career choice as she stares down the tunnel of age. 'Monologue' was unreadable, a woman's rant through New Year's eve celebrations, she's in her forties, all alone, bitter, twisted. By far the most powerful piece was 'The Woman Destroyed'. Monique is forty-four, happy in her long marriage to Maurice. The nove...

„La femme rompue“, The Woman Destroyed, written by one of the most controversial feminists, Simone de Beauvoir, was originally published in 1967. Her impeccable writing style full of wits and eloquence and my curiosity on how the stories of 3 different women would end has kept me digging deeper...so deep that it partially served Madame de Beauvoir’s purpose for her readers: There isn’t a morale to the stories nor are there any lessons to be learnt according to her. De Beauvoir wanted her readers...

I gave this book 5 stars, but I didn't enjoy it. If a book can move me the way this one moved me, I consider it a great book. However, I felt so bad for the characters in this set of 3 short stories (one in particular) that I finished it literally feeling angry! I was glad to finish it.

I am the type of person who loves characters above all. I want very human figures and I want to feel with them and I want them to surprise me and remind of of the fact that no formula is ever going to let me understand what an individual is. But this depth and this humanity cannot end up on the extreme of randomness. Simone de Beauvoir's third story in this book has had me thinking about the protagonist of the story for weeks. I felt so strong for her. I worried about her. I asked myself and her...

What an odd thing a diary is: the things you omit are more important than those you put in.*And I saw that words say nothing. Rages, nightmares, horror—words cannot encompass them. I set things down on paper when I recover strength, either in despair or in hope. But the feeling of total bewilderment, of stunned stupidity, of falling apart—these pages do not contain them. And then these pages lie so—they get things so wrong.*I have taken to my pen again not to go back over the same ground but bec...

Rich and powerful writing in these three novellas. I will definitely read more of this author. SPOILERS FOLLOW BELOW FOR ALL 3 NOVELLAS! The first novella, The Age of Discretion, centers around the aging process and the end of careers of both husband and wife. In addition, there’s the bitter disappointment the woman feels after the son she has ‘groomed’ to follow in her footsteps as a professor turns thirty and changes career and political outlook to go into government service. His mother feels

I must admit, I started this book with A LOT of negative reviews in mind. I remember De Beauvoir being called pretentious, petty and generally often treated like a joke (at least by a great part of my teachers & scholars that they quoted). Despite my initial animosity, the book is literally phenomenal. The first story, for me at least, was really aesthetically pleasingly in the descriptions of the nature. The main character was relatable in a lot of ways, but because of that at the end I could f...

3.5 out of 5 starsThe missing stars are due to the homophobic remarks and slurs strewn throughout the book that, although read in context, are still offensive to the modern reader.Happy reading!

This time around my favorite of the short stories was the first one, probably bc I’m going through an age crisis myself😌Also, for an even more painful experience listen to “Tolerate it” by Taylor Swift after you’ve read The woman destroyed and think about its MC. You’re welcome @Annari <33And no, in the end I could not bring myself to reread the monologue.

ENGLISH / SPANISH-- The Woman Destroyed by Simone de Beauvoir. Warning: do not read this if you can't stand unlikeable characters. For the rest of you: don't miss this. In a current world where readers demand strong female role-models, the so-called "badass" heroines (kick-ass, fierce, strong...), it might seem weird to read about the thoughts and reflections of women passed their 40's and even in their 60's, full of flaws, of doubts, of failures. But these are the exact same lives that will mak...

Although this book was published in 1967 (and the three pieces written at different times), the book this reminded me of most - almost serves as a precedent to - is Ferrante's The Days of Abandonment. With her focus firmly on the inner lives of three women, de Beauvoir somehow manages to be coolly analytical while still conjuring the searing emotions that both make and unmake her female protagonists. With two short pieces followed by the novella 'The Woman Destroyed', she charts commonalities: w...