697 Quotes by Simone de Beauvoir

Du jour où il nait, l'homme commence à mourir; c'est la vérité qu'incarne la Mère.

The goal toward which I surpass myself must appear to me as a point of departure toward a new act of surpassing.

To re-establish man at the heart of his destiny is, they claim, to repudiate all ethics. However, far from God's absence authorizing all license, the contrary is the case, because man is abandoned on the earth, because his acts are definitive, absolute engagements. He bears the responsibility for a world which is not the work of a strange power, but of himself, where his defeats are inscribed, & his victories as well.

La fatalité triomphe dès que l'on croit en elle.

On s'empresse de les décharger de toute tâche pénible et de tout souci: c'est les délivrer du même coup de toute responsabilité. On espère qu'ainsi dupées, séduites par la facilité de leur condition, elles accepteront le rôle de mère et de ménagére dans lequel on veut les confiner.

It was easier for me to think of a world without a creator than of a creator burdened with all the contradictions in the world.

One night I summoned God, if He really existed, to show Himself to me. He didn't, and I never addressed another word to Him. In my heart of hearts I was very glad He didn't exist. I should have hated it if what was going on here below had had to end up in eternity.

Have you ever felt in your inmost being, the conscience of others?' again she was trembling, the words were not releasing her. 'It's intolerable you know

I was convinced that I would be, that I was already, one in a million.