Simone de Beauvoir – 17 Quotes

17 Quotes by Simone de Beauvoir

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 destiny: in a way it preserves it by giving it the absolute dimension. Death does away with time.

– Simone de Beauvoir

What is an adult? A child blown up by age.

– Simone de Beauvoir

Art is an attempt to integrate evil.

– Simone de Beauvoir

To catch a husband is an art to hold him is a job.

– Simone de Beauvoir

Change your life today. Don’t gamble on the future, act now, without delay.

– Simone de Beauvoir

In itself, homosexuality is as limiting as heterosexuality: the ideal should be to be capable of loving a woman or a man either, a human being, without feeling fear, restraint, or obligation.

– Simone de Beauvoir

I wish that every human life might be pure transparent freedom.

– Simone de Beauvoir

One’s life has value so long as one attributes value to the life of others, by means of love, friendship, indignation and compassion.

– Simone de Beauvoir

I tore myself away from the safe comfort of certainties through my love for truth – and truth rewarded me.

– Simone de Beauvoir

All the idols made by man, however terrifying they may be, are in point of fact subordinate to him, and that is why he will always have it in his power to destroy them.

– Simone de Beauvoir

Society cares for the individual only so far as he is profitable.

– Simone de Beauvoir

Society, being codified by man, decrees that woman is inferior she can do away with this inferiority only by destroying the male’s superiority.

– Simone de Beauvoir

Defending the truth is not something one does out of a sense of duty or to allay guilt complexes, but is a reward in itself.

– Simone de Beauvoir

Representation of the world, like the world itself, is the work of men they describe it from their own point of view, which they confuse with the absolute truth.

– Simone de Beauvoir

All oppression creates a state of war.

– Simone de Beauvoir

No one is more arrogant toward women, more aggressive or scornful, than the man who is anxious about his virility.

– Simone de Beauvoir

The most mediocre of males feels himself a demigod as compared with women.

– Simone de Beauvoir