The title story, “The Woman Destroyed,” is told in a more modified tone; but the undercurrent of despair builds to uncontrolled proportions. In this monologue, the woman tells of a comfortable life that is being washed away by her husband’s affair with another woman. A couple who go on living together merely because that was how they began, without any other reason: was that what we were turning into?” the meaninglessness of life, the existential crisis, the melancholy that comes with age, are all shown through uniquely female perspective. on the surface level, these three women may all have been called “hysterical”, which is derived from the greek word hystera, or ‘uterus’. this word has been exclusively used to describe women historically (especially freud)—for de beauvoir to write these characters that would have been called ‘hysterical’ and give them emotions and the vulnerability necessary to let readers see through their paradigms.

As her marital relationship shifts into a different key, she and her spouse grow father and farther apart. At the end there is a suggestion of a new plateau of understanding, but it’s not convincing because non of the problems have been resolved. Hayatı, aile kavramını, anne olmayı sorgulayan 3 kadının hikayesini anlatmış Beauvoir. yıkılmış üç kadın. Okuduğunuz şeyler içinizi sıkıyor biraz. Kadın olmak, birey olabilmek, var olabilmek hakkında detaylıca düşünüyorsunuz. I don't have the reading to link these stories to Madame de Beauvoir's philosophical or autobiographical concerns, but across all three stories is a sense of dependency and domination, living through others and living through appearances and of the tremendous grief that ensues when the ploughshare cuts through the mouse's nest I feel that I reference Robert Burn's To a Mouse at least every third or fourth review that I write and plainly I'd best not break that social union . The writing device of "The Woman Destroyed" is not as psychologically oppressive to me as that of "The Monologue," because it includes dialogue quoted from various people and therefore is not a completely closed monologue. However, Monique's obsessions don't interest me much, and no advice that I would consider practical emerges until the very end, when Monique visits her younger daughter, Lucienne, in New York City:While de Beauvoir shows us these three women in periods of crisis, some shorter, some longer, it is also plain that the roots of their sorrow run deep, their happiness built on unreliable foundations, they have to carry the burden - particularly marked in the final story, of social expectation. The first and the last women really aren't even dealing with their own crises but are caught up in the effects of the crises of the men in their lives, the different manifestations of resignation in man and son, followed eventually by the woman coming to face as well with her own shortcomings so all three form a triptych of reaction to loss and pain: resignation, anger, the distraction of ambition. The last woman is left reeling by the husband's mid-life crisis as manifested in adultery. Her friend advises her to see a gynecologist, a nice touch with it's suggestion that the suffering woman must finally give birth to herself, but that is no easy process: Non ipotecare il futuro. Facile a dire. Lo vedevo, il futuro. Si estendeva davanti a me a perdita d’occhio, piatto, nudo. Non un progetto, non un desiderio. Non avrei scritto piú. E allora, che cosa avrei fatto? Che vuoto, dentro di me, attorno a me. Inutile. I greci chiamavano i loro vecchi «mosconi». «Inutile moscone», si dice Ecuba nelle Troiane. Sono io. Sono rimasta folgorata. Mi domandavo come si possa riuscire ancora a vivere quando da se stessi non si spera piú niente.” El libro se compone de tres relatos bien distintos en forma y contenido, aunque todos sean en primera persona, aunque en todos ellos haya una mujer que sufre, que ve como se tambalea su propia identidad al derrumbarse los pilares sobre los que se sustentaba. MONÓLOGO “Los niños nunca son otra cosa que semillas de canallas.” Un monólogo interior durísimo, devastador, fruto de la rabia, de la angustia, de una mujer de mediana edad afectada por serios problemas psicológicos y que se siente sola, abandonada y culpable. Una mujer con una infancia difícil, que, gracias a su belleza ahora marchita, ha vivido a costa de hombres ricos desde que su madre la arrojó en los brazos de su propio amante, y que, intentando no caer en los mismos errores con su hija, cometió otros de terribles consecuencias. “…hubiera merecido que me amaran. ¡Ah! he sido asquerosamente frustrada la vida no me ha hecho regalos.”

In “The Woman Destroyed”, Monique’s husband, Maurice, has confessed to having an affair and asks that she be okay with it. Taking advice from a close friend, Monique wills herself to allow the affair to continue, hoping in vain that Maurice’s midlife crisis will pass and that he’ll eventually spurn his mistress. But as time passes, the mistress slowly begins to take center-stage in Maurice’s life, so much so that No se trata de víctimas, sería pecar de condescendiente considerarlas “mujeres anuladas por relaciones absorbentes”, como se dice en la contraportada. Más bien son, como dijo la propia autora, tres mujeres que se sienten fracasadas, rotas. La única que puede considerarse víctima, que de hecho lo es, es la protagonista de la segunda de las historias, pero no tanto por sus relaciones como por la infancia que sufrió y que la condicionó de por vida. Las otras dos son mujeres cultas, inteligentes y liberales que eligieron la forma en la que quisieron vivir y que ahora pasan por circunstancias desagradables, circunstancias que pueden afectar tanto a hombres como a mujeres y que son sobrellevadas dependiendo de la personalidad más que del género. The Woman Destroyed is Simone de Beauvoir’s beguiling fictional analysis of womanhood’s complexities. The work is a collection of three novellas, each featuring a different woman in crisis and trapped by circumstance. “The Age of Discretion” recounts the desperation of a successful professor and writer who feels her power and influence over her newly-married son slipping. “The Monologue” centers around an aging, rich woman sits at home, alone, and pours out her bitterness in a stream of consciousness diatribe. In the title story, an older heroine struggles to rediscover happiness after her husband confesses to an affair. The three stories, each captivating in its beautifully profound exploration of the woman’s mind, center around individuals battling the unstoppable passage of time, the inevitably of age, resounding loneliness, the indifference of loved ones, and the unfortunate decay of passion. Mio Dio! La vita è cosí liscia, cosí chiara, scorre cosí naturalmente, quando tutto va bene, ma basta un intoppo e si scopre che è opaca, che non sappiamo niente di nessuno, né di noi stessi né degli altri, chi sono, cosa pensano, che cosa fanno, come ci vedono.”E’ la notte di Capodanno. Mentre scoppiano i festeggiamenti, una donna, nella solitudine della sua casa, inveisce contro tutti. E’ una voce disperata rotta da un angoscioso dolore che l’ha resa cinica e rabbiosa... Youth and what the Italians so prettily call stamina. The vigor, the fire, that enables you to love and create. When you’ve lost that, you’ve lost everything.” i've been putting off reading this book because i know that i'll love it and five star it and i have a habit of saving good things until i absolutely cannot hold off anymore. A Frenchwoman who lived through almost all of the 20 th century, de Beauvoir was a writer of novels, essays, and biographies, an intellectual, social theorist, and political activist. Most famously known for The Second Sex , she laid the tract for contemporary feminism. It is impossible to understand de Beauvoir without mentioning her almost lifelong open relationship with Jean-Paul Sartre. The couple never got married, understandably rejecting the institutional constraints and purposeless of marriage. The existentialist undertones of de Beauvoir’s philosophy and lifestyle are carried over beautifully to the emotional devastation of the three women in The Women Destroyed . The woman telling her story has two grown daughters, one of whom is married and the other pursuing an independent career in the United States. Now, as her unhappiness builds, she even questions her upbringing of her daughters.

de Beauvoir è regista che filma voci e corpi che si sfaldano sotto il peso del crollo di un castello su cui poggiava tutta la loro vita. But so it is for me too. The heartbreaking side of growing old is not in the things around one but in oneself.” The opinions expressed in The Georgetown Voice do not necessarily represent the views of the administration, faculty, or students of Georgetown University unless specifically stated. These are the other two short stories by Simone de Beauvoir in the volume I'm reading. "The Monologue" is not to my taste, because it is written in the stream of consciousness style, which I generally don't like. It describes the point of view of a woman named Murielle, whose life hasn't been going well at all. Her daughter from her first marriage, Sylvie, apparently has died, and she is separated from her second husband, who has custody of their son, Francis. She is living alone in a noisy apartment and ruminating over her life and the people who have wronged her. I found it a little confusing to follow and couldn't see the point of the awkward presentation.that's enough for me to read anything in and of itself, including but not limited to golf magazines, industrial catalogs, and the grocery lists of my least favorite neighbor (WHY ARE YOUR PARTIES ALWAYS ON WEEKDAYS, YES I KNOW I SOUND LIKE A GRUMPY OLD MAN IN THE FIRST HALF OF A FEEL-GOOD FAMILY FILM)...but in addition to that, simone de beauvoir is a stunning writer with a true sense of people. Fathers never have exactly the daughters they want because they invent a notion a them that the daughters have to conform to.” In earlier days I never used to worry about old people. I looked upon them as the dead whose legs still kept moving.”