What an incredible work! An enormous task, to take on the entire history of womankind from biology to psychology, literature, religion, mythology. She explores every phase of a woman's life from birth to menopause. The sheer size of this book (2 volumes!) provokes anxiety and its contents will make you fume with rage, nod in agreement, laugh, cry, question, dare to hope and try to understand why it is that man thinks woman an 'inessential being’ ‘a subspecies destined uniquely for reproduction.’ Basically, man and woman were created equal (we both endure the same organic troubles) - man didn’t agree with nature though, because he thought himself a God and he resented his mother for reducing him to flesh. And so he sought to dominate nature/woman. He saw himself as active, her as passive and once he realised he could conquer her by ‘ploughing her furrow', so to speak, he did. With impunity. Men wrote her history and defined her in relation to himself. Then he called her neurotic for not being able to cope with the contradictions he set for her: she is both idol & servant, Eve & the Virgin, good & bad, love & hatred, wife & prostitute; divorce is legal & then it isn’t; abortion is legal then criminal when the foetus inherits a soul; the unmarried woman has no social dignity and hides in the shadow of her paternal family or in a convent; the married woman is a slave, but she sits on a throne!; men only want to marry virgins, but wait, if no-one else has deflowered her there must be something wrong with her! (Ahhhhhhhhhhh!) Her debasement was the quickest way to ensure his superiority. The subjugation of women was necessary for society to progress, apparently. But all I can think of is how much further along we’d be if both sexes were afforded the same privileges. After reading (most of) the book, the very notion of one sex being superior to another baffles/infuriates/perplexes me. It’s kindergarten stuff and it sounds like fear to me; fear and desire - the desire to control to conquer to possess. Why can't he just let her 'be'?
What I find not only infuriating but depressing is where this fear leaves women. Just as a young girl is coming into her own, ready not just to take on the world but take charge of it: her femininity, her identity in relation to man, her inferiority means that many of her hopes and aspirations will go unsatisfied. Equality is the only intelligent way to progress but as Simone puts forward in her conclusion: 'Few men wish to see women accomplish themselves. Those who scorn her do not see what they would have to gain and those who cherish her see too well what they have to lose.'
Credit is also due to the translators Borde and Malovany-Chevallier.
Make no mistake, this is a difficult read, I'd recommend checking it out of the library every now and then, it's a lot to take on in one go. Fascinating.