#de beauvoir

[philosophors]

“Self-knowledge is no guarantee of happiness, but it is on the side of happiness and can supply the courage to fight for it.”

— Simone de Beauvoir

[thepursuitofunderstanding]

If you live long enough, you'll see that every victory turns into a defeat.

Simone de Beauvoir

[blackswaneuroparedux]

There was a quotation from Simone de Beauvoir that I read in the paper only the other day… You may agree with those words or not, but those are the key spring of The Lord of the Rings.

J. R. R. Tolkien, 1968

Tolkien is talking about Original Sin in which death ("the wages of sin is death" as Paul would put it in the gospels) was never part of the original design of God before the Fall. De Beauvoir unwittingly makes the point for Tolkien. Had she known she might have choked on her coffee in Café de Flore.

[papillon-de-mai]

"I’ve always been keenly aware of the passing of time. I’ve always thought that I was old. Even when I was twelve, I thought it was awful to be thirty. I felt that something was lost. At the same time, I was aware of what I could gain, and certain periods of my life have taught me a great deal. But, in spite of everything, I’ve always been haunted by the passing of time and by the fact that death keeps closing in on us. For me, the problem of time is linked up with that of death, with the thought that we inevitably draw closer and closer to it, with the horror of decay. It’s that, rather than the fact that things disintegrate, that love peters out."

— Simone de Beauvoir, An Interview

[persistentrain]

[zoimpetridou]

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

Simone de Beauvoir

[dogsaver-blog]

16 red by d0gwalker Via Flickr: St Aubins Court, De Beauvoir Estate, Hackney

[pourquoiwhy]

well... until 1991 (91!!!) in the Canadian agricultural sensus identified women linving on a farm with no outside income as "farm wife". I shit you not.

It was officially for "continuity of the data" reasons - which is super important in long term stats like that - but it took them until 1991 to decide that "farmer" was a good enough descriptive and that gender could be matched to previous data without being all misoginic about it.

[mournfulroses]

Simone de Beauvoir, from "Inseraparable: A Never Before Published Novel,"

[ehj3]

AMBIGUITY

“Fantasy abandoned by reason produces monsters” —Francisco Goya This Is not an editorial cartoon. OK, it’s in a cartoon format/style and the content is “editorial,” i.e. of current [political, cultural, and/or economic] events. But it lacks both the here-today-gone-tomorrow and the serio-comic “gag” (pun intended) qualities the genre requires. Also, were it an editorial cartoon I’d be required…

[philosophors]

// Art: “Venice, A Canal in the Moonlight, with Santa Maria della Salute in the Background” by Andreas Achenbach

“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

[thepursuitofunderstanding]

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

Simone de Beauvior

[blackswaneuroparedux]

The tints of the dunes changed according to the time of day and the angle of the light: golden as apricots from far off, when we drove close to them they turned to freshly made butter; behind us they grew pink; from sand to rock, the materials of which the desert was made varied as much as its tints.

- Simone de Beauvoir

One of the great things I look forward to at the weekends here in Dubai is go out into the desert with Emirati friends and do a spot driving on the dunes. I’m experienced driver so it’s no so bad to get the hang of it.

You have to scrutinise the shape and the slope of the dune before getting there. It is generally better to drive perpendicular to the dune, that is to say, in the direction of the wind. If you find traces of existing tracks, then this is the best route to follow. If there is no trace of any track, do not hesitate to stop at the top of a dune and step out of the vehicle to assess the direction to take.

You have to remember to check the absence of plants and animals on your journey (they are not always visible). Consistency of the sand may change during the day. In the morning, sand is usually harder, so is it after the rain. Driving around noon is particularly tricky because there are few shadows and few contrasts available to foresee the bumps and hollows. With experience you will know how to read dunes signs in order to find the way to gain momentum or slow down. You learn quickly to watch out for fine sand that gets accumulated in the hidden hollows and may cause problems to more reckless drivers.

Going up a dune you have to gain momentum before starting to go up the dune. During the ascent you have to keep your speed up to downshift.

I was taught to go up, if possible, on the axis of the slope. If you ride diagonally, you have to make sure your speed is high enough to play with gravity, because the weight of the car will pull you down the dune. It’s better to approach the top of the dune from the front, or risk getting stuck on the crest of the dune.

You learn that it’s important to not go too fast or not far enough (at the risk of getting stuck on the crest, in which case it will be necessary to dig under the car).

Going down a dune can just as troublesome. The best way is to go down along the axis of the slope. If you go down at an angle, you risk breaking a tire. You have to use your engine brake (never freewheel). If the slope is steep, slow down slowly.At the end of the slope, gently accelerate to get out of the dune (and do not stuck the front of the car in the sand).

Easy.

[papillon-de-mai]

"Love is a great privilege. Real love, which is very rare, enriches the lives of the men and women who experience it."

— Simone de Beauvoir, An Interview

[nicklloydnow]

“As for “despair,” the meaning of this expression is extremely simple. It merely means that we limit ourselves to a reliance upon that which is within our wills, or within the sum of the probabilities which render our action feasible. Whenever one wills anything, there are always these elements of probability. If I am counting upon a visit from a friend, who may be coming by train or by tram, I presuppose that the train will arrive at the appointed time, or that the tram will not be derailed. I remain in the realm of possibilities; but one does not rely upon any possibilities beyond those that are strictly concerned in one’s action. Beyond the point at which the possibilities under consideration cease to affect my action, I ought to disinterest myself. For there is no God and no prevenient design, which can adapt the world and all its possibilities to my will. When Descartes said, “Conquer yourself rather than the world,” what he meant was, at bottom, the same – that we should act without hope.

Marxists, to whom I have said this, have answered: “Your action is limited, obviously, by your death; but you can rely upon the help of others. That is, you can count both upon what the others are doing to help you elsewhere, as in China and in Russia, and upon what they will do later, after your death, to take up your action and carry it forward to its final accomplishment which will be the revolution. Moreover you must rely upon this; not to do so is immoral.” To this I rejoin, first, that I shall always count upon my comrades-in-arms in the struggle, in so far as they are committed, as I am, to a definite, common cause; and in the unity of a party or a group which I can more or less control – that is, in which I am enrolled as a militant and whose movements at every moment are known to me. In that respect, to rely upon the unity and the will of the party is exactly like my reckoning that the train will run to time or that the tram will not be derailed. But I cannot count upon men whom I do not know, I cannot base my confidence upon human goodness or upon man’s interest in the good of society, seeing that man is free and that there is no human nature which I can take as foundational. I do not know where the Russian revolution will lead. I can admire it and take it as an example in so far as it is evident, today, that the proletariat plays a part in Russia which it has attained in no other nation. But I cannot affirm that this will necessarily lead to the triumph of the proletariat: I must confine myself to what I can see. Nor can I be sure that comrades-in-arms will take up my work after my death and carry it to the maximum perfection, seeing that those men are free agents and will freely decide, tomorrow, what man is then to be. Tomorrow, after my death, some men may decide to establish Fascism, and the others may be so cowardly or so slack as to let them do so. If so, Fascism will then be the truth of man, and so much the worse for us. In reality, things will be such as men have decided they shall be. Does that mean that I should abandon myself to quietism? No. First I ought to commit myself and then act my commitment, according to the time-honoured formula that “one need not hope in order to undertake one’s work.” Nor does this mean that I should not belong to a party, but only that I should be without illusion and that I should do what I can. For instance, if I ask myself “Will the social ideal as such, ever become a reality?” I cannot tell, I only know that whatever may be in my power to make it so, I shall do; beyond that, I can count upon nothing.” - Jean-Paul Sartre, ‘Existentialism Is a Humanism’ (1946)

[buffetstraat]