Philosophical Writings Foreword by Sylvie Le Bon de Beauvoir. Edited by Margaret A. Simons with Marybeth Timmermann

The first complete, scholarly edition of Beauvoir's essays in English translation

This volume aims at nothing less than the transformation of Simone de Beauvoir's place in the philosophical canon. Despite growing interest her philosophy, Beauvoir remains widely misunderstood and is typically portrayed as a mere philosophical follower of her companion, Jean-Paul Sartre. In Philosophical Writings, Beauvoir herself shows that nothing could be further from the truth.

One factor contributing to misunderstanding has been the lack of English translations of much of Simone de Beauvoir's philosophical work, or worse--its mistranslation in heavily condensed, popular editions. Philosophical Writings addresses this source of misunderstanding by providing complete, scholarly editions of Beauvoir's philosophical texts covering the first twenty-three years of her work, including some only recently discovered. Ranging from metaphysical literature to essays on existentialist ethics, Philosophical Writings brings together diverse elements of Beauvoir's work while highlighting continuities in the development of her thought. Each of the translations features detailed notes and a scholarly introduction explaining its larger significance.

Philosophical Writings is a major contribution to the renaissance of interest in her work, and to a philosophical curriculum in which women remain underrepresented.

The inaugural volume in The Beauvoir Series, coedited by Margaret A. Simons and Sylvie Le Bon de Beauvoir

Simone de Beauvoir (1908-1986) was a French existentialist philosopher who pioneered a literary-philosophical method in her work, including Ethics of Ambiguity (1946) and The Second Sex (1949), as well as in her novels, play, and multi-volume autobiography. Margaret A. Simons is a professor of philosophy at Southern Illinois University, Edwardsville, and author of Beauvoir and the Second Sex. Sylvie Le Bon de Beauvoir, adopted daughter and literary executor of Simone de Beauvoir, is the editor of Lettres à Sartre and many other works by Beauvoir. Marybeth Timmermann is a certified translator of the American Translators Association. Mary Beth Mader is an assistant professor of philosophy at the University of Memphis.

oreword to the Beauvoir Series ix

Sylvie Le Bon de Beauvoir

Acknowledgments xi

Introduction 1

Analysis of Claude Bernard's Introduction to the Study of Experimental Medicine [1924] 13
Introduction by Margaret A. Simons and Hélène N. Peters

Two Unpublished Chapters from She Came to Stay [1938] 31
Introduction by Edward Fullbrook

Pyrrhus and Cineas (1944) 77
Introduction by Debra Bergoffe

A Review of The Phenomenology of Perception by Maurice Merleau- Ponty (1945) 151
Introduction by Sara Heinämaa

Moral Idealism and Political Realism (1945) 165
Introduction by Sonia Kruks

Existentialism and Popular Wisdom (1945) 195
Introduction by Eleanore Holveck

Jean-Paul Sartre [1945] 221
Introduction by Karen Vintges

An Eye for an Eye (1946) 237
Introduction by Kristana Arp

Literature and Metaphysics (1946) 261
Introduction by Margaret A. Simons

Introduction to an Ethics of Ambiguity (1946) 279
Introduction by Gail Weiss

An Existentialist Looks at Americans (1947) 299
Introduction by Shannon M. Mussett

What Is Existentialism? (1947) 317
Introduction by Nancy Bauer


Contributors 327

Index 331