A Quote by Simone de Beauvoir

On the day when it will be possible for woman to love not in her weakness but in her strength, not to escape herself but to find herself, not to abase herself but to assert herself--on that day love will become for her, as for man, a source of life and not of mortal danger.

Simone de Beauvoir

Quote Topics

Assert Become Danger Day Escape Find Her Herself Life Love Man Mortal Possible Source Source Of Life Strength To Love Weakness Will Woman

Quote Author

Simone de Beauvoir
French - Writer
January 9, 1908 - April 14, 1986

The Strength of a hero is not in her abilities. In her weapons. These things are important, but they are not the source of her strength. The source of her strength is in her belief in an idea – the idea that those who are strong, and those who are able, protect those who are not, and those who cannot protect themselves. The idea that the good, and the right, will triumph. She is willing to put herself in harm’s way – in mortal danger – to prove her belief in this idea.” “That it is the duty of those who have within themselves the power, and the gift, to help others.

Scott Speer

Adultery is in most cases a theft in the dark. At such moments almost every woman betrays her husband's innermost secrets; becomes a Delilah who discloses to a stranger, discloses to her lover, the mysteries of her husband's strength or weakness. What seems to me treason is, not that women give themselves, but that a woman is prone, when she does so, to justify herself to herself by uncovering her husband's nakedness, exposing it to the inquisitive and scornful gaze of a stranger.

Stefan Zweig

The only way for a woman, as for a man, to find herself, to know herself as a person, is by creative work of her own.

Betty Friedan

A Woman in harmony with her spirit is like a river flowing. She goes where she will without pretense and arrives at her destination prepared to be herself and only herself

Maya Angelou

It made Fire so angry, the thought of such a medicine, a violence done to herself to stop her from creating anything like herself. And what was the purpose of these eyes, this impossible face, the softness and the curves of this body, the strength of this mind; what was the point, if none of the men who desired her were to give her any babies, and all it ever brought her was grief? What was the purpose of a woman monster?

Kristin Cashore

Yet there were times when he did love her with all the kindness she demanded, and how was she to know what were those times? Alone she raged against his cheerfulness and put herself at the mercy of her own love and longed to be free of it because it made her less than he and dependent on him. But how could she be free of chains she had put upon herself? Her soul was all tempest. The dreams she had once had of her life were dead. She was in prison in the house. And yet who was her jailer except herself?

Pearl S. Buck

For a woman ... to explore and express the fullness of her sexuality, her ambitions, her emotional and intellectual capacities, her social duties, her tender virtues, would entail who knows what risks and who knows what truly revolutionary alteration to the social conditions that demean and constrain her. Or she may go on trying to fit herself into the order of the world and thereby consign herself forever to the bondage of some stereotype of normal femininity - a perversion, if you will.

Louise J. Kaplan

It was so important that women were involved in 'She's Gotta Have It' because it's about a woman's opinion. It's about her views of herself, and the world around her, and how the world perceives her, and finding that ground for herself - not even a common ground, but that ground for herself in which she can walk on firmly with confidence.

Lyriq Bent

Vengeful as nature herself, she loves her children only in order to devour them better and if she herself rips her own veils of self-deceit, Mother perceives in herself untold abysses of cruelty as subtle as it is refined.

Angela Carter

Women react differently: a French woman who sees herself betrayed by her husband will kill his mistress; an Italian will kill her husband; a Spaniard will kill both; and a German will kill herself.

Bernard le Bovier de Fontenelle

Virtue and vice suppose the freedom to choose between good and evil; but what can be the morals of a woman who is not even in possession of herself, who has nothing of her own, and who all her life has been trained to extricate herself from the arbitrary by ruse, from constraint by using her charms?... As long as she is subject to man's yoke or to prejudice, as long as she receives no professional education, as long as she is deprived of her civil rights, there can be no moral law for her!

Flora Tristan

If you meet a woman of whatever complexion who sails her life with strength and grace and assurance, talk to her! And what you will find is that there has been a suffering, that at some time she has left herself for hanging dead.

Sena Jeter Naslund

No woman kills herself for love, and rarely for shame. It is the cruelty of hope that does a woman in; for no matter how many men a woman has given herself to, she never holds her life cheap until she foolishly believed it to be valued.

Sheri Holman

A great leader should make it clear to her team members that as a matter of culture, her job is to replace herself. A new hire should know from the outset that she will ultimately have to bring in new talent to replace herself so that she can personally better herself and achieve loftier goals.

Joe Lonsdale

Woman is learning for herself that not self-sacrifice, but self development, is her first duty in life; and this, not primarily for the sake of others but that she may become fully herself.