Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir. They were the intellectual power couple of the 20th century. Some have called Sartre the father of Existentialism. But perhaps it’s more accurate to call him the chief popularizer of the philosophical movement. And Simone de Beauvoir, she wrote The Second Sex, the sprawling 1949 tome that laid the intellectual foundation for second-wave feminism that exploded during the 1960s.
The two philosophers first became an item in October 1929, but it was never a traditional relationship. They neither married nor shared the same living quarters, and they famously had an open relationship. But, as de Beauvoir said, “The comradeship that welded our lives together made a superfluous mockery of any other bond we might have forged for ourselves.”
They were a powerful couple, writes Louis Menand in The New Yorker, “with independent lives, who met in cafés, where they wrote their books and saw their friends at separate tables… but who maintained a kind of soul marriage.” Whatever your personal views, you need to consider this: The relationship worked for Sartre and de Beauvoir for 50 years.
Despite their celebrity, we’ve rarely come across footage of the two philosophers together. So we’re bringing you this — a rare clip from a 1967 documentary filmed at Sartre’s Montparnasse high-rise apartment, overlooking the cemetery where the two philosophers were eventually buried. Somewhat fittingly, we see the two intellectuals, but never in the same frame. You can purchase the complete film for educational use here.
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I love it, so amazing and beautiful article. Congratulations !!
“Whatever your personal views, you need to consider this: The relationship worked for Sartre and de Beauvoir for 50 years.”
MY RESPONSE: de Beauvoir was ridden with jealousy the entire time Sartre had his affairs with other women. This is a known and proven fact because she documents this in her writings. The only reason this relationship worked was because it was the only way she could be with Sartre. If she had not agreed to his terms it would have put a strain between them. de Beauvoir loved Sartre so much she would rather deal with her jealousy than lose him altogether. In fact, every partner she took was only done in retaliation to her jealous feelings for Sartre’s lovers, even going as far as to sleep with the same women as he did to make a point.
It is completely inaccurate to say their relationship “worked” 50 years because it was an open relationship. No, it worked because de Beauvoir loved Sartre. It worked because she bit her tongue and turned a blind eye. It worked because she knew she could potentially lose her best friend. FYI, it takes TWO people to be completely okay with an open relationship in order for it to actually BE a “working” open relationship. And this one certainly was not.
Very good to see film of them both ‚however
Sartre did know that his own country were
the first to make war in Viet-Nam .
It’s more complicated then to think only of
the Super-power ideas as a protest ‚these many years later.
However as with war an enemy becomes a co-partner as today to find Viet-Nam making the computer I now write on along with my winter jacket.
Tôi tìm những gì mới mẻ nhất trong văn chương cũng như triết học. Có thể có một nền văn hóa nào đó hoàn toàn mới mẻ từ góc độ toàn cầu? Nó không dựa trên các kinh nghiệm văn hóa từ quá khứ? Với những đặc tính bản địa, dận tộc, và do vậy rơi vào sự kỳ thị của nó?