Portrait of the day: Simone de Beauvoir

Simone was a French writer, intellectual, existentialist philosopher, political activist, feminist, and social theorist. She was one of the women who laid the groundwork for the second wave and she is known for her most famous statement, “One is not born, but rather becomes, a woman”. She was born on January 9, 1908. She studied mathematics at the Institut Catholique de Paris and literature and languages at the Institut Sainte-Marie. She was the youngest person ever to pass the agrégation exam. At the end of World War II, Simone Beauvoir and Sartre edited Les Temps modernes, a political journal which Sartre founded along with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and others. She used Les Temps Modernes to promote her own work and explore her ideas on a small scale before fashioning essays and books. Beauvoir remained an editor until her death. She died of pneumonia on April 14, 1986, in Paris.

Simone was a French writer, intellectual, existentialist philosopher, political activist, feminist, and social theorist. She was one of the women who laid the groundwork for the second wave and she is known for her most famous statement, “One is not born, but rather becomes, a woman”. She was born on January 9, 1908. She studied mathematics at the Institut Catholique de Paris and literature and languages at the Institut Sainte-Marie. She was the youngest person ever to pass the agrégation exam. At the end of World War II, Simone Beauvoir and Sartre edited Les Temps modernes, a political journal which Sartre founded along with Maurice Merleau-Ponty and others. She used Les Temps Modernes to promote her own work and explore her ideas on a small scale before fashioning essays and books. Beauvoir remained an editor until her death. She died of pneumonia on  April 14, 1986, in Paris.