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 BeauvoirWhen an individual (or a group of individuals) is kept in a situation of inferiority, the fact is that he is inferior.
Simone de BeauvoirFranรงoise could not help taking a surreptitious glance at Xaviรจre: she gave a start of amazement. Xaviรจre was no longer watching, her head was lowered. Franรงoise barely suppressed a scream. The girl was pressing the lighted end against her skin, a bitter smile curling her lips. It was an intimate, solitary smile, like that of a half-wit; the voluptuous, tortured smile of a woman possessed of some secret pleasure.
Simone de Beauvoir