xxxvi INTRODUCTION Introduction to Book II The women of today are in a fair way to dethrone the myth of fem- Translator's Note ininity;they are beginning to affirm their independence in concrete ways;but they do not easily succeed in living completely the life of a A sgRrous,all-inclusive,and uninhibited work on woman by a human being.Reared by women within a feminine world,their nor- woman of wit and learning!What,I had often thought,could be mal destiny is marriage,which still means practically subordination to more desirable and yet less to be expected?When I was asked,some man;for masculine prestige is far from extinction,resting still upon three years ago,to read Mlle Simone de Beauvoir's Le Deuxieme Sexe, solid economic and social foundations.We must therefore study the then appearing in two successive volumes in France,and to offer my traditional destiny of woman with some care.In Book II I shall seck opinion on the advisability of its publication in English,I was not to describe how woman undergoes her apprenticeship,how she ex- long in realizing that the unexpected had happened.My opinion,I periences her situation,in what kind of universe she is confined, need hardly say,was favorable,for the work displayed unique qualities what modes of escape are vouchsafed her.Then only-with so much of style and content which,I thought,would make it a classic in its understood-shall we be able to comprehend the problems of women, often worked but far from exhausted field.And when,a little later,I the heirs of a burdensome past,who are striving to build a new fu- ventured to undertake the arduous task of translation-not from any ture.When I use the words woman or feminine I evidently refer to pretension to linguistic scholarship but because I had long been con- no archetype,no changeless essence whatever;the reader must under- cerned with certain scientific and humanistic aspects of the subject stand the phrase"in the present state of education and custom"after (not to mention the subsidiary inducements of wealth and fame)- most of my statements.It is not our concern here to proclaim eternal verities,but rather to describe the common basis that underlies every the ensuing more intimate acquaintance served to confirm and,in- deed,to heighten my first impression of the work. individual feminine existence. Much,in truth,has been written on woman from more or less re- stricted points of view,such as the physiological,the cynical,the re- ligious,the psychoanalytical,and the feministic-some of it written even by women;but it has remained for Mlle de Beauvoir to produce a book on woman and her historical and contemporary situation in Western culture,which is at once scientifically accurate in matters of biology,comprehensive and frank in its treatment of woman's indi- vidual development and social relations,illuminated throughout by a wealth of literary and scientific citation,and founded upon a broadly generous and consistent philosophy."Feminine literature,"the au- thor remarks,"is in our day animated less by a wish to demand our rights than by an effort toward clarity and understanding."Her work is certainly a good example of this tendency,and if,in addition,it sometimes may provoke dissent and give rise to controversy,so much the better.Mlle de Beauvoir is in general more concerned to explain than to reform,but she does look forward to better things and,por. traying with approval the independent woman of today,in the end gives persuasive expression to her vision of the future