Beauvoir’s long paragraphs encode her reasoning, so editing them distorts her argument
Evidence
The long and dense paragraphs that were changed in the 1953 translation to conform to more traditional styles of punctuation—or even eliminated—have now been translated as she wrote them, all within the confines of English. Long paragraphs (sometimes going on for pages) are a stylistic aspect of her writing that is essential, integral to the development of her arguments. Cutting her sentences, cutting her paragraphs, and using a more traditional and conventional punctuation do not render Simone de Beauvoir’s voice. Beauvoir’s style expresses her reasoning. Her prose has its own consistent grammar, and that grammar follows a logic. — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 30
Categorization
- DEFINE: A key interpretive principle for reading Beauvoir: style and argument are inseparable, so the reader should not skim over the long paragraphs.
- DEEPTHINKING: The claim that a text’s grammar follows a logic — that stylistic form is itself carrying philosophical content — bears on how to read Beauvoir and any dense Continental text.
- XREF: connects to: Emphasis in theoretical exposition can itself shift or weaken an author’s argument — Wael Hallaq, Restating Orientalism: A Critique of…, 346
Broader Connections
- Emphasis in theoretical exposition can itself shift or weaken an author’s argument
#qualifies(0.72) — Wael Hallaq, Restating Orientalism, 346