Women’s social gatherings bore because women lack shared independent interests

Evidence

The implacable ennui weighing on these gatherings has been described hundreds of times. It comes from the fact that these women gathered there by “social obligations” have nothing to say to each other. There is no common interest linking the lawyer’s wife to the doctor’s—and none between Dr. Dupont’s and Dr. Durand’s. It is bad taste in a general conversation to talk of one’s children’s pranks or problems with the help. What is left is discussion of the weather, the latest novel, and a few general ideas borrowed from their husbands. — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1583

Categorization

• XREF: Echoes Betty Friedan’s ‘problem that has no name’ decades later, and the analysis of the housewife’s empty social circulation in Chapters 5-6. — connects to: Women’s isolation from each other blocks recognition that their subjectivity struggles are shared — Christine Daigle, Jacob Golomb (eds.), Beauvoir and Sartre: The Riddle of…, 73; Women’s literary mediocrity stems from social situation, not natural destiny — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1947; Women lack the practice of sovereign solitude needed for creative transcendence. — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1948 (+4 more)

Broader Connections

• Women’s isolation from each other blocks recognition that their subjectivity struggles are shared #expands (0.85) — Christine Daigle, Jacob Golomb (eds.), Beauvoir and Sartre, 73
• Women’s ambivalence about men prevents them from building a solid counter-universe #expands (0.82) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1760
• Women lack the practice of sovereign solitude needed for creative transcendence. #expands (0.80) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1948
• Women tell stories that lack character and humor. #exemplifies (0.78) — Crews, Harry, A childhood the biography of a place, 564
• Women’s literary mediocrity stems from social situation, not natural destiny #corroborates (0.75) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1947
• Conflicting expectations of equality and otherness produce women’s lack of balance #expands (0.75) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 668
• Women’s lack of creative genius stems from situation, not essence #corroborates (0.75) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1952