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The feminist phenomenology of excess: Ontological multiplicity, auto-jealousy, and suicide in Beauvoir’s L’Invitée

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Abstract

In this paper, I present a new reading of Simone de Beauvoir’s first major work, L’Invitée (She Came to Stay), in order to reveal the text as a vital place of origin for feminist phenomenological philosophy. My reading of L’Invitée departs from most scholarly interpretations of the text in three notable respects: (1) it is inclusive of the “two unpublished chapters” that were excised from the original manuscript at the publisher’s request, (2) it takes seriously Beauvoir’s claim that phenomenological philosophy is often better expressed in novels than essays or treatises, and (3) it views the novel’s main characters, Françoise and Xavière, as one woman who has multiple, contradictory, excessive selves. Thus approached, L’Invitée provides us with a thick description of one woman’s embodied consciousness and thereby shows us with specificity what a consciousness whose underlying structures reflect sexual difference looks like. This consciousness not only experiences itself as being both gendered, categorized, disciplined, and defined and in excess of these genders, categories, disciplines, and definitions at the same time, but also experiences its own self-relation through the presence of multiple selves who are each simultaneously attracted to and negating of the other. As such, the defining features of this consciousness involve experiences that I have respectively labeled “ontological multiplicity” and “auto-jealousy.”

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Notes

  1. See, for example, Lundgren-Gothlin (1996); Bergoffen (1997); Fullbrook (1999); Cataldi (2001); Gothlin (2001, 2003); Tidd (2001); Holveck (2002); Heinämaa (2003a, b, 2006); Simons (2003); Langer (2003); Bauer (2006); McWeeny (2009−2010).

  2. For some of the defining works in this field, see Bartky (1975); Young (1980); Allen (1982–1983); Butler (1989, 2003); Bergoffen (1997); Fisher (1999); Dastur (2000); Fisher and Embree (2000); Heinämaa (2003a); Oksala (2004, 2006).

  3. Beauvoir (1943). The original and the English translation are hereafter cited as L’Invitée and “SCS,” respectively.

  4. Beauvoir (1949). The original, which consists of two volumes, and the English translation are hereafter cited as and “DSI” or “DSII” and “SS,” respectively.

  5. Fullbrook and Fullbrook (1998, p. 77).

  6. Beauvoir (1946/1948). The original and the English translation are hereafter cited as “LM” and “LME”.

  7. LME (p. 269); LM (p. 87).

  8. LME (p. 274); LM (p. 98).

  9. LME (pp. 273–274); LM (pp. 97–100).

  10. LME (p. 274); LM (p. 98).

  11. LME (p. 274); LM (p. 100).

  12. See Klaw (1995).

  13. Beauvoir (1979). The original, “Deux chapitres inédit de L’Invitée,” and the English translation, “Two Unpublished Chapters from She Came to Stay,” are hereafter cited as “DCI” and “TUC,” respectively.

  14. In addition to LM, see Merleau-Ponty (1945/1964, pp. 27–28), who also makes the argument that literature and phenomenology cannot be separated in regard to L’Invitée.

  15. In this respect, my approach to L’Invitée is not altogether unique. For philosophical readings of the text, see also Merleau-Ponty (1945/1964; Barnes 1998; Fullbrook 1999; Holveck 2002, pp. 67–90; Simons 2003).

  16. See note 1 above.

  17. Heinämaa (2003a, pp. xvi, 21, 2006, pp. 21–22).

  18. Heinämaa (2006, p. 25).

  19. Bergoffen (1997, p. 29).

  20. Butler (1989, 2003); Fisher (1999); Fisher and Embree (2000).

  21. Butler (1989, p. 98, original emphasis).

  22. Cataldi’s (2001, pp. 101–105) and Kaufman’s (2003) brief analyses are notable exceptions.

  23. Merleau-Ponty (1945/1964).

  24. Fullbrook (1999, p. 56).

  25. Simons (2003, p. 108).

  26. Simons does note differences between Bergson’s and Beauvoir’s philosophies, but Beauvoir’s feminist insights are not mentioned in this analysis (2003, p. 108).

  27. Beauvoir (1960). The original and the English translation are hereafter cited as PL and FA, respectively.

  28. PL (p. 173), translation modified; FA (p. 151).

  29. PL (p. 733), translation modified; FA (p. 622).

  30. PL (p. 46); FA (p. 46).

  31. PL (p. 44), translation modified; FA (p. 44).

  32. PL (p. 44); FA (p. 44).

  33. PL (p. 733); FA (p. 622). See also Merleau-Ponty (1945/1962, p. xx), who writes, “Our relationship to the world, as it is untiringly enunciated within us, is not a thing which can be any further clarified by analysis; philosophy can only place it once more before our eyes and present it for our ratification.”

  34. PL (p. 44); FA (p. 44).

  35. PL (p. 522); FA (p. 447).

  36. LME (p. 270), translation modified; LM (p. 90).

  37. LME (p. 270); LM (p. 89).

  38. Although their conceptualizations of “excess” are somewhat different than the one I present here, see Diprose (1991) and Holland (2009) for discussions of the relationship between excess and sexual difference.

  39. PL (p. 313), translation modified; FA (pp. 268–269).

  40. Merleau-Ponty (1945/1964, p. 39).

  41. Beauvoir (1958, p. 26; English translation, p. 17, translation modified).

  42. See Allen (1997), Simons (2001, p. 28; 2003), and Heinämaa (2003a, b, pp. 53–57).

  43. PL (p. 241, 428, pp. 521–522; FA p. 208, pp. 363–364, p. 447). See also Simons (1998) and Heinämaa (2004, p. 154).

  44. See note 1 above.

  45. Merleau-Ponty (1945/1964, p. 28, original emphasis).

  46. Fullbrook (2004, p. 39).

  47. TUC (p. 42); DCI (p. 277).

  48. TUC (pp. 42–44); DCI (pp. 277–278).

  49. TUC (p, 43), emphasis added, translation modified; DCI (p. 277).

  50. The forbidden books mentioned in the text, which are Henry Bataille’s Maman Colibri, Colette’s Chéri, and Émile Zola’s Nana, are all about women who stand outside of established social and (hetero)sexual conventions.

  51. TUC (p. 45); DCI (p. 279).

  52. TUC (p. 45, 43); DCI, (pp. 277, 278).

  53. TUC (p. 65), translation modified; DCI (p. 305).

  54. TUC (p. 63), translation modified; DCI (p. 302).

  55. TUC (p. 64); DCI (p. 304).

  56. TUC (pp. 64–65), emphasis added, translation modified; DCI (p. 304).

  57. TUC (p. 57); DCI (p. 294). The entire poem can be found in Baudelaire (1986, pp. 125–127).

  58. SS (p. 38), translation modified; DSI (p. 80).

  59. SS (p. 34), translation modified; DSI (p. 75).

  60. SS (p. 36); DSI (p. 77).

  61. Merleau-Ponty (1945/1962, p. 121).

  62. For various philosophical descriptions of this phenomenon as it manifests in the lived experiences of oppressed beings see W. E. B. Du Bois’ concept of “double-consciousness” (1997, pp. 37–44), Frantz Fanon’s discussion of being a “triple person” (1967, pp. 109–140), Gloria Anzaldúa’s notion of “mestiza consciousness” (1987/1999), and María Lugones’ account of “‘world’-traveling” (1987).

  63. Beauvoir (1945, p. 363; English translation, p. 160).

  64. SS (p. 267); DSII (p. 13).

  65. Merleau-Ponty (1945/1962, pp. xx, 498). See McWeeny (2010, pp. 308–309) for more on how Merleau-Ponty’s account of operative intentionality can bypass the philosophical problems generated by the idea of ontological multiplicity.

  66. Holveck (2002, p. 74).

  67. SS (p. 29), translation modified; DSI (p. 69).

  68. Beauvoir (1945, p. 365; English translation, p. 161).

  69. SS (pp. xxi–xxii); DSI (p. 14).

  70. SS (p. 157); DSI (p. 257).

  71. Beauvoir (1945, p. 364; English translation, p. 161).

  72. Simons (1999, p. 1) and PL (p. 408); FA (p. 347). In this passage from the Prime of Life, Beauvoir also uses the words “exile” and “exorcise” to describe Françoise’s situation vis-à-vis Xavière.

  73. TUC (pp. 41–42); DCI, (pp. 275–276). Beauvoir was apparently unwilling to excise this scene entirely from the novel, since it appears again with few revisions as one of Françoise’s memories in the published version. See SCS (p. 120); L’Invitée (pp. 128–129).

  74. SCS (p. 15); L’Invitée (p. 17).

  75. SCS (p. 15, translation modified); L’Invitée (p. 17).

  76. SCS (p. 12); L’Invitée (p. 13).

  77. SCS (p. 18); L’Invitée (p. 21).

  78. SCS (p. 20); L’Invitée (p. 22).

  79. SCS (p. 38); L’Invitée (p. 45).

  80. SCS (p. 24), translation modified; L’Invitée (p. 27).

  81. SCS (p. 35), translation modified; L’Invitée (p. 42).

  82. Let us also note that we have easily accepted similar strategies of metaphysical disruption that expose painful psychologies operative under oppression in the case of critically acclaimed novels, such as Toni Morrison’s Beloved (1987).

  83. SCS (pp. 128, 228): L’Invitée (pp. 156, 284).

  84. SCS (p. 40, translation modified); L’Invitée (p. 47).

  85. See PL (p. 407, 414); FA (pp. 346–347, 352), where Beauvoir discusses her use of this technique.

  86. SCS (p. 288); L’Invitée (p. 359).

  87. SCS (p. 242), translation modified; L’Invitée (pp. 303–304).

  88. SCS (p. 245); L’Invitée (p. 308).

  89. SCS (pp. 291–292); L’Invitée (p. 364).

  90. SCS (p. 109); L’Invitée (p. 359).

  91. SCS (p. 19); L’Invitée (p. 21).

  92. For philosophical accounts of jealousy that favor this paradigm see Neu (1980), Farrell (1980), Wreen (1989), Kristjansson (1996).

  93. Many scholarly interpretations see Françoise’s jealousy in just these terms. For example, Eric Levéel claims that the dramatic framework of L’Invitée is “dictated by Françoise’s jealousy vis-à-vis her rival Xavière; the two women engage in a fight to the death for the emotional control of Pierre, a.k.a. Sartre” (2003–2004, p. 65; my translation).

  94. TUC (p. 53); DCI (p. 290).

  95. TUC (p. 65); DCI (p. 305).

  96. See Wreen’s discussion of this point (1989, p. 651).

  97. Merleau-Ponty (1945/1964, p. 29).

  98. SCS (pp. 242–243); L’Invitée, (pp. 304–305).

  99. For a thorough discussion of the possibilities of reading L’Invitée as a lesbian text, see Emery (1998–1999). See also Simons (1992).

  100. SCS (p. 246), translation modified; L’Invitée (p. 309).

  101. SCS (p. 284), translation modified; L’Invitée, (pp. 354–355).

  102. SCS (p. 292), translation modified; L’Invitée (p. 365).

  103. SCS (p. 291); L’Invitée (p. 365).

  104. SCS (p. 233); L’Invitée (p. 292).

  105. SCS (p. 295); L’Invitée (p. 369).

  106. Simons (1999, p. 17). See also Fallaize (1988, pp. 35–36, 42).

  107. Evans (1986, pp. 82–86); Moi (1991, pp. 161–165); McPherson (1988, pp. 37–39); Secomb (2006, p. 352).

  108. Beauvoir (PL, pp. 409–411); FA, (pp. 346–353). See also Beauvoir (1963, p. 290; English translation p. 283) and Moi’s commentary on this “excessive” aspect of the novel (Moi 1991, p. 152).

  109. In her analysis, Evans construes Beauvoir’s act of writing Xavière’s murder as a kind of suicide. However, she does not go so far as to conceptualize Françoise’s act as a fulfillment of Xavière’s wishes (1986, p. 86).

  110. SCS (p. 349), translation modified; L’Invitée (p. 434).

  111. SCS (pp. 35, 109, 134, 185–186, 234, 310, 313, 316–317, 334, 349, 374, 399, 403); L’Invitée (pp. 42, 132, 164, 230–231, 293, 387, 390–391, 394–395, 416, 434, 467, 497, 502).

  112. Self-mutilation is not necessarily an indication of suicide and can instead be expressive of a wish to overcome trauma. See McLane (1996).

  113. TUC (p. 52, translation modified); DCI (p. 288).

  114. SCS (p. 234); L’Invitée (p. 293).

  115. SCS (69, 77); L’Invitée, (pp. 83, 94).

  116. SCS (p.74, translation modified); L’Invitée (p. 90).

  117. SCS (pp. 107–109, translation modified); L’Invitée, (pp. 131–132).

  118. SCS (p. 310, translation modified); L’Invitée (p. 387).

  119. TUC (p. 62); DCI (p. 300).

  120. TUC (p. 62); DCI (p. 301).

  121. SCS (p. 184, 208); L’Invitée (pp. 228, 260).

  122. Barnes (1998, p. 165).

  123. SCS (pp. 369–371); L’Invitée, (pp. 460–462).

  124. SCS (p. 24); L’Invitée (p. 28).

  125. See also Fallaize’s discussion of this point (Fallaize 1988, pp. 36–37).

  126. SCS (p. 26), translation modified; L’Invitée (p. 30).

  127. Merleau-Ponty (1945/1964, p. 33).

  128. SCS (p. 208, translation modified); L’Invitée, (pp. 260–261).

  129. Holveck (2002, p. 75).

  130. Fallaize (1988, p. 42).

  131. SCS (p. 402); L’Invitée (p. 500).

  132. SCS (p. 4030); L’Invitée (p. 501).

  133. SCS (p. 403); L’Invitée (p. 502).

  134. SCS (p. 352, translation modified); L’Invitée (p. 438).

  135. SCS (p. 404, translation modified); L’Invitée (p. 503).

  136. See note 68 above.

  137. PL (p. 733); FA (p. 622).

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Acknowledgments

I am grateful to Kyoo Lee, Beata Stawarska, Christine Daigle, and an anonymous reviewer for their insightful and careful comments on an earlier version of this essay. I would also like to thank those individuals in attendance at the “Phenomenology of Simone de Beauvoir” session of the 2008 Annual Meeting of the Society for Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where I presented an initial formulation of the ideas expressed in this paper. In addition to the three individuals listed above, attendees included Margaret A. Simons, Sara Heinämaa, Mary Beth Mader, and Dianna Taylor, among others. Their supportive contributions to the session’s lengthy discussion helped me to develop my ideas further into the present essay. Finally, I am appreciative of the encouragement and support given to me by the members of the Gestalt Training Program XII at the Gestalt Institute of Cleveland.

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  1. John Carroll University, University Heights, OH, USA

    Jennifer McWeeny

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Correspondence to Jennifer McWeeny.

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McWeeny, J. The feminist phenomenology of excess: Ontological multiplicity, auto-jealousy, and suicide in Beauvoir’s L’Invitée . Cont Philos Rev 45, 41–75 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11007-011-9204-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11007-011-9204-7

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