Simone Weil as We Knew HerIn 1941 Simone Weil was introduced to Father Jean-Marie Perrin, a priest of the Dominican order whose friendship became one of the most significant influences on her spiritual development. It was for Father Perrin that she wrote her 'spiritual autobiography', contained in Waiting for God, and to him that she later wrote 'Letter to a Priest'. When Weil requested work as a field hand, Perrin sent her to Gustave Thibon, a farmer and Christian philosopher. From 1941-2, Weil stayed with the Thibon family, working in the fields by day while writing by night the notebooks which posthumously became Gravity and Grace and other seminal works. Perrin and Thibon met Weil at a time when her interior life and her creative genius were at the height of their glowing maturity. During the short but deep period of their acquaintance with her, they came to know her as she actually was. Their accounts of this time reveal her to us in the bare parlour of the Dominican convent at Marseilles where, after waiting her turn among a stream of refugees, she discussed her personal problems with Father Perrin. They show her to us in the vineyards of Ardèche, and on the stone seat by the fountain overlooking the Rhone valley where she read Plato to Thibon, her host. First published in 1953, and now newly introduced by Patricia Little, this unique portrait depicts Weil through the eyes of her friends, not as a strange and unaccountable genius but as an ardent and very human young person in search of truth and knowledge. |
Contents
888 | 85 |
How Simone Weil appeared to me | 105 |
Vertigo of the absolute | 126 |
On the threshold of the church | 146 |
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Common terms and phrases
absolute admiration affliction Ardèche attention baptism beauty body Cahiers Simone Catharism Catharist Catholic Catholicism Christ Christian Church conflict Connaissance Surnaturelle death dialogue difficulties divine dogmas eternal Eucharist everything evil experience expression fact Father Perrin feel formulæ friends friendship gifts give God's Gospel Gravity and Grace Gustave Thibon human humility ideas idolatry Iliad infinite inspiration intelligence Intuitions Joë Bousquet knew Letter light living Marseilles meaning mind Moreover mysteries mystical nature necessity Need for Roots never Nietzsche nothingness objective Pascal perfect perhaps person philosophical Plato point of view possible Priest purity question reality refused religion religious revelation Rhône rience Romanesque architecture sacraments Saint Saint Paul Saintliness of genius sanctity sense Simone Weil's Simone's social soul speak spiritual spiritual evolution Stoicism suffering supernatural syncretism temporal testimony texts things thought true truth understand vertigo vocation Waiting wanted Weil's words writings wrote