To Be A Woman, If Not A

Old Age Was Growing Inside Me. It Kept Catching My Eye From The Depths Of The Mirror. I Was Paralyzed Sometimes As I Saw It Making Its Way Toward Me So Steadily When Nothing Inside Me Was Ready For It.

I Was Struck By The Absence, Even Among Very Young Boys And Girls, Of Any Interior Motivation; They Were Incapable Of Thinking, Of Inventing, Of Imagining, Of Choosing, Of Deciding For Themselves; This Incapacity Was Expressed By Their Conformism; In Every Domain Of Life They Employed Only The Abstract Measure Of Money, Because They Were Unable To Trust To Their Own Judgment.

It's True That What You Find In New York Is Something Other Than America. Only Small Towns And Small Countries Are Self-satisfied; A Real Capital Goes Beyond Its Borders.

Since It Is The Other Within Us Who Is Old, It Is Natural That The Revelation Of Our Age Should Come To Us From Outside --from Others. We Do Not Accept It Willingly.

There Is Something False In This Search For A Purely Feminine Writing Style. Language, Such As It Is, Is Inherited From A Masculine Society, And It Contains Many Male Prejudices. We Must Rid Language Of All That. Still, A Language Is Not Something Created Artificially; The Proletariat Can't Use A Different Language From The Bourgeoisie, Even If They Use It Differently, Even If From Time To Time They Invent Something, Technical Words Or Even A Kind Of Worker's Slang, Which Can Be Very Beautiful And Very Rich. Women Can Do That As Well, Enrich Their Language, Clean It Up.