A Very Easy Death by Simone De Beauvoir (2005, Unabridged, Compact Disc)

Francoise de Beauvoir, the feminist author’s seventy-seven year old mother, went into the hospital with a broken femur she sustained in a fall and died there a month later of stomach cancer. This short, understated work deftly sketches her last days, places her in a familial and universal context, and analyzes the relationship between life and death and the effect of the loss of a parent on surviving children.

During the course of their lifetime, de Beauvoir’s mother was both proud of her daughter’s intellectual accomplishments and ashamed of her blatant spurning of traditional mores. Their relationship suffered accordingly. But watching her mother cope with a terminal illness leads the author to a series of surprising and positive revelations about love, personal choice, and the triumph of individualism. Hillary Huber’s portrayal of a vital, intelligent woman in her prime and a frail one at the end of her life is a sensitive masterpiece that subtly captures de Beauvoir’s inner conflicts and her mother’s pain, spirit and dignity.