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ETHICS
The Concept of Force in Simone Weil
From the Greek poem “Iliad” to sexual violence
Simone Weil (1909–1943) was a French thinker who was completely unconventional. After studying Marxism, she rejected it and approached religious experience without ever accepting Christian baptism.
Wanting to know first-hand the experience of the working class, she left teaching and, despite serious health problems, worked for several months on the production lines of several French companies, including Renault.
Simone Weil volunteered for the Spanish Civil War, siding with the Republicans against Franco’s Fascists, though she did not take part in combat because she could not use a rifle.
After the outbreak of war, between December 1940 and January 1941, she published a remarkable reflection on the concept of force, centered on the Greek epic poem Iliad: L’Iliade ou le poème de la force, one of the few texts published during her lifetime.
What is ‘force’?
The short text (about twenty pages or so) opens with the assertion that
The true hero, the true subject, the center of the Iliad is force.
But, what is force, here? Weil goes on to explain that force is
