“Lassata necdum satiata”

“Lassata necdum satiata” names the passage’s central contrast between exhaustion and completion: a person may be spent without feeling definitively satisfied. Attributed to Juvenal, the phrase serves Simone de Beauvoir as a compact expression of her argument that feminine pleasure, in contrast with the finite pattern she assigns to masculine pleasure, does not necessarily end at a single point of release.

Meaning and Source

The phrase appears in Latin in two adjacent lines, with the second completing the thought: “Et lassata viris, necdum satiata recessite.” Simone de Beauvoir then gives the concise form “Lassata necdum satiata,” attributing it to Juvenal. Its force lies in the opposition it holds together: fatigue has arrived, but satisfaction has not become final.

The Passage’s Argument

The saying concludes a comparison between sexual pleasure as the passage presents it. Male pleasure is described as rising toward a threshold, reaching fulfillment, and ending abruptly; its structure is finite and discontinuous. Feminine pleasure, by contrast, is represented as spreading through the body and unfolding in successive waves rather than being confined to one fixed endpoint.

On this account, precise satisfaction does not necessarily determine when feminine erotic possibility ends. Nervous or cardiac fatigue, or psychic satiety, may impose limits instead. The Latin phrase condenses that distinction: exhaustion can be real without amounting to complete release.

Rhetorical Function

The phrase is more than a quotation placed at the end of the discussion. Its balanced contrast—weariness on one side, continuing lack of satisfaction on the other—gives memorable form to the passage’s claim that pleasure need not follow a single, sharply bounded trajectory. The allusion to Juvenal also lends the argument an inherited literary voice, while the surrounding explanation makes clear how Simone de Beauvoir applies it to her comparison of sexual experience.