ménopause

narrower and narrower would her bed be

« Like a nun withdrawing, or a child exploring a tower, she went, upstairs, paused at the window, came to the bathroom. There was a green linoleum and a tap dripping. There was an emptiness about the heart of life ; an attic room. Women must put off their rich apparel. At midday they must disrobe. She pierced the pincushion and laid her feathered yellow hat on the bed. The sheets were clean, tight stretched in a broad white band from side to side. Narrower and narrower would her bed be. The candle was half burnt down and she had read deep in Baron’s Marbot’s Memoirs. She had read late at night of the retreat of Moscow»

Virginia Woolf, Mrs Dalloway, Penguin books, Modern classics, pp 33-34

~, ou le temps des propos obscènes

« Lorsqu’une certaine réserve de langage et de tenue est imposée au sexe féminin, les femmes d’un certain âge peuvent, elles, tenir des propos obscènes aussi librement et même plus librement que les hommes. »

L’un et l’autre sexe, Margaret Mead, page 212

Voir également l'entrée "debout".