Originally published in French in 2009, Simone Weil Attention to the Real leads the reader through Weil's earliest writing as a perceptive social critic to her work on spirituality and materialism, and finally to her concept of decreation, produced before her death at the age of thirty-four. "To an exceptional degree," Chenavier says, "the life of Simone Weil, her personality, her commitment, and her reflection form one single whole." Chenavier argues that Weil's vocation took on a very original form in the history of philosophical thought.