What is Cruel Optimism?
The system of metaphors linking associative ideas across the length and breadth of the narrative begins with the very title of the book. Cruel optimism is a metaphor fueled by a rich tapestry of comparative concepts. But at its heart, the metaphor is explicitly framed by the author as essentially being a real sticky wicket:
“Cruel optimism is the condition of maintaining an attachment to a significantly problematic object.”
“the good life”
The sticky wicket in play here is the desire by everyone to realize their version of a metaphorical concept known as living “the good life.” What that metaphor actually means is entirely subjective: we all may fantasize about certain conditions that qualify, but the meat is in the details.
“This book is…about the attrition of a fantasy, a collectively invested form of life, the good life… that fantasy has become more fantasmatic, with less and less relation to how people can live—as the blueprint has faded.”
Metaphors within Metaphor
Metaphor is a controlling literary device throughout the book, often taking shape in unexpected. For instance, at one point the author of this book provides analysis of a novel titled Two Girls, Fat and Thin. This analysis serves as not just a review of the novel, but an extended metaphor for the argument being presented. But within that larger metaphorical landscape are individual metaphorical images that punctuate the broader argument:
“Adrenaline is the addictive booty in this novel: its experience always involves tapping into one’s creativity, even if the scene of stimulation repeats the most unpleasant or disappointing urges of need and desire.”
“the falling man”
Historical events also serve the purpose of metaphor to underline argumentative evidence. For instance, the 9/11 attacks on the Twin Towers—specifically an image which has come to be known as “the falling man” which an unknown man was photographed upside-down on his way to slamming on the ground below after having either jumped or fallen from a floor high above. The photo itself became known as “the falling man” and gave birth to a documentary film as well as a highly regarded novel by Don DeLillo. For Berlant, the metaphorical implication is clear and unambiguous:
“The falling man is an enigma from 9/11 who has generated other novels and documentaries about the horror of anonymous death.”
Metaphorical Truth Through Negation
One of the chapters in the book is subtitled “Slow Death” and the text embraces the idea of explaining what is meant by this metaphor. Ultimately, things reach the point where the author decides to explain what “slow death” is a metaphor for by rejecting the things that “slow death” is not a metaphor for:
“Slow death is not primarily a gloss on the lives of quiet desperation that Thoreau attributed to men in capitalist society,…Nor is it in the melodramatic idiom that Baudrillard uses when he refers to “slow death” as the double execution of the capitalist subject…Nor is the phrase an existential way of talking about living as such, on the way to dying.”
