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I read this book back in the 1990's when I was a teenage. At the time, I really liked that story for two main reasons: 1. The effort put by the author to present a living and vivd rendering of a historical period long past (well, I know the story is a tale, but it is taking place in a period that existed). At the time, I really appreciateed Franco-Belgian comics author Jacques Martin for his Alix series for the same reason, even though, he was dealing with actual characters, not just legends. And I was studying latine as well as late antiquity and Middle-Age in History class. 2. The idea to look at the Arthurian tales from the perspective of the women characters, even though, the author had to heavily use her imagination, as women in these tales are more often objects of the narration than active motors of it, but I appreciated how she did it. Almost 30 years later, the whole novel looks very different to me and I'm not sure I appreciate it as much anymore. Now, I'm just reading it as a way to remember the various stages of the story, but I'm not touched as much anymore. Especially, it doesn't seem as feminist to me anymore as it did then. It dvelwes deep into the sacred feminine, an ideology that has been so damaging to feminism and so many women, but I wasn't aware of this then.

After "Happycracy: How the Industry of Happiness controls our lives", and "Bright-Sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America" by Barbara Ehreneich, which both are concerned with the way positive psychology and positive thinking have served as blue pills to make the neoliberal system we live under since the late 1970's more acceptable to over-squizzed people from top to down the socioeconomic ladder, I wished to have a better understanding of the notion of capitalism and neoliberalism. At first, I wanted to read Luc Boltanski's and Eve Chiappello's work "The New Spirit of Capitalism", but have realized that it is a continuation of previous works published separately in the previous years. It turns out that in these, he has treated in depth several notions that he used in this one. Not reading them first would make understand this one very difficult. And I haven't been able yet to find them in a satisfying format, so I thought that in the meantime, "Cold Intimacies" could help me dvelwe into these notions.

I have only started reading it today and I must warn that it is much denser than "Happycraty" and much more academic in its tone and form. However, I feel that if one hangs on there, it will be still understanable and very useful.

I will begin by saying that this book was not as engaging as other books by this author. I found Nickel and Dimed to be more interesting; I read that book and reviewed it here as well. Maybe because that book has the author doing more things rather than just presenting research. Having said that, this is a book that should be read, but it is also a book that you can scan large parts of it and still get the point.

Ehrenreich looks at the cult of the positive thinking in the United States, and it exposes it for what it is: something that actually dulls our edge, and it serves as a social control tool. Yes, the cult of positive thinking can be placed right along things like Stalinism. But getting rid of it is not as easy as it sounds given that, in the U.S., the cult of positivism is a billionaire industry. There are a lot of coaches, speakers, and ministers making a vast fortune over telling you that, if you do not become wealthy yourself, it is your own damn fault. People have pretty much bought into what is basically a con game.

Ehrenreich does a very thorough job of going over the history of positive thinking starting with the Calvinists and Puritans and working up to the modern gurus of today. She leads then from the beginnings to the current financial meltdown and economic mess we are facing. The message is simple: we need a defensive pessimism. It is what keeps us alive and gives us an edge. And we need to be realistic, get some empathy, and help each other out. And we need to be very skeptical. This is something I found appealing given that I am often surrounded by worshipers of the happy thoughts who are more than happy to exclude me if I express what they see as a "negative thought." And in a society where you can be fired for being "too negative," those of us who are realists have to pick our battles. Yet in the end, as the financial mess has proven, it was the naysayers who saw what was coming, but they were disregarded. It is a harsh lesson that needs to be learned and remembered.

I am not saying don't have a positive outlook. I am just saying you should temper it with realism, as Ehrenreich seems to say at the end. If you want a real explanation of why things are as bad as they are, skip all the financial analysis books and such and read this instead. Only reason I did not rate it higher is because it does get a little repetitive at times. The ideas Ehrenreich presents are not really new ones. Anyone with half a brain who has critical thinking skills probably has thought of some of this. Her strength is in taking all that and putting it together in an accessible form.

Commute audiobook. Narrator was fine. Book was perfect level of difficulty for a commute audiobook (moderately complex, adequately engaging).

In this book Ehrenreich explores the the invasion of American preoccupation with positive thinking into various aspects of our lives: corporate culture, church, medical diagnosis and treatment, motivational speaking as big business, social stratification, psychology as an academic field.

Why not think positively? It might help! It certainly can't hurt, right?

Wrong, Ehrenreich says. The results of all this forced positivity are mostly -- perhaps entirely -- damaging. Through the lens of positive thinking, everything is good for us and we should be grateful it's happened to us. Cancer patients (pardon, "survivors" or "fighters" who are "battling" cancer) aren't supposed to be angry or sad for even a moment. Employees shouldn't be angry or sad about the erosion of employee-friendly labor policies or job termination. If we think enough positive thoughts, good things will come to us because "God wants to give us nice things."

But denying negative emotions/negative situations doesn't help us in the long run. Sometimes shitty things happen for no reason, and we need to acknowledge that. Sometimes shitty things happen for systematic reasons (e.g. the wealth gap, poverty, wage inequality) and failing to acknowledge that maintains the status quo. All this positive thinking -- "if I think positive thoughts hard enough, good things will happen to me" -- has the corollary that if good things DON'T happen to me, it must be my fault because I didn't think positively enough. It couldn't possibly be due to living in an unfair, chaotic world in a society structured to keep the little guys down. Positive thinking ends up a key component of the modern conception of rugged American individualism. Notably, the major figures of the positive thinking movement are, Ehrenreich points out, Republicans, the party which would gut the social safety net and constantly extols the hard work of individuals without reference to systematic factors that helped the successful achieve their success.