Book
Silogismele amărăciunii
by Emil Cioran · 1952 · 2 reading cards
2 cards
Silogismele amărăciunii · 1952
Our inner perception colors the external world, transforming beauty into threat.
Cioran projects onto all of nature a subjective trait: the fear of death by drowning. Waters, no matter how clear or serene, take on the same dark color for him. The mechanism is psychological projection: inner despair colors outer reality. A mountain lake, for a happy person, is blue and calm; for someone contemplating suicide, it is black and deep.
“All waters are the colour of drowning.”
Silogismele amărăciunii · 1952
Suicide is an act of shattered optimism, not of profound pessimism.
Cioran makes a paradoxical distinction: pessimists have no reason to die because they never had illusions. The optimist, on the other hand, believed in something good, and when that belief collapses, the void becomes unbearable. A person who hoped all their life for love and loses it may turn to suicide; someone who never hoped for anything remains indifferent.
“Only optimists commit suicide — optimists who can no longer be optimists. The others, having no reason to live, why should they have any reason to die?”