Schadenfreude ist die schönste Freude” – “Schadenfreude is the best joy” says a German proverb. If you’re not on board with this, this book might make you look at the more positive sides of finding joy in other people’s misfortune. Or it might bore you to tears with strained examples for Schadenfreude for chapter upon chapter. I know that “This book should have been a blog post” is tired and meh, but in this case I’d say: this book’s afterword (which contains the good parts) would suffice as a blog post.
The best use of the book is probably to point out that Schadenfreude can also be the small flash of satisfaction at somebody else’s misfortune, and needn’t be long and loud and gleeful. Othere than that, there wasn’t much. Good points (among a bunch of really sketchy ones):
- The correct amount of Schadenfreude in your life is not zero.
- Schadenfreude points at interesting things about yourself (and is often a good place to start shadow work).
- Schadenfreude can be a way of bonding and surviving the small everyday indignities of life.
