HROG #2: Exploring Metamodernism & Optimistic Nihilism in Sci-Fi.
I wrote “Hope Runners of Gridlock” for three primary reasons:
I enjoy novel cities.
I wanted to explore metamodernism and optimistic nihilism in character arcs.
I wanted to learn to write a novel.
I wrote a companion guide that expands on these topics that you can read alongside the Gumroad bundle.
This blog series details and expands the sections in the companion guide, and is comprised of three articles:
Exploring Metamodernism & Optimistic Nihilism in Sci-Fi. [this article]
NOTE: These posts contain *SPOILERS*. If you want to read the novel, find links here.
https://blog.simondlr.com/posts/hope-runners-of-gridlock
Metamodernism & Optimistic Nihilism In Sci-Fi
Photo by Jordan Donaldson | @jordi.d on Unsplash
Like many, I also go through life like a mollusc picking up new ideological shells to see if they fit against the mental attacks of life and the modern era: the existential dread of death, heat death of the universe, and other seemingly inevitable problems like climate change. There’s many maps that help us navigate these territories. Two such maps (that are related) that I wanted to explore from the get-go in Hope Runners of Gridlock was Optimistic Nihilism & Metamodernism. It’s a feeling of acceptance, and the pursuit of meaningful action in the face of seeming meaningless. The addition of sci-fi or fantasy can help elucidate these mental maps by creating novel fictional constraints or extremes that does not exist as apparently in the complex, messy life of the real world.
1 Flora’s Nihilism
The core character arc of the protagonist, Flora, is one of reconciling the opposites of nihilism & grand narratives. She learns to accept the absurd reality of her world, accepts her own identity that was not moulded by herself, and learns to accept hope. The core realisation is that she doesn’t have to choose one narrative. She can both believe it’s absurd and meaningless, yet still believe in hope.
This realisation can sometimes be summed up as ‘optimistic nihilism’, or what I would regard as a broader mental framework and structure of feeling: metamodernism. While optimistic nihilism is a more specific framing of it, metamodernism puts it in a broader cultural landscape. We are in the messy aftermath of postmodernism and the internet age, and we are grasping for shared realities and grand narratives. We are at sea, but we don’t see the shore. Metamodernism as a structure of feeling that tries to navigate this new frontier by not resorting to wholly throwing out postmodernism, but by piecing together a new feeling: that of reconstruction.
Modernism was a pursuit of truth, scientific rationality, and the objective endeavour to better the human condition. It had grand narratives. To quote from Wikipedia:
More common, especially in the West, are those who see it as a socially progressive trend of thought that affirms the power of human beings to create, improve and reshape their environment with the aid of practical experimentation, scientific knowledge, or technology. From this perspective, modernism encouraged the re-examination of every aspect of existence, from commerce to philosophy, with the goal of finding that which was 'holding back' progress, and replacing it with new ways of reaching the same end.
Postmodernism on the other hand came to reject that world view, and replaced it with subjectivities, deconstruction, cynicism, irony, and relativism. Postmodernism was deconstruction. To quote from Wikipedia:
Postmodern thinkers frequently describe knowledge claims and value systems as contingent or socially-conditioned, framing them as products of political, historical, or cultural discourses and hierarchies. Common targets of postmodern criticism include universalist ideas of objective reality, morality, truth, human nature, reason, science, language, and social progress. Accordingly, postmodern thought is broadly characterized by tendencies to self-consciousness, self-referentiality, epistemological and moral relativism, pluralism, and irreverence.
Metamodernism is the dialogue and structure of feeling that brings us towards reconstruction. It’s to not shy away from both the deconstructive self-awareness of postmodernism and the grand narratives of modernism.
That was Flora’s core arc. To wrestle with the grand narratives of hope, and her own self-awareness to rise to a third-way. Acceptance, yet not throwing away her old self. That’s what I hoped the reader would digest and feel when the book was done. That they too can rise to the occasion and reconcile their own conflicts of life and meaning. Not much of life makes much sense, but hey, the sunsets are beautiful.
2 Quotes On Metamodernism
I quote some descriptions of Metamodernism to get an understanding of what it entails.
“We see this manifest as a kind of informed naivety, a pragmatic idealism, a moderate fanaticism, oscillating between sincerity and irony, deconstruction and construction, apathy and affect, attempting to attain some sort of transcendent position, as if such a thing were within our grasp. The metamodern generation understands that we can be both ironic and sincere in the same moment; that one does not necessarily diminish the other.” - http://www.metamodernism.com/2015/01/12/metamodernism-a-brief-introduction/
“Whereas postmodernism was characterised by deconstruction, irony, pastiche, relativism, nihilism, and the rejection of grand narratives (to caricature it somewhat), the discourse surrounding metamodernism engages with the resurgence of sincerity, hope, romanticism, affect, and the potential for grand narratives and universal truths, whilst not forfeiting all that we’ve learnt from postmodernism.” - http://www.metamodernism.com/2015/01/12/metamodernism-a-brief-introduction/
“So here it is: metamodernism believes in reconstructing things that have been deconstructed with a view toward reestablishing hope and optimism in the midst of a period (the postmodern period) marked by irony, cynicism, and despair.” - http://www.metamodernism.com/2015/01/12/metamodernism-a-brief-introduction/
“This last metamodern quality—the feeling of understanding something, or at least thinking of it as “coherent,” without being able to deconstruct it into its parts—is sometimes called “the metamodern awesome.” (Think of “awesome” as the twenty-first century equivalent of “the sublime.”) If we go back to the pendulum metaphor I used above, the oddity of seeing a pendulum hanging straight downward and quivering slightly—which suggests to us that there’s a motion occurring that can’t properly be seen, and that we can no longer say where on the spectrum the pendulum is at any moment—corresponds to a feeling that you’re witnessing something “awesome.” An “awesome” thing is one that’s marvelous and gives a kind of instinctive pleasure but is almost impossible to describe or explain.” - https://www.huffpost.com/entry/what-is-metamodernism_b_586e7075e4b0a5e600a788cd
“In addition to the above, it’s worth noting that we often speak of metamodernism as trying to negotiate between Modernism and postmodernism through a “romantic response to crisis”—essentially, asking that we remain optimistic in the face of our postmodernism-enabled hopelessness and act “as if” things will get better (even if we don’t necessarily think they will). - https://www.huffpost.com/entry/what-is-metamodernism_b_586e7075e4b0a5e600a788cd
“Metamodernism moves for the sake of moving, attempts in spite of its inevitable failure; it seeks forever for a truth that it never expects to find.” - https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.3402/jac.v2i0.5677
“Although science tells us that it is impossible to look into the future and transcend the limits of time, science fiction allows for a realization of the metamodern philosophical idea that, as Luke Turner writes in ‘The Metamodernist Manifesto’, “existence is enriched if we set about our task as if those limits might be exceeded, for such action unfolds the world.” - https://ourculturemag.com/2019/09/14/back-to-sincerity-hope-and-love-metamodernism-in-sci-fi
“Ontologically, metamodernism oscillates between the modern and the postmodern. It oscillates between a modern enthusiasm and a postmodern irony, between hope and melancholy, between naivete and knowingness, empathy and apathy, unity and plurality, totality and fragmentation, purity and ambiguity.” - https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.3402/jac.v2i0.5677
“Metamodernism displaces the parameters of the present with those of a future presence that is futureless; and it displaces the boundaries of our place with those of a surreal place that is placeless. For indeed, that is the ‘‘destiny’’ of the metamodern wo/man: to pursue a horizon that is forever receding.” - https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.3402/jac.v2i0.5677
2.1 Examples of Metamodernism in Culture
This article greatly encapsulates where you can find Metamodernism in Sci-Fi: https://ourculturemag.com/2019/09/14/back-to-sincerity-hope-and-love-metamodernism-in-sci-fi/. In films like Interstellar, Arrival, and Her. Coincidentally Arrival and Her are some of my favourite films.
To me, the hallmark of metamodernism in culture is both a form self-awareness, yet unapologetically not shying away from grand emotions. I don’t think I’ve seen any references to to Schitt’s Creek, but that to me is a cornerstone metamodern show. It’s self-aware in its irony, yet simultaneously immensely sincere. As a comparison. Arrested Development is postmodern. It doesn’t attempt to be sincere despite a similar premise of a rich family in trouble. Schitt’s Creek has the happiest, hopeful, and most sincere moments in TV I’ve seen.
Another example comes from my favourite country artist, Sturgill Simpson, that titled an album: “Metamodern Sounds in Country Music”.
“So don't waste your mind on nursery rhymes
Or fairy tales of blood and wine
It's turtles all the way down the line
So to each their own 'til we go home
To other realms our souls must roam
To and through the myth that we all call space and time.”
In “Long White Line”, he sings about the ‘horizon forever receding”, searching for the end of the long white line painted on the roads we drive.
“I won't be around this old town anymore for a long long time
Gonna hit the road and start looking for the end of that long white line.”
3 Metamodernism in Gridlock
By the novel’s very name, it presents this impossibility: a utopia and dystopia. It starts with the grand event of hope, and both Flora and Esper ridiculing it.
Through the novel, we see Flora come to understand that it is okay to feel all that she feels, and that she shouldn’t reject any one part of her. The pursuit of answers is the modernist drive. That betrays her when she almost fails. She then tries on different ‘identities’ in being a protector and actually being hopeful. But, that also collapses and she continuously deconstructs her reality.
Eventually, she reconstructs herself when she realises that she had no choice (also aided in part by Argent, Modera, and Rulo). She sees it all with a new perspective: she can be afraid, yet hopeful. She could believe that the gridlock is an economically manipulative system that feeds off hope to keep people in power, yet see that a part of it is necessary. It’s both/and thinking, oscillating between the extremes that are both true.
Finally, as part of Flora’s arc, it also brings forth an acceptance of not having answers, which is where the story begins and the story ends. Having only answered one question, many more still remain, but along with Flora’s arc, it’s one of newfound acceptance. The answers matter, but they don’t control the reader anymore. As John Truby puts in “The Anatomy of a Story”, it’s the ‘never-ending story’: an ending that allows you to see the whole novel in a new light.
That is thus the core theme of the novel. Despite the interesting world building and exploring, it’s that feeling of acceptance that I wanted to leave the reader with. “For indeed, that is the ‘‘destiny’’ of the metamodern wo/man: to pursue a horizon that is forever receding.” To accept and run into the horizon in search of an answer that she might not find. Everyday we struggle with the pursuit of meaning. It’s okay to be nihilistic, but still pursue meaning.
4 Comparisons to Heroine’s Journey
During the final stages of proofreading, my brother, Niel, pointed me to the Heroine’s Journey. We often talk about story narratives. He introduced me to Joseph Campbell and the concept of the monomyth a few years back. My brother is a big Star Wars fan and George Lucas heavily cited Joseph Campbell’s writing as an influence. Of the reading on writing/storytelling that I did, it often pops up. You know when you see it: archetypes of the Hero’s Journey. A reason it’s such a strong narrative tool is because, ultimately, stories survived because it taught us things. The core function of the Hero’s Journey is that of a hero undergoing trials, conquering it, and then returning to normal, having learned something new that can be shared.
What I wasn’t aware of, was the existence of the “Heroine’s Journey”, which originally, is a proposal by Maureen Murdock in 1990 to describe a female protagonist’s journey. Its journey is focused on the female protagonist rejecting the feminine, failing at employing masculine methods, and eventually reconciling the alternatives into synthesis. I realise that this specific journey is in some sense related to Flora’s arc and is actually closely related to metamodernism: which is a reconciliation attempt at seeming dichotomies. I had unintentionally written a narrative arc for Flora that aligns with the Heroine’s Journey.
I realise that writing female characters as a male is often fraught with pitfalls/traps, and I might still have made mistakes. I did not want to write a typical story with the male gaze and saw that as part of a challenge to question my own assumptions. There is no right way to do it and character traits can also just be down to the character, but, I believe one can definitely be egregious. Hopefully, I wasn’t.
5 The Smaller Themes: Belonging, Systems, Truth, and Choice.
Whilst hope is a big theme, it more readily falls under metamodernism and optimistic nihilism. Three of the other smaller themes: systems, truth, and choice are captured in three of the four parts of the novel. In some sense they play into a 3-act structure. In Systems, we learn more about the world and its struggles. Truth is about elucidation towards a climax. Choice is the climax and end.
5.1 Belonging
Belonging is a strong theme in almost all of the characters, even the smaller ones. There’s a lot of interplay between family, and found family.
Esper is an orphan that was left to die, and that is his core struggle. During the novel he sees how siblings deal with their struggles, and how a father tries to fight for his son. Esper had none of this. He really wants family, and belonging, but it manifests as wanting control.
Klara wants to get closer to her husband’s family that is in power, yet keeps her own sister hidden from her own family.
Tenu just wants his own family to be together, and safe, but is too afraid to speak up.
Rulo and Saga, siblings who had to take on the world on their own each struggle with this in different directions. Saga wants freedom from her brother. And freedom to have a new life. Rulo is attached, suffering from anxious attachment. This is exacerbated by having lost his dog in an accident.
Mason provides for the citizens of the Trunks, having an orphanage, even though it might be done through coercive means.
For both Argent and Flora, they keep sentimental items on them at all times: a way to remember and hold on to someone that meant something to them.
It’s all about relationships and belonging: the desire to have a place feel like home. This all plays into the dichotomy of the setting. It is home, yet, within it is a monument aimed towards the exits. The temporary nature of the gridlock also emphasises the necessity to not become too attached to people or outcomes.
5.2 Systems
I’m an avid fan of complexity studies.
From wikipedia: “Systems that are "complex" have distinct properties that arise from these relationships, such as nonlinearity, emergence, spontaneous order, adaptation, and feedback loops, among others.”
Small things can often lead to wildly divergent outcomes. This theme plays into Esper’s belief and tendency to find small levers that can enact massive change. A simple trick is what set it all into motion. The city itself and its gridlock was formed due to emergent behaviour following a climate crisis and anomaly. That’s how the world works. It’s also what leads to the eventual climax: a small tax change leads to anger from Mason and allows Esper to go back.
During the Systems section in the novel, I have the voices from several citizens add different perspectives to emphasise the complexity of the city (this was really fun).
Finally, systems-as-a-theme, is also something that plays into all of the characters. Almost all of them had a hand in the whole event, and was due to their weaknesses as people. Examples:
- Modera doesn’t want her daughter to enter because she is afraid of re-experiencing the feeling of losing someone she loves.
- Flora could’ve chosen to share the truth before the Mason/Esper climax, but she wanted to be a protector due to her loss of identity.
- Esper wanted control, because he wants family.
- Palma could’ve chosen not to hack his parents, but he wanted to feel needed, and do that through helping others.
- Rulo didn’t inspect Flora’s mech because he was afraid of it.
- Saga didn’t recognize the tracking because she wanted to leave as much as she could.
- Tenu didn’t have the courage to stand up to his family.
It’s all connected and interdependent, which is why complex systems as a thematic framework also fits into metamodernism. It’s not mutually exclusive.
5.3 Truth
The whole novel is based on the protagonist’s questions. So, truth is a strong theme. Particularly, it’s about how the characters deal with new information. Modera, for example, the truths sets her free. For Flora, it creates a crisis. For Esper, he struggles with it, because it gives him the option to gain belonging. For Palma, truth tears him apart from his innocent past and his family. For Klara, it’s fragile, something that needs to be protected. For Saga, it’s the realisation that she made a mistake in her judgement.
It also plays into the uncertainty of the novel: the constant search for answers, which at the end is never given. Thus, it’s also a realisation of how truth can come to define us. For Flora, specifically, her identity is her search for truth, and that in itself scares her when she pummels into Sonny. That arc, with Sonny, is proof into how the search for the truth can derail us.
5.4 Choice
In most stories, choices are how we understand the characters and create what-if scenarios. In many ways, a great story sets up these choices such that it feels impactful, yet inevitable. The largest change from the March BETA draft was to go back to the characters and actually give them choices rather than having the world take them along. The latter is still a strong facet of Flora’s arc. The fact that she didn’t have choices. Yet, still within this framework, she has a choice: to change her perspective. Of all the characters, Flora is the most prominent in that she escapes the feeling of lost optionality when choosing. The concept of choice itself also played into metamodernism. Do we go with the flow of life, or do we slam against the box society has made for us? That in itself, ironically, is a choice. A choice to have choices. That paradox is resolved through a metamodernist framework: choose the grand narrative, even when it might be illusory.
A big theme of choices too in the novel is the trade-offs it represents for almost all the characters. Palma chooses himself at the cost of his friends being jailed. Saga chooses to go ahead with the hacking, to get money, and create freedom for herself at the risk of getting caught. Esper chooses belonging under the lie that’s about taking control from others. Klara goes ahead with her report on her own without familial consent. She also believes that self-sacrifice is sometimes necessary for collective good.
Perhaps the most unique interplay of the theme of choice is the gridlock itself. COST is a unique property rights regime that plays off private and public ownership to find a middle ground. You own a car, but it's always-on-sale. Is the trade-off meaningful, such that it creates funds for hope? Yes, but also creates unstable power dynamics if mismanaged.
6 The Ending
Ending the book on such an open-ended note is on purpose, and I know that people will either love it or hate it. Thus, the biggest struggle was making sure that the open ending felt impactful. I struggled with it a lot, especially in what happens to Flora during the final trial and what she chooses to do. For a long while, the final trial consisted of Flora running the race and then experiencing an epiphany during it, and then choosing to stop before the end. Then: panicking, Mother Mech (having some remote control over Flora’s mech), fires off Flora’s jets and launches her across the finish line. However, it did not feel impactful because even though Flora experiences an epiphany, and “chooses herself”, she still ends up ‘winning’ through no choice of her own. Regardless of what the epiphany is supposed to be, it just throws the character back to square one. “I chose myself and what I want, and yet I still don’t actually have control.”
Changing it to the stabiliser and Flora being aware of it was a stronger narrative since she then had to choose herself and only have access to her own strengths. It’s also more poignant because the acceptance comes off the back that because of her internal crisis, she didn’t practice enough.
It also inadvertently allowed Flora and Argent’s relationship to change such that Argent also completes her own ‘Heroine’s Journey’ and rejects Armin’s control over her. Argent’s loss allows her to reflect and reform her own identity without Armin that helped her get back on her feet. Their kiss goodbye represents both Flora and Argent’s choices to accept their spectres and be open to being vulnerable. Heroism doesn’t always entail being the stereotypical hero.
Thus: the ending is about “pursuing the horizon forever receding” and I hope that came across. The questions will remain questions. Accept it.
8 Characters
In the next article, I touch upon more details on how the main characters changed over time, but I just want to point out some of the goals I had in mind, and why. In many ways, the characters are parts of myself and I carry much of my own personal life experience into them.
8.1 Flora Kaigo
The protagonist. This article had already substantiated much of her arc and who she is. Dissatisfied with her reality, and curious to her own detriment. At some point Palma tells that she often does things without considering others, and that’s true. Her insular nature and the pursuit of her own mental sanity does cause others to get hurt in the process. Her final acceptance is her own reconciliation of her internal conflict. Self-aware hope. The pursuit of truth and answers, yet not having it control her.
8.2 Palma Emmer
Palma is very much attached to his family and their belief in public service. However, all of this unravels as he learns the truth over the course of the novel. He just wants to help, but discovers his own truth: that maybe he just wants to feel needed. He realises that in some sense, he is co-dependent, only feeling worthy if he helps others. Thus, his arc is about setting boundaries and helping for the right reasons. His story is about coming out of his shell, to finally transform into a proper adult that stands on his own two feet.
8.3 Esper
Esper did not have a good childhood and his entire desire manifests in a desire to understand and control his reality. But deep down, he just wants acceptance. A mother, a father, a sister, a brother, family. He is not very self-aware in how he can stumble over others. Esper’s desire to want family and his realisation of control and power is his undoing. He sees family in others, and sees how others control others. His arc is about realising that he was blinded by this and chooses to help and atone for his actions. He now has a new family to look after.
8.4 Rulo & Saga
Rulo & Saga’s story is one of the anxiety of attachment in relationship. In this case: siblings. Saga’s desire to leave is partly her desire to unwrap herself from her brother. Brilliant creative mind, but has a false belief that in going out alone, that she’ll find her freedom and happiness. Rulo is anxious, and his story is exacerbated by the loss of his dog. Rulo is goofy and light-hearted. Smarter than he looks. His arc of gathering courage is aided by growing closer to his sister after she finally leaves. It eventually allows him to let go of his own pain of his past in losing his dog, and help to fly his mech again. Saga, also a painter, learns to accept that the world she is heading towards isn’t all its chalked up to be. She realises that the mistakes she had made was because she simply wanted to peel away to independence. In the aftermath, the siblings, now living alone grows closer again and realise what they had.
8.5 Klara Emmer & Tenu Emmer
Klara is a strong-willed character that emphasises individual sacrifice for the public good. However, ethically, there are blurred lines in the way their family approaches it. To manipulate markets, and working hard, their own sacrifice for the perception that they are doing the right thing. Klara’s stubbornness and pursuit to protect the truth at all costs leads to her own undoing: making unnecessary enemies. Klara does, however, stays true to her creed and when it mattered, sacrificed herself to protect her family.
Tenu Emmer is a smart engineer that is unable to handle conflict. He hides behind his wife and his family, believing it’s the right thing to do. He doesn’t want to upset the apple cart and just wants his family to be fine and okay. He realises too late that because he was afraid to stand up for himself and what he believed in, that it caused unnecessary harm and chaos. He resolves to become more courageous and fight against his family.
8.6 Mason
Mason is a questionable anti-villain. He controls chunks of the Trunks, but through dubious power: demanding loyalty with violence. At first, seemingly villainous, but over time, as the apparent nature of the city reveals itself. The Trunks provide a home. However, his downfall is similar to his anti-thesis: Klara. Unwilling to bend, resulting in his break, and untimely end. Noble goals but misguided.
8.7 Modera Kaigo
Modera is the mother figure that comes to terms with the fact that her own fears and grief about losing her husband has caused her to not be the best mother she could be. She also realises that when she discovers the truth about River’s life and what her husband protected her from, that what she really needed was merely the truth. Despite these upsets, with both of her family members with-holding the truth from her, she pushes through in being a supportive pillar. Despite what happened, she still pushes through her coma towards recovery, signalling that a beacon of comfort and home will always exist. Her story is one where the hero isn’t necessarily the one on the frontlines. Without her support, the story would not have happened.
8.8 Argent Winslow
Argent is in grief about the loss of her pillar, Armin, the Hope Runner. She channels it into following him into the anomaly. In some sense, she lies to herself about why she wants to do it. Later, after getting closer to Flora and sharing their grief, she realises that Armin had too much control over her, even after he left and died. True strength does not always come from pushing through, but accepting one’s weaknesses.
9 Cover Design
Regarding themes and the cover design:
The sketch above was a design I drew after I finished the first draft of the novel. Flora, floating in the middle, with the rest of the cast looking to the side. Cars would stretch away like wings from a sunset.
In terms of themes, what I wanted to evoke from the cover is the feeling of superhero film aesthetics, but when digging deeper, seeing the strange: like the gridlock and Flora’s bracelet. After giving the excellent Dale Halvorsen creative freedom, he took that design along with a moodboard I gave him (on character design), he created the final cover.
Conclusion
I like metamodermism as a structure of feeling because it gives me a mental framework that does not involve having to throw out other mental frameworks. It’s a dialogue with oneself, and sometimes, just kicking back with a whiskey while the sun is setting, and thinking about shit is fun. Let’s change the world for the better, but let’s not get lost along the way.
Then again, it’s all just stories, so take it as serious as you want. :)
Next up: The Process & Learnings of Writing My Debut Novel.
