We are exhausted. We are overwhelmed. Worse, we are numb.

No matter what screen you’re getting your news and information from, the barrage is constant, horrific and always urgent: Gaza, Ukraine, Sudan, Congo, climate change, ecological devastation, economic collapse . . . and of course Donald Trump and all he represents.

Authoritarian leaders and genocidal regimes have always found numbness a desirable goal, as it narrows the possibilities for revolt. Shocked and awed into submission, we are at the mercy of tyrants, like captive animals in a zoo. What we see in zoo animals today may be a ghostly image of ourselves. In this lucid, trenchant book, Mark Abley explores the idea of numbness in today’s political context.