Brexit, Trump, colonialism, Tommy Robinson, “incels”, identity politics: award-winning Guardian journalist Nesrine Malik’s new book stares into the heart of our current seething political volcano and gives it a cool hosing down.

Her overall point is that we have not been ambushed by some sort of unpleasant surprise or hit a random crisis speed bump. Instead, we are experiencing a “culmination” of longstanding factors shored up by enduring “toxic delusions” that are “rehashing… themes that are decades old”. Whether it is Brexiters and Trump harking back to some mythical time of national power, peace and plenty, far-right activists bellowing about their human right to offend being impinged or columnists representing university students’ desire for more racially diverse syllabuses as a form of spoilt bullying,