Idiocy is all around us: whether it’s the uncle spouting conspiracy theories, the colleagues who repeat your point but louder, or the commuters who still can’t count two metres, our lives are beset by idiots. But what is the answer to this perpetual scourge?

Maxime Rovere is a philosopher who has dedicated his life to studying the ways we interact, and the Early Enlightenment. Here he turns his attention to the murkiest of intellectual corners. With warmth, wit and wisdom, he illuminates a new understanding of idiots, one which examines our relations to others and our own ego, offers tools and strategies to dismantle the most desperate of idiotic situations, and even reveals how to stop being the idiots ourselves (because we’re always someone else’s idiot).

Expertly translated by David Bellos, this is an erudite, enjoyable and much-needed solution to a most familiar vexation.