Written with Žižek’s customary brio and love of paradoxes and analogies in popular culture, this book explores the topsy-turvy world of life under lockdown, when the greatest act of love is to stay away from the object of your affection. Žižek argues that the massive interventions in the economy by many states and the revaluation of the kind of work that is being done by health workers and others on the frontline are developments that carry far-reaching consequences, pointing to the possibility of a new form of society emerging out of an unprecedented crisis in the heartlands of western capitalism. Erudite, provocative, and forthright, Pandemic! will be essential reading for everyone concerned and touched by the COVID-19 pandemic.