Avram Alpert is a fellow at The New Institute, Hamburg. He is the author of Global Origins of the Modern Self, from Montaigne to Suzuki (2019), A Partial Enlightenment: What Modern Literature and Buddhism Can Teach Us About Living Well Without Perfection (2021), and The Good-Enough Life (2022). He has also written cultural criticism for outlets including The New York Times, The Washington Post, Aeon, The Brooklyn Rail, and Truthout.