We regularly encounter appalling wrongdoing, with the media offering a depressing parade of violent assault, rape, and murder. Yet sometimes even the cynical and world-weary amongst us are taken aback. Sometimes we confront a crime so terrible, so horrendous, so deeply wrong, that we reach for the word evil. The 9/11 terrorist attacks were not merely wrong, but evil. A serial killer who tortures their victims is not merely a bad person. They are evil. And as the Holocaust showed us, we must remain vigilant against the threat of evil. But what exactly is it? If we use the word evil, are we buying into a naive Manichean worldview, in which two cosmic forces of good and evil are pitted against one another? Are we guilty of demonizing our enemies? How does evil go beyond what is merely bad or wrong?
This book explores the answers that philosophers have offered to these questions. Luke Russell discusses why some philosophers think that evil is a myth or a fantasy, while others think that evil is real. Along the way he asks whether evil is always horrific and incomprehensible, or if it can be banal. Considering if there is a special psychological hallmark that sets the evildoers apart from the rest of us, Russell also engages with ongoing discussions over psychopathy and empathy, analyzing the psychology behind evildoing.

James Cameron Stewart trained at Hull University and the Bristol Old Vic Theatre
School. Some theater highlights of his thirty-six-year career include Frank-n-Furter (The Rocky Horror Show), Thenadier (Les Miserables), the poet Philip Larkin in Larkin with Women (Best Actor nominee, MEN Awards 2005), and originating the part of Hamish in Sir Alan Ayckbourn's Things We Do for Love. In 2008 he published his grandfather's World War I memoirs and toured his one-man show based on them from 2008 to 2011. His television/film credits include Outlander, Jericho, Flying Blind, Golden Years, Emmerdale, London's Burning, Eastenders, Coronation Street,
Holby City, and Taggart. He often appears on Radio 4, and is a regular presenter on the weekly The Economist podcast.

James loves recording audiobooks and is delighted to have had the opportunity to narrate such a
variety of magnificent authors, from Seneca through Max Hastings and Antony Beevor, to
superlative fiction by J. M. Coetzee, Michael Dibdin, Stuart MacBride, and more.

James's upbringing alternated between the Home Counties and the Isle of Skye. In addition to
being an actor, he is a nutritional therapist, a keen sailor, and is at his happiest when flying his hot-air balloon.