The pandemic brought out a key contradiction at the heart of human nature.Different living arrangements meant that those stuck on their own during lockdowns felt a profound sense of isolation, while those who were living with family lost any sense of personal space and independence. Neither arrangement was ideal – humans are social beings who at the same time crave independence and freedom.

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Modern life has meant many of us inhabiting big cities are increasingly living away from our families and the communities we might have grown up in. Some see this as a sign of liberation - a conscious, free choice many of us have made, rejecting a more traditional lifestyle that involves intergenerational cohabitation, or at the very least living and working in the town we grew up in. At the same time, mental health practitioners are documenting an increase in phenomena like anxiety and depression, and the suggestion is that this might be linked to a sense of social isolation. So, what is to be done by this realisation? In a debate last month at HowTheLightGetsIn festival in London, the novelist and essayist Jane Teller, the Booker Prize nominee Sophie Ward, and psychiatrist Stephen Priebe disagreed over whether the sense of isolation in modern city life is a conscious choice on our part and a worthy price to pay for our independence, or whether we have involuntarily lost something necessary for human happiness in leaving behind us more communal forms of life.