How to check if one of the following items is in a list?

I’m trying to find a short way to see if any of the following items is in a list, but my first attempt does not work. Besides writing a function to accomplish this, is the any short way to check if one of multiple items is in a list.

>>> a = [2,3,4]
>>> print (1 or 2) in a
False
>>> print (2 or 1) in a
True