Tuesday, December 22, 2020

The Plague


Book: The Plague
Basic Information : Synopsis : Characters : Expectations : Thoughts : Evaluation : Book Group : New Words : Book References : Good Quotes : Table of Contents : References

Basic Information:

Author: Albert Camus

Edition: ePub on Libby from the Fresno County Public Library

Publisher: Vintage International

Start Date: December 12, 2020

Read Date: December 22, 2020

308 pages

Genre: Fiction, Philosophy

Language Warning: None

Rated Overall: 4 ½ out of 5


Religion: Christianit

Religious Quality:2 out of 5

Christianity-Teaching Quality: 2 out of 5


Fiction-Tells a good story: 4 out of 5

Fiction-Character development:4 out of 5

 

Updated Jan 3, 2021 with a link to Camus and absurdity


Synopsis (Caution: Spoiler Alert-Jump to Thoughts):

Dr Rieux sees that there are certain signs of an unknown disease. Rats are appearing and dying, cats and dogs disappear. And then his connoisseur gets sick and dies with symptoms much like the plague. Other doctors notice the same thing.


Eventually the city government takes action, and the regional government quarantine the city, shutting everybody in. Camus tracks several characters, some heroic, some common and some a bit unlawful. He tells their story through Dr Rieux’s eyes and a friend of his journal.


The plague overwhelms the current facilities as well as the staff. Staffing then gets conquered through volunteers. Camus talks about the various attitudes of people in the city as well as Rieux and his friends.


Finally plague recedes. Rieux is left to count what he has lost and understand his relationship in the city after the plague.



Cast of Characters:
  • Dr. Bernard Rieux-physician, about 35, medium build and height, driving force in discovering the plague in Oran. Also at the end, acknowledges himself to be the narrator of the story.
  • M. Micheal-concierge of building, one of the first to die of the plague
  • Mother Rieux-behind the scenes person, keeping house for the doctor
  • M. Othon-police magistrate, eventual dies from the plague
  • Raymond Rambert-journalist who lives in Paris and gets stuck in Oran, away from his love
  • Jean Tarrou-private means, newly come to Oran, the philosopher and Rieux right hand person during the plague. Dies from the plague
  • Father Paneloux-Catholic priest, Jesuit, militant in spirit. Dies from the plague.
  • Joseph Grand-town clerk, used to working up statistics and such. Though he still had most of the teeth in his lower jaw, all the upper ones were gone, with the result that when he smiled, raising his upper lip—the lower scarcely moved—his mouth looked like a small black hole let into his face. Also he had the walk of a shy young priest, sidling along walls and slipping mouselike into doorways, and he exuded a faint odor of smoke and basement rooms;
  • Cottard-a person with a dark background and had smuggler connections.
  • Richard-official in charge of medical. Not willing to take action
  • Prefect-In charge of the city
  • Castel-an older doctor who had seen the plague first hand. Rieux’s mentor in some ways.. Creates a serum to help fight the plague.

Expectations:

Recommendation: Dr Andrew Fiala, Osher series on Philosophy and the Pandemic

When: September 29, 2020

Date Became Aware of Book: Long time ago


Thoughts:

There are certain similarities between the fictional account in The Plague and our time of the 2020 pandemic. Our current pandemic is not the plague.

  • The officials for a long time waited until the spread was too late to stop. They did not want to alarm the populace. Seems familiar

  • Everybody knows that pestilences have a way of recurring in the world; yet somehow we find it hard to believe in ones that crash down on our heads from a blue sky. There have been as many plagues as wars in history; yet always plagues and wars take people equally by surprise.

  • Camus also notes we tend to underestimate the time which a plague will be with us.

  • A few cases, he told himself, don’t make an epidemic; they merely call for serious precautions. That is how we were in February.

  • commerce, too, had died of plague.

  • Their first reaction, for instance, was to abuse the authorities. We see this as well.

  • And while a good many people adapted themselves to confinement and carried on their humdrum lives as before, there were others who rebelled and whose one idea now was to break loose from the prison-house. And we have this today with people refusing to wear masks and taking violently to the streets to protest any restrictions.

  • Medicines and supplies, particularly the serum to innoculate, was in short supply. Sounds familiar with the amount of testing limited, along with protective gear, and the vaccine not going to be generally available for another six months once it was developed.

  • Medical professionals were operating in the dark at the start of the plague. Very similar to our time. We have tried things and they have not worked, but other things have worked.

  • We think the vaccine will stop the virus and then we will be free forever. As Camus notes, these things will hide and reappear, maybe as something else.

  • the only means of fighting a plague is—common decency. Something which we seem to be missing these days.

  • the future remained uncertain; history proved that epidemics have a way of recrudescing when least expected. The authorities, who had long been desirous. We have seen at least a second surge and maybe a third.

  • Christmas that year had none of its old-time associations; it smacked of hell rather than of heaven. Instead of warm family gatherings this year, it is remote contact. Still glad to see, but seems so far away.


One thing Camus does not go into is why was the city quarantine. Would this have made the inhabitants anymore reconciled to their state? Or if Rambert knew that if he was able to escape, he might give the plague to his lover?


I think Rambert was right about Rieux. He seemed to withdraw from any emotional state possible. He was an active observer. Active because he was engaged as a doctor and a friend to many. But you did not feel the emotion of character. I think that is what Camus was getting at with the absurd.


Interesting that Tarrou the philosopher is Rieux's most practical person. He is the one who knows how to get things done. I think Dr. Fiala of Fresno State would be most proud of him.


Nazi’s. When you read those who are much more knowledgeable about Camus, his writings, and particularly, The Plague, they will point to that The Plague really is about living under Nazi rule. It was only after rereading chapter 19 did I see the connection. That is Camus talks about the plague and the mistrust sown on the populace. You did not know who had it and could spread it.This turned into mistrust and withdrawing from everybody. Also the medical professionals were not very effective in eradicating the plague in this story. I would suspect that being under Nazi rule would have been very similar. But I suspect that the same could be said about any conquered people. Even the Algerian’s under French control.


In an Osher class I took, Dr. Andrew Fiala talked about Philosophy andthe Pandemic. In his fourth lecture, he went through 20th century existential writers. The Plague was the book he talked the most about. Some of the points he hit on were:

  • There are “collaborators” and people in denial àand a few “heroes” who try to help

  • Endurance, persistence, and truth

  • Ordinary people living decent lives of quiet compassion

  • Solidarity and Truth: working together to fight within modest limits

  • Sympathy = Rescuing the Victims

  • In 1942, Camus was stuck close to Le Chambon-sur-Lignon while he recovered from TB

  • In Le Chambon, André Trocméand others led a rescue effort for Jews during Vichy (Nazi) regime—saving 3,500 Jewish children

    • My note: it seems like André Trocméand was a lot closer to preaching a Christian gospel than the Father Paneloux sermons were in The Plague.

  • To the Nazi’s, Jews were rats and brown pests

  • Existentialist Hero: Truth, Duty, Sympathy


From the Boston Review: Camus explained that his allegory could be read in three ways: “It is at the same time a tale about an epidemic, a symbol of Nazi occupation (and incidentally the prefiguration of any totalitarian regime, no matter where), and, thirdly, the concrete illustration of a metaphysical problem, that of evil.”

 


Part I

1

The time is in the late 1940’s in an Algerian city called Oran. It is the second largest city in Algeria now and had about 200,000 people then. During the time of the book, it was a French colony. This is one of the places where the Allied forces landed and engaged German forces. Camus says the town is ugly and pretty much a pretty desolate place to live. Then Camus goes on and says Perhaps the easiest way of making a town’s acquaintance is to ascertain how the people in it work, how they love, and how they die. In this case, the narrator says that they work hard with the chief end to get rich. No other thing drives their lives. The town is by a nice bay, surrounded by hills and on a flat plain. But it is constructed where you really need to look for pleasure in any of these things rather than it being there for you.


2

Rieux finds a dead rat when leaving his home/office on the steps leading down to the street. He talks with the concierge about it who thinks the rat is there as a prank by young boys. But rats are the topic of conversation everywhere-they are dying and in large numbers. The dying rats increase in number quickly. Sanitation is making daily pickups of the rats. And then the rats suddenly disappeared. The concierge comes down sick and then dies.


The language he used was that of a man who was sick and tired of the world he lived in. Rieux goes on and says that he, like most people, wants to live in a world of truth without injustice. This is where Camus throws in the kind of person is the idea. Now does the doctor live up to this profession throughout the book?


3

Tarrou was a keeper of notebooks and kept them through the plague. We are introduced to his way of doing things.Cottard tries to commit suicide. Grand saves him.


One side comment, nothing important in the story. But just because I played the trombone. Someone said It’s hard on the lungs, blowing a trombone.


4

Rieux tries to get action to stop the plague. Rieux is at Grands place to meet the police about the suicide. Cottard does not want to see the police. More of Rieux’s patients were getting this strange fever and swelling. The local press, so lavish of news about the rats, now had nothing to say. For rats died in the street; men in their homes. Dark patches appeared on their legs and stomachs; sometimes a ganglion would stop suppurating, then suddenly swell again. Usually the sick man died, in a stench of corruption.


In a discussion with Castel, where Castel knows what they are dealing with. Yes, Castel,” he [Rieux] replied. “It’s hardly credible. But everything points to its being plague.” “Vanished’? What does that word really mean?” See the last sentence of the book.


5

Everybody knows that pestilences have a way of recurring in the world; yet somehow we find it hard to believe in ones that crash down on our heads from a blue sky. There have been as many plagues as wars in history; yet always plagues and wars take people equally by surprise. To go on with this, Camus notes that like wars, when a plague arrives, we say it cannot last long. Little do we know. He also notes that it is not people who need to be blamed, it is just the immodesty of thinking it will not happen to us.


Indeed, even after Dr. Rieux had admitted in his friend’s company that a handful of persons, scattered about the town, had without warning died of plague, the danger still remained fantastically.


Rieux notes that a person dead is a concept. A concept until you see a real dead person. Same way 50,000 dead is just a number until you see the dead lined up. Isn’t this what is happening in our hospitals now? They are used to having people die there. But not in mass. Now there is a form of PTSD going on in ICU.


Who was Procopius-a prominent late antique Byzantine scholar from Palaestina Prima From Wikipedia


A few cases, he told himself, don’t make an epidemic; they merely call for serious precautions. That is how we were in February.


6

After seeing the death totals provided by Grand, Rieux says perhaps we’d better make up our minds to call this disease by its name. That is the start of being able to tackle a problem. Conversions with and about Grand and Cottard. The best thought on Grand was He was one of those rare people, rare in our town as elsewhere, who have the courage of their good feelings. Isn’t this something towards the height of what can be said about anybody?


7

A meeting is convened in the Prefect’s office. The purpose was to impose measures about the outbreak which had not been named yet. Richard did not want to take anything which would raise an alarm. Rieux's statement was that it matters not what you call it, just know that in three days time, it can quadruple if measures are not taken.


8

After the meeting, small notices were posted around the city. Also a small news article appeared in the paper. It was hard to find in these notices any indication that the authorities were facing the situation squarely. The measures enjoined were far from Draconian and one had the feeling that many concessions had been made to a desire not to alarm the public. Some small changes in how things were done was stated.


Dialogue with Rieux and Grand about Cottard. The serum had not come. Rieux talks with Cottard.


The measures instituted were not enough. The outbreak was growing. The only hope was that the outbreak would die a natural death; it certainly wouldn’t be arrested by the measures the authorities had so far devised. The hospital wards and special care buildings were filling and new buildings were being requisitioned. Richard’s conclusion: the rats died of the plague and the fleas on them have found new victims: humans.


When Rieux meets with the Prefect, the Prefect says that they will have new orders. Rieux says to Castel that what is needed is new imagination. Isn’t this what we need in a crisis where the old solutions are not working?


The solution gets imposed on them from outside: Proclaim a state of plague stop close the town.



Part II

9

The city gates are closed and people are having to adapt. One of the most striking consequences of the closing of the gates was, in fact, this sudden deprivation befalling people who were completely unprepared for it. Such as Rieux’ wife was at the sanitarium for treatment. So he could not go and spend time with her. Rambert had just met a lover in Paris. Now he was being nagged by the question, would she be there for him. There were no special arrangements. Even letters were denied-how did the plague spread? Telegrams and telephone calls were allowed. Remember: no Internet in those days. Also even the telephone was highly restricted. Think about putting your words of love in a single twitter or less. Thus the first thing that plague brought to our town was exile. The narrator said that separated lovers took stock about what they had and what they were losing. In much of this, each person in the city needed to bear their burden alone.


It might indeed be said that the first effect of this brutal visitation was to compel our townspeople to act as if they had no feelings as individuals. But why would this happen? And to what effect?


They did not try to figure out how long, after all what use was that? They drifted through life rather than lived. And then they came to know the incorrigible sorrow of all prisoners and exiles, which is to live in company with a memory that serves no purpose. I think many of us have the following reaction in our current pandemic: Hostile to the past, impatient of the present, and cheated of the future, we were much like those whom men’s justice, or hatred, forces to live behind prison bars.


For at the precise moment when the residents of the town began to panic, their thoughts were wholly fixed on the person whom they longed to meet again. This is where love really shows through.


10

With the whole city under quarantine, all testified that commerce, too, had died of plague.


Most people were chiefly aware of what ruffled the normal tenor of their lives or affected their interests … Their first reaction, for instance, was to abuse the authorities.


Thus the bare statement that three hundred and two deaths had taken place in the third week of plague failed to strike their imagination. Just numbers until one of those happens to be close to you-a family member or friend.


People doing strange things. Cottard told Rieux some of them, concluding that Anyhow, we’ll all be nuts before long, unless I’m much mistaken.


Grand tells Rieux his life story. He got married. But then You get married, you go on loving a bit longer, you work. And you work so hard that it makes you forget to love. … Owing largely to fatigue, he gradually lost his grip of himself, had less and less to say, and failed to keep alive the feeling in his wife that she was loved.


Rambert came to talk with Rieux, wanting to find a way to leave the city. Rieux would not be able to help him. Even if Rieux could give a certificate, the authorities would not honor it. Rieux understands that it’s an absurd situation. Rambert’s response was, But I don’t belong here.” According to Wikipedia, this is the absurdity which Camus is trying to get us to see refers to the conflict between the human tendency to seek inherent value and meaning in life, and the human inability to find any in a purposeless, meaningless or chaotic and irrational universe. Rambert is stuck in the place where he does not belong and there is no way out. Later on Rambert has the opportunity to leave Oran and decides to stay? Why, because he found meaning in doing and helping Rieux.


When Rieux says that he understands Rambert’s situation, but cannot do anything, Rambert says You’re using the language of reason, not of the heart; you live in a world of abstractions. Was Rieux really living in abstractions? He gives this thought and wonders to since he has the reality of his patients. Of course, the patients he was trying to save was dying. What was reality then? This is one of the main things Camus wants us to think about.


So what is the public welfare? Rambert says that it is the sum of all of the individual private .welfares. But what does that really mean? What happens if there are conflicting private interests or that the interests do not line up?


When Rieux would diagnose a person with the Plague, he has the ambulance take them away. But no sooner was he gone than the family locked and barred their doors, preferring contact with the plague to a parting with their family member. One of those places where a person may not really believe that the plague is real. Rieux had nothing to look forward to but a long sequence of such scenes, renewed again and again.


At first, Rieux felt pity towards the families and patients. But as the weeks went by, he found that One grows out of pity when it’s useless. I wonder if pastors ever do?


Much more on abstraction in this chapter. I do not think I understand that part which Camus is trying to get across.


11

Where some saw abstraction others saw the truth. Enter Father Paneloux, a popular Catholic preacher. The ecclesiastical authorities in our town resolved to do battle against the plague with the weapons appropriate to them, and organized a Week of Prayer.


Who was St. Roch? a Catholic saint, a confessor whose death is commemorated on 16 August and 9 September in Italy; he is specially invoked against the plague.From Wikipedia


Apparently during this time, they did not realize anything about super-spreader events. Church was able to operate in full. On Sunday mornings, for instance, sea-bathing competes seriously with churchgoing but because everything else was off limits, people flocked to church. Also with the Father preaching, people were wanting to hear about how the plague related to spirituality.

In short, they were waiting for the turn of events. With regard to religion—as to many other problems—plague had induced in them a curious frame of mind, as remote from indifference as from fervor; the best name to give it, perhaps, might be “objectivity”.


Frankly, I do not follow the flow of the sermon as Camus put it down.


12

And while a good many people adapted themselves to confinement and carried on their humdrum lives as before, there were others who rebelled and whose one idea now was to break loose from the prison-house. After the Father’s sermon, and probably not because of it, there was tension in the air and on the streets about to explode with people who wanted to get out of the city. Summer temperatures were not helping the situation.


Grand and Rieux talked, particularly about a story Grand was writing about his wife who had left him. It was to be a love story.


13

Rambert continued to look for ways out of the city. He tried a variety of people. But he was what struck one most—the excellence of their intentions. But as regards plague their competence was practically nil. I guess we should not be too hard on our current President at the start because this was not one which a great many people had experience on. But he could have also listened to those who had some and worked with their experience.


As Rambert went through the various official lines of authority to get himself released, he realized that the really remarkable thing, and Rambert was greatly struck by this, was the way in which, in the very midst of catastrophe, offices could go on functioning serenely and take initiatives of no immediate relevance, and often unknown to the highest authority, purely and simply because they had been created originally for this purpose.


Also I would think that eventually Rambert would realize that it was not the city authorities who were in charge, but the state. It is them whom he should have appealed to, not that he had contact with them.


14

The death toll climbed to about 0.35% of the population each week was dying. This lead to every door was shut, nobody was to be seen, even the venetian blinds stayed down, and there was no knowing if it was the heat or the plague that they were trying to shut out. Clashes at the gates increased and the police were forced to defend with guns.


While with this pandemic, we think being outdoors in warm weather will mitigate the effects of the virus, Everyone realized with dismay that hot weather would favor the epidemic.


Life was turning gray as the plague progressed. Plague had killed all colors, vetoed pleasure. But isn’t this a function of where you find your pleasure? Earlier Camus noted that Oran lived for commerce. If this was true, then commerce would be dying.


Tarrou re-enters the picture and is a chronicler of events. An old man and his cats. Another man who is a patient of Rieux. The latter told Tarrou that God did not exist, since otherwise there would be no need for priests. But, from some observations which followed, Tarrou realized that the old fellow’s philosophy was closely involved with the irritation caused by the house-to-house collections in aid of charities. I wonder how universally true this is? Is it not God who does not exist, but our reactions to some of the things which happen around us?


Shortages now are evident about 90 days into the quarantine. If the epidemic spreads, morals too will broaden, and we may see again the saturnalia of Milan, men and women dancing round the graves. What is this? Saturnalia was an ancient Roman festival and holiday in honour of the god Saturn, held on 17 December of the Julian calendar and later expanded with festivities through to 25 December.(from Wikipedia). Is this the Christmas of the future which Camus (Dickens like) is holding out?


When a street evangelist calls out “God is great.” The crowds all make haste toward some trivial objective that seems of more immediate interest than God. We do not want to think about how the Creator plays in a situation. Once these people realized their instant peril, they gave their thoughts to pleasure.


15

They did not have enough serum to combat the plague. In addition, the batches were not equally effective. They could not inoculate the populace, only give it to those who had gotten sick. And then the plague morphed into a new form. Even when the local government took the proper steps, the medical professionals were operating in the dark to know what was effective.


Intelligent people like Tarrou were coming to the conclusion that the medical profession had about a month more where they could be effective. Tarrou suggested that a volunteer force be raised, not through official channels-Officialdom can never cope with something really catastrophic. Tarrou was proposing that volunteers would come from outside of those channels and be coordinated through people like him. Tarrou understood that this probably meant death to some of the volunteers.


Referring to the Father’s sermon where the Father thinks the plague is punishment for evil doing. Rieux answers a question from Tarrou saying, I’ve seen too much of hospitals to relish any idea of collective punishment. But, as you know, Christians sometimes say that sort of thing without really thinking it. They’re better than they seem. The benefit of the sermon is it gets people thinking. But what I am thinking is this: what secular people think, that Christians have good hearts, but does not put things very well? Rieux says that What’s true of all the evils in the world is true of plague as well. It helps men to rise above themselves.


Rieux says that it is easy to talk about death when you do not have to face it. The difference between a scholar like the Father and a country priest is the country priest is there at a person’s deathbed. The country priest tries to relieve suffering while the person removed talks about the benefits of suffering.


And then the question to those who do not believe like Rieux, Why do you yourself show such devotion, considering you don’t believe in God? This is the $64 question. Rieux looks at his role as fighting against creation. By this I am thinking of the defects he sees.


Another Camus word: abstract. Rieux feels he went into his profession without any real thought of what his profession entailed. But now it is facing death daily instead of going to victory. As far as if there is a God, he says: it’s something that a man of your sort can understand most likely, but, since the order of the world is shaped by death, mightn’t it be better for God if we refuse to believe in Him and struggle with all our might against death, without raising our eyes toward the heaven where He sits in silence?


Who taught you all this [wisdom about God and suffering and death], Doctor?” The reply came promptly: “Suffering.” I suppose that is the basis for most personal learning and growth. So why do we shy away from suffering? Because it hurts!


After being questioned by Tarrou, Rieux asks him why he wants to be involved? Tarrou says it is his code of morals. Which is? Comprehension. What does Camus mean by this?


16

Tarrou got right to work and was able to enroll a group of people to work, mostly helping with the sanitary procedures. The narrator is inclined to think that by attributing overimportance to praiseworthy actions one may, by implication, be paying indirect but potent homage to the worse side of human nature. I do not understand what Camus is saying. Is he saying that by praising noteworthy actions, we also are saying there are actions which are degraded? That we should not praise people? I can understand this in terms of humility-praise tends to destroy the humble. But that is not what Camus is saying. He then follows by saying The narrator does not share that view. The evil that is in the world always comes of ignorance, and good intentions may do as much harm as malevolence, if they lack understanding.


Camus’ world view is that people are more good than bad. But the real problem is that we tend to be more ignorant than knowledgeable and that is what we call vice. I think Camus is wrong about vice. He may be right about ignorance.


There is the view which says that we deserve this punishment, so we need to take it like mature people. But do nothing to abate the situation. I do not think that is a very moral or Christian view. It seems to me if that was what was needed, Jesus would not have come around healing people, but condemning them. Today we get a similar vein of people which says we should not do anything to abate the pandemic or the climate or man’s immorality as the punishment is from God. These folks have a limited view of God’s grace and goodness. They are saying that God placed them here on earth to have them suffer at best or just be a nuisance. Instead, it would seem that he places us here on earth to be emissaries of his goodness.


Grand becomes part of the Rieuz, Tarrou team to provide leadership. Discussion of Grand’s opening line to his book.


To Camus, it seemed like Grand was a hero. Why? Because he did what was needed, much of it was doing what he did to the best of his ability through the turmoil of the plague. That this narrative should include a “hero,” the narrator commends to his readers, with, to his thinking, perfect justice, this insignificant and obscure hero who had to his credit only a little goodness of heart and a seemingly absurd ideal


17

Rambert is still trying to leave the city. Runs into Cottard. Cottard behind the scenes was working with smugglers. Cottard introduces him to people who can help him.


Tarrou has asked the Father to join them. He has said yes. Rieux says that “Im glad to know he’s better than his sermon.” On the other hand, Tarrou was expecting him too because he thinks people are better than they appear.


This is the struggle which we currently have. Some do not feel that they should be inconvenienced by wearing a mask or that they have a duty to protect others. Camus has Cottard saying:You can’t make more stringent ones than those we have now.”

With Tarrou replying: “No. But every person in the town must apply them to himself


Cottard talks about his past as a smuggler and how he is wanted by the police.


St James Infirmary song


Rambert tells why he will not be joining Tarrou and Rieux: I know now that man is capable of great deeds. But if he isn’t capable of a great emotion, well, he leaves me cold. He notes that he was in the Spanish Civil War. I’ve seen enough of people who die for an idea. I don’t believe in heroism; I know it’s easy and I’ve learned it can be murderous. What interests me is living and dying for what one loves. Sort of explains why he wants to go to his lover. Rieux responds with nothing in the world would I try to dissuade you from what you’re going to do; it seems to me absolutely right and proper. However, there’s one thing I must tell you: there’s no question of heroism in all this. It’s a matter of common decency. That’s an idea which may make some people smile, but the only means of fighting a plague is—common decency. Is this what we are missing today, is common decency? When we are too busy fighting each other, we do not have enough left to help each other fight a small virus which is conquering us. And how do we do this? Rieux’s answer, is to do his job.And maybe that is how we start, each of us doing what we are called to do.


Raambert thinks about this and finds out that Rieux’s wife is in a sanitarium. Rambert volunteers.



Part III

18

Camus starts this part with by this time, mid-August, the plague had swallowed up everything and everyone. No longer were there individual destinies; only a collective destiny, made of plague and the emotions shared by all. Strongest of these emotions was the sense of exile and of deprivation, with all the crosscurrents of revolt and fear set up by these.


During the Summer months of heat, a wind came up with violent tendencies. Dust billowed and then settled everywhere. The plague now became democratized. It went from the highly compact, densely populated areas to everyone. Fires now seemed to be more than usual. People and communities within Oran were displaced.


Funerals were sped up and only a few people were allowed to attend, and usually not even to the burial. Families were outraged that the passing of their loved one was in isolated and they could not have time to grieve. During the time of plague such sentiments can’t be taken into account, and all was sacrificed to efficiency. Cemetery space ran out so they dug up previous inhabitants and cremated them.


if there was another rise in the death-rate, no organization, however efficient, could stand up to it; that men would die in heaps, and corpses rot in the street, whatever the authorities might do, and the town would see in public squares the dying embrace the living in the frenzies of an all too comprehensible hatred or some crazy hope.

Camus personalized an non-intelligent item: It was, above all, a shrewd, unflagging adversary; a skilled organizer, doing his work thoroughly and well. Sort of like calling it an enemy to out maneuver.

We have not had this so far in our pandemic. We still have active protests: The furious revolt of the first weeks had given place to a vast despondency, not to be taken for resignation, though it was none the less a sort of passive and provisional acquiescence.


Something to think about, even without the pandemic. It is too easy to slide into mindless routine. the habit of despair is worse than despair.


The plague had gradually killed off in all of us the faculty not of love only but even of friendship. I can only think how sad it is on both accounts. I wonder about the loss on both.



Part IV

19

Marking time and at the mercy of the plague. Exhaustion was being experienced by those who worked the hardest against the plague: it took the form of a strange indifference to everything.


Rambert ws put in charge of a quarantine station. Grand was weakening. It was to Grand which Rieux was able to talk to about his wife and her condition.


Rieux felt he no longer provided medical aid, only information. With exhaustion and only four hours of sleep each night, Rieux saw things as they are; that is to say, he sees them in the garish light of justice—hideous, witless justice.


The one person in Rieux’ orbit who seemed to not be exhausted and actually positive was Cottard.


Tarrou and Cottard would go out and let them be swept away with the crowd. For in public places, luxury and the lavish life, the frenzied orgies he[Cottard] had dreamed of without being able to procure them—these were now the quest of a whole populace. When you face death each day, do you look for pleasure?


You hear them saying,’ he told me, ‘ “After the plague I’ll do this or that.” … But what are they doing now? What am I doing now which will advance me? Those around me? Something which I can look back on and sy I did more than retreat into my hole?


I think this is the part where people say this is like the Nazi. Camus talks about the mistrust of your neighbor. In the case of the plague, each person may be giving you the plague. The mistrust is that your neighbor could be a hidden spy, a hidden Nazi sympathizer. So you end up trusting nobody. It comes to this: like all of us who have not yet died of plague he[Cottard] fully realizes that his freedom and his life may be snatched from him at any moment.


20

Rambert worked well in one of Tarrou’s squads. He thought that he might have caught the plague-false alarm. For the first time, he saw Rambert smile after being warned by the police through Rieux about associating with smugglers. Rieux when asked about the meaning, all he could say was you had better hurry up. Then this response: “If that’s so, why tell me to hurry up?” It was Rieux who now smiled. “Perhaps because I, too, would like to do my bit for happiness.” Aw, yes, We all would like to work for another’s happiness. Why? Because of the happiness it brings to ourselves.


When asked, did he believe in God? He says no. Then it was said You must go back to her. Or else—what would be left you? So true, if you do not have God in your life, then all which you have is human love. You had better cling to that.


Rambert is set to leave at midnight. He goes to tell Rieux. Tarrou guesses what is going to happen and he wishes him well. Rambert asks if he is sincere. Tarrou’s reply: At my age one’s got to be sincere. Lying’s too much effort. Tying should be an effort no matter what age.


Are masks of any use? Opening one of these, he took from a sterilizer two masks of cottonwool enclosed in muslin, handed one to Rambert, and told him to put it on. The journalist asked if it was really any use. Tarrou said no, but it inspired confidence in others. I think in our current time if we found that masks did not have use, there would be rioting in the streets and permanent disbelief in what scientists say.


Rambert went to tell Rieux that he would not be going after all. Why? Rambert said he’d thought it over very carefully, and his views hadn’t changed, but if he went away, he would feel ashamed of himself, and that would embarrass his relations with the woman he loved. Rieux did not agree and asked why the change? Certainly,” Rambert replied. “But it may be shameful to be happy by oneself.


Rambert notes that nothing in the world is it worth turning one’s back on what one loves. Yet that is what I’m doing, though why I do not know. He now feels part of the team, part of the effort and does not know why he is turning his back on happiness and love. Maybe there is something higher than happiness and love? I go back a few chapters where Rieux says it is duty. I do not know if that is the answer.


21

A homemade serum is created by Castel. Othon’s little son comes down with the plague. Not only does the son have it, but the whole family needs to be quarantined apart from each other. Rieux felt guilty about this. Othon replied that there was one rule for all alike, and it was only proper to abide by it.


The serum has a violent reaction with the boy. The description of the boy’s struggle is gripping, along with the agony the doctors had when they could only watch. And then the boy dies.


Rieux and the Father have a dialogue. Rieux says that But weariness is a kind of madness. And there are times when the only feeling I have is one of mad revolt. The Father gives a response that there are some things which pass our understanding. Rieux responds with he refuses to acknowledge a love which allows children to be tortured.The Father thinks and says I now realize what grace means. They dialogue some more-a good dialogue. The Father says that they are both working for man’s salvation. Rieux goes on and says What I hate is death and disease, as you well know. And whether you wish it or not, we’re allies, facing them and fighting them together.” Rieux was still holding Paneloux’s hand. “So you see”—but he refrained from meeting the priest’s eyes—“God Himself can’t part us now.”


22

Father Paneloux preaches his second sermon on “Is a Priest Justified in Consulting a Doctor?” Seems like a really weak subject. And actual other items in this chapter seems really weak concerning religion. Last chapter was a lot stronger. When the Father preached, it was not very full. Camus says that superstition had usurped the place of religion in the life of our town, and that is why the church in which Peneloux preached his sermon was only three-quarters full.


The sermon matched the sermon title. It spoke to me as one who said what they thought a sermon should be, not an actual sermon. In one part, he has Father Paneloux saying That religion in a time of plague could not be the religion of every day. I think that Grand’s example is the example of both everyday and of time in the plague-he kept on plugging along, doing his job the best he could. Eventually he talks about how 77 out of the 81 monks at the Mercy Monastery of Marseille died during the Black Plague (this incident I could not find), three ran away and one was left alive. The Father said My brothers, each one of us must be the one who stays. Bishop Belzunce was said to be attacked because of shutting himself up. But Wikipedia says that he was given high honors for trying to help. the love of God is a hard love. It demands total self-surrender. Not sure what this means in the context of the plague.


When Rieux and Tarrou talked about the sermon, Tarrou said that he heard of a priest who lost his faith during the war when he saw a young soldier’s eyes blown out. He went on to say When an innocent youth can have his eyes destroyed, a Christian should either lose his faith or consent to having his eyes destroyed. Paneloux declines to lose his faith, and he will go through with it to the end. That’s what he meant to say.


St. Odilia’s prophecies


Father Paneloux gets the plague. Rieux offers to stay with him. But the Father replies priests can have no friends. They have given their all to God. He is taken to the hospital.


23

All Souls Day came and the cemeteries could not be visited. The number of deaths had leveled off instead of increasing. The Castel’s serum seemed to be doing some good work. While not dissenting, the old doctor reminded him that the future remained uncertain; history proved that epidemics have a way of recrudescing when least expected. The authorities, who had long been desirous.


Profiteers were taking a hand and purveying at enormous prices essential foodstuffs not available in the shops. The result was that poor families were in great straits, while the rich went short of practically nothing. Thus, whereas plague by its impartial ministrations should have promoted equality among our townsfolk, it now had the opposite effect and, thanks to the habitual conflict of cupidities, exacerbated the sense of injustice rankling in men’s hearts. The disproportionate effects of wealth makes itself felt during times of stress. We have seen this. Those who are in economic straits tend to work in “essential” jobs, being exposed more to the virus, while having a harder time caring for their families.Camus pictures protests happening, which we now have in the name of racial disparities in the administration of justice.


They visit, along with the smuggler, a stadium which had been turned into a quarantine center. In places like this, resentment and distrust featured. One had, indeed, a feeling that suspicion was falling, dewlike, from the grayly shining sky over the brickred camp. You would think that they would be thinking constantly about a loved one lost or separated from. But Camus points out that is not possible. There are flies and torments. There is self-pity. There is others around you.


They met with Othon, the police person whose son died.


24

One night Tarrou and Rieux visited his asthma patient. They went on up to a terrace on top of the building and enjoyed the evening. Tarrou told Rieux about himself. How he worked to bring a more peaceful world, particularly removing capital punishment. He feels that since he is part of society, he is also part of the plague of murder. He says that all our troubles spring from our failure to use plain, clear-cut language.


How do you to follow for attaining peace. “Yes,” he replied. “The path of sympathy.” How do you do this? And sympathy to what and who? Do you feel sympathy to the person who was shot? Ot the shooter who felt he had no choice? Tarrou’s thoughts is that he wants to learn how to become a saint. But it seems like Tarrou backtracks from this. When they hear a ruckus in the distance and then it subsides, Tarrou notes that these things are never over, and there would be more victims, because that was in the order of things. I feel more fellowship with the defeated than with saints. Heroism and sanctity don’t really appeal to me, I imagine. What interests me is being a man.” How do you do this? Pilate said about Jesus, Behold the man. And that may be the only way.


Tarrou wants to do one more thing that night, go for a swim with Rieux, something forbidden, but they have passes. Tarrou notes that a man should fight for the victims, but if he ceases caring for anything outside that, what’s the use of his fighting?


25

The plague continued on in December. This left for Oran the only thing for us to do was to go on waiting, and since after a too long waiting one gives up waiting, the whole town lived as if it had no future. This is what despair looks like. When you get beaten down long enough, hope leaves. I do not think we have gotten that for yet. But if the vaccine does not work out, we will get that way. And to go with the Nazi undercurrent, despair happens when there is no relief which can be hoped for.


Rieux found that his patients were fighting more to stay alive rather than being resigned to death.


Unexpected Othon volunteers to go on leave from the police and work as a volunteer in the camp where he had been quarantined.


Each person had a different take on Christmas But in general, Christmas that year had none of its old-time associations; it smacked of hell rather than of heaven. There was no room in their hearts for any Christmas joy.


Grand is missing. When found, he is looking at shop windows, crying. that a loveless world is a dead world … there comes an hour when one is weary of prisons, of one’s work, and of devotion to duty, and all one craves for is a loved face, the warmth and wonder of a loving heart. But Grand has caught the plague. He has Rieux burn the manuscript, but then makes a recovery.


As a sign for better things, the rats were back.



Part V

26

The rampage of the plague had abated some. But the townsfolk were in no hurry to jubilate. While intensifying their desire to be set free, the terrible months they had lived through had taught them prudence, … I wonder what we have learned through this past year? Have we learned prudence? Or has our impatience been exposed? Will life go on as before? Or have we been scarred? What are the values which we now hold onto better?


One lesson which Oran learned was that destruction is an easier, speedier process than reconstruction


The plague receded significantly. But it got Othon. Castel’s serum started working where before it did not.


27

The plague continued to decline, much to the relief of everybody,except Cottard. The epidemic was declared over and the gates would open in two weeks. Two men walk out of Cottard’s stairway wanting Cottard who runs off. ... Tarrou’s diary ends—he noted that there is always a certain hour of the day and of the night when a man’s courage is at its lowest ebb, and it was that hour only that he feared.


28

No man can live on the stretch all the time, with his energy and will-power strained to the breaking-point, and it is a joy to be able to relax at last and loosen nerves and muscles that were braced for the struggle. This has got to be how the front-line personnel feel. First when will this ever end, and then I can relax and enjoy the quiet comforts now.


Tarrou has the plague. Rieux decides that he will keep Tarrou instead of sending him off to isolation. Rieux and his mother were there to comfort and take care of Tarrou as much as they could. But Tarrou lost the battle and died. The doctor could not tell if Tarrou had found peace, now that all was over, but for himself he had a feeling that no peace was possible to him henceforth, any more than there can be an armistice for a mother bereaved of her son or for a man who buries his friend.


he knew, too, that to love someone means relatively little; or, rather, that love is never strong enough to find the words befitting it


Rieux realized that there is sterility in a life if we do not have illusions. That illusion of hope.


Many things to ponder in the concluding paragraphs.


Rieux gets a telegram that his wife died.


29

The gates opened and the celebrations began. Camus’ words do strike one, more than my recapturing them.


Rambert had some anxiety about himself. Would be the same person as when his love last saw him? But that, he knew, was out of the question now; he had changed too greatly. Their reunion was subtle and melted into the comfort of each other. Many couples, indeed, and many families, looked like people out for a casual stroll, no more than that; in reality most of them were making sentimental pilgrimages to places where they had gone to school with suffering.


There is a mixture of receptions for those coming into the city. For some they were able to Nestling to one another, they went to their homes, blind to the outside world and seemingly triumphant over the plague, forgetting every sadness and the plight of those who had come by the same train and found no one awaiting them, and were bracing themselves to hear in their homes a confirmation of the fear that the long silence had already implanted in their hearts. The joy of reuniting was Far more effectively than the bands playing in the squares they vouched for the vast joy of liberation.


Rieux still had sick people who were dependent on him. So it was not a day off for him.


Most of them [the townspeople] had longed intensely for an absent one, for the warmth of a body, for love, or merely for a life that habit had endeared. Some, often without knowing it, suffered from being deprived of the company of friends and from their inability to get in touch with them through the usual channels of friendship—letters, trains, and boats.


The narrator notes that most of the townspeople wanted something and that something for want of a better name, they sometimes called it peace. Rieux realizes that all we need consider is the answer given to men’s hope.


Then, again, those were happy who had not suffered a twofold separation, like some of us who, in the days before the epidemic, had failed to build their love on a solid basis at the outset, and had spent years blindly groping for the pact, so slow and hard to come by, that in the long run binds together ill-assorted lovers. Such people had had, like Rieux himself, the rashness of counting overmuch on time; and now they were parted forever. I think what Camus is saying is very similar to what St Paul meant by don’t let the sun go down on your anger. Do not let any separation between those whom you love be because of neglect or anger. When you are physically distant, make sure you still remain close to your person. And when you are physically close, do not waste those moments. You never know when it is too late.


30

Rieux reveals he is the narrator to the story. Not really a surprise. He evidently was influenced by Tarrou as he tried to take the victim’s side when presenting the story. But as talked about before, who is the victim? He tried to bring out in his fellow townspeople only certitudes they had in common—love, exile, and suffering.


While a lonely occupation as he did not share much, he also realized that sorrow is so often lonely.


The one man who remained a mystery in this narrative was Cottard. When Rieux came to visit him, Cottard was in a shootout with the police. Cottard gets captured and beaten. Rieux thinks Perhaps it was more painful to think of a guilty man than of a dead man.


Rieux goes on and visits his astmatic patient. In talking with him, the patient says But what does that mean—‘plague’? Just life, no more than that. I am not understanding this statement. Does the patient mean that all of life is a plague, without it we are not really living? Or does he mean that if we live we will always have hardship and things which will invade our lives? I do not know.


It seemed like to Rieux that in celebrating the plague’s end, they were forgetting those whom they lost. Even though there was talk of a memorial, Rieux was only hearing the shouts of victory, not of loss. So this chronicle is Rieux’ memorial of the injustice and outrage done them might endure; and to state quite simply what we learn in time of pestilence: that there are more things to admire in men than to despise. And that is just it. What is man? Someone who rises up? Or someone who hides in the shadows? During this pandemic, I feel much more like I hid in the shadows. He wants this chronicle to be a record of what had had to be done, and what assuredly would have to be done again in the never ending fight against terror and its relentless onslaughts, despite their personal afflictions, by all who, while unable to be saints but refusing to bow down to pestilences, strive their utmost to be healers.


He ends the book by saying that He knew what those jubilant crowds did not know, but could have learned from books: that the plague bacillus never dies or disappears for good; that it can lie dormant for years and years in furniture and linen-closets; that it bides its time in bedrooms, cellars, trunks, and bookshelves; and that perhaps the day would come when, for the bane and the enlightening of men, it would rouse up its rats again and send forth to die in a happy city.



Evaluation:

Confession: I do not think I got all the subtleties which Camus presented in this book. Also I suspect if we were not in the middle of the 2020 Pandemic would I have been as interested in this book. But having said those items, Camus really laid out the various responses to our current pandemic would be.


As you can tell, this book is a timely read this year. Camus' story is not the exciting modern day stories, driven by the unexpected. Instead we are led through the ordinary lives of people who are living through the plague and how their lives intertwine with each other and how most of them make a difference in how people are treated. He views there is more good than bad in people and that the good needs an intelligent release.


And then he talks about two a words which is where I think I really lose him: absurd and abstract. I think this is the main parts of what Camus wants to bring out. Abstraction is lost on me completely. The absurd is that the people in the story are put into a predicament of hopelessness-many of Camus’ characters die while trying to help. But our natural inclination is to save one self. Where Camus raises, what makes a saint? What makes a hero?


I count at least 13 different points Camus makes about the plague which are directly related to our Pandemic. Hence the timeliness of reading this book-I do not think he wrote it as a Plague handbook. Still there is a lot we can learn on how to act in our current Pandemic.


 
Notes from my book group:



Why did Camus choose Oran, Algeria as the backdrop for his story?


Were there any Algerians in his story?


Did you see places in the plague Camus describes and the Pandemic of 2020-2021?


Many commentators note that Camus has in mind the time France was under Nazi occupation. Where and how do you see that Camus is talking about the Nazi’s in this book?


Camus is known for that life is absurd. How does he bring that out in this story? What does Camus mean when he talks about absurdity?


Also Camus has Rieux talking about abstraction. What does this mean? How does Rieux exhibit it?


Camus says that most people want to live in a world of trust without injustice. What would this world look like? Has anyplace in any time achieved this? Why can we not achieve it? Is there something intrinsic in our systems which prevents it? Or in humans themselves?


Rieux and Castel both think the plague will not vanish. Why do they think this? Is this true of the virus we know about? Does it vanish? In what ways is Camus making this similar to the Nazi’s? What is Camus trying to warn us of?


We have had over 346,000 Americans die due to COVID-19 as of Jan 1, 2021. When you hear this number, what do you think? Camus says that when we deal with such large numbers, it is just a concept, it is only when we see a dead person or able to visualize a number does it become real. Why is this so? How would you make the number 346,000 American’s dead become real? Camus notes that it is easier to talk about death as one who studies rather than a country priest who is with a person when they die. How does this fit into Camus’ thoughts on abstraction?


Camus says about Grand that He was one of those rare people, rare in our town as elsewhere, who have the courage of their good feelings. Explain this sentence? Why is this condition rare?


Why does Rieux say that the failing of the Prefect’s attack on the plague is a failure of imagination? What would an imaginative solution look like in Oran? What imaginative solutions would you like to see attack the COVID-19 virus?


the first thing that plague brought to our town was exile. Why the need for isolation? How did the sense of isolation grow from being cut off from the outside world to being cut off from one’s neighbors? How does isolation lead to a sense of detachment from other humans? What consequences does Camus examine?


As the plague goes on, Rieux says that he has outgrown pity. Is this a reasonable progression? Do we see this in our current environment?


What is the public welfare? How does Rieux define this? Is this how you would talk about public welfare? Also the common good. How does Rieux define that? Do you think this is a high enough definition?


Did either of Father Paneloux’s sermons bring truth or comfort to the city? Why were they preached? Why did Camus present them the way he did?


When Tarrou is asked why he is involved in the fight against the plague, he replies Comprehension. What does Tarrou mean by this? How does this fit into Camus’ broader view of the world?


The narrator is inclined to think that by attributing overimportance to praiseworthy actions one may, by implication, be paying indirect but potent homage to the worse side of human nature. Is he saying that by praising noteworthy actions, we also are saying there are actions which are degraded? That we should not praise people?


He also says The narrator does not share that view. The evil that is in the world always comes of ignorance, and good intentions may do as much harm as malevolence, if they lack understanding. Is this the source of evil/bad deeds in Camus’ view? How does Camus view people in their relationship to good and evil?


Grand is writing a book about his love. Why does Camus include it in this story? How does Camus view this effort? Is it essential to Camus’ message of the book?


Explain what Rieux means by common decency? Why is this essential to Rieux’s being? How does Rieux fulfill this civic requirement? How can we talk about common decency today?


Throughout the story, Camus personalizes the plague, such as regrouping for battle.Does he do this? Does the plague, or our current COVID-19 virus have intelligence to form battle? How come do we humans want to personalize things which do not have intelligence?


In Camus’ time, people were protesting and fighting the restrictions, as we do today? Why was there this dis-unity of concern with the plague (or virus)? Is there any way to rally people towards a common cause?


One of the more striking sentences in this book is: The plague had gradually killed off in all of us the faculty not of love only but even of friendship. How did this happen?


During a pandemic facing the possibility of death each day, where do your thoughts turn to? Religion? Numbness? Pleasure? … Why this response?


Rambert sought happiness. When the happiness of not being with his lover was lost, what was left for him to turn to? What did he have to fulfill his life?


Talk about Tarrou’s statement: a man should fight for the victims, but if he ceases caring for anything outside that, what’s the use of his fighting? Who is a victim?


Cottard is the most mysterious character in the book. How did his activities shape his outlook on a situation? Why was he trying to hang himself? Why did he prefer to die than to live after the plague receded? What was his motivation for being involved with smuggling?


Why did Camus have Tarrou die? Was there anything left for Tarrou to accomplish?


In the last chapter, Rieux’s asthmatic patient says: But what does that mean—‘plague’? Just life, no more than that. What does this mean?


Camus ends the book with the plague will be around again. How come Camus says this? What does that say about our current pandemic? What emotions does this raise in you?


After reading this book, what thoughts did you have about our current pandemic?


Many of these questions are either from or adapted from LitLovers.

  • Why the title of The Plague?
  • Did the ending seem fitting? Satisfying? Predictable?
  • Which character was the most convincing? Least?
    • Which character did you identify with?
    • Which one did you dislike?
  • Every story has a world view. Were you able to identify this story’s world view? What was it? How did it affect the story?
  • In what context was religion talked about in this book?
    • Was there anybody you would consider religious?
    • How did they show it?
    • Was the book overtly religious?
    • How did it affect the book's story?
  • Why do you think the author wrote this book?
  • What would you ask the author if you had a chance?
  • What “takeaways” did you have from this book?
  • What central ideas does the author present?
    • Are they personal, sociological, global, political, economic, spiritual, medical, or scientific
    • What evidence does the author use to support the book's ideas?
    • Is the evidence convincing...definitive or...speculative?
    • Does the author depend on personal opinion, observation, and assessment? Or is the evidence factual—based on science, statistics, historical documents, or quotations from (credible) experts?
    • What implications for you, our nation or the world do these ideas have?
    • Are these idea’s controversial?
      • To whom and why?
  • How did this book affect your view of the world?
    • Of how God is viewed?
    • What questions did you ask yourself after reading this book?
  • Talk about specific passages that struck you as significant—or interesting, profound, amusing, illuminating, disturbing, sad...?
    • What was memorable?





New Words:
  • Ganglia (2): an abnormal benign swelling on a tendon sheath.
  • Felo-de-se (4): suicide.
  • peremptorily (4): leaving no opportunity for denial or refusal; imperative:
  • suppurate (4):  undergo the formation of pus; fester.
  • Sibilance (5): a literary device where strongly stressed consonants are created deliberately by producing air from vocal tracts through the use of lips and tongue. Such consonants produce hissing sounds. However, in poetry, it is used as a stylistic device, and sibilants are used more than twice in quick succession.
  • Buboes (8):  a symptom of bubonic plague, and occur as painful swellings in the thighs, neck, groin or armpits
  • Recrudescence (11): the recurrence of an undesirable condition.
  • Exordium (11):  the beginning or introductory part, especially of a discourse or treatise.
  • Balustrade (14): a railing supported by balusters, especially an ornamental parapet on a balcony, bridge, or terrace.
  • Sibilants (16): See sibilance (5)
  • Tocsin (18): an alarm bell or signal.
  • Mooted (18): raise (a question or topic) for discussion; suggest (an idea or possibility)
  • Sordes (21): the crusts that collect on the teeth and lips in debilitating diseases with protracted low fever.
  • Harangue (24): a lengthy and aggressive speech.
  • loquacity (24): the quality of talking a great deal; talkativeness.
  • pestiferous (24): harboring infection and disease

Book References:
  • Golden Legend by  Jacobus de Voragine

Good Quotes:
  • First Line: The unusual events described in this chronicle occurred in 194_ at Oran.
  • Last Line: He knew what those jubilant crowds did not know, but could have learned from books: that the plague bacillus never dies or disappears for good; that it can lie dormant for years and years in furniture and linen-closets; that it bides its time in bedrooms, cellars, trunks, and bookshelves; and that perhaps the day would come when, for the bane and the enlightening of men, it would rouse up its rats again and send forth to die in a happy city.
  • Perhaps the easiest way of making a town’s acquaintance is to ascertain how the people in it work, how they love, and how they die. Chp 1
  • Everybody knows that pestilences have a way of recurring in the world; yet somehow we find it hard to believe in ones that crash down on our heads from a blue sky. There have been as many plagues as wars in history; yet always plagues and wars take people equally by surprise. Chp 5
  • Officialdom can never cope with something really catastrophic. Chp 15
  • What’s true of all the evils in the world is true of plague as well. It helps men to rise above themselves. Chp 15
  • the only means of fighting a plague is—common decency. Chp 17
  • the habit of despair is worse than despair. Chp 18
  •  all our troubles spring from our failure to use plain, clear-cut language. Chp 24
  • a loveless world is a dead world … there comes an hour when one is weary of prisons, of one’s work, and of devotion to duty, and all one craves for is a loved face, the warmth and wonder of a loving heart. Chp 25
  • destruction is an easier, speedier process than reconstruction. Chp 26
  • No man can live on the stretch all the time, with his energy and will-power strained to the breaking-point, and it is a joy to be able to relax at last and loosen nerves and muscles that were braced for the struggle. Chp 28
  • to love someone means relatively little; or, rather, that love is never strong enough to find the words befitting it. Chp 28
Table of Contents:
  • Part I
  • Part II
  • Part III
  • Part IV
  • Part V

References:
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