A study of humanity, locked in a quarantined city and dying by the truckload. I have never been much for navel-gazing writers or literary pretensions, but Camus ducks all that with his stiletto-like writing and objectivity. He started out as a reporter, and frankly I like his journalism much more than his philosophical works (The Stranger, The Myth of Sisyphus and Other Essays). He was a brilliant writer, but his observations are better than his theorizing.
This is a story set sometime in the mid-20th century, we presume, in Oran, Algiers. The date doesn't matter. The book revolves around a doctor (who really is the hub of the book), a journalist and a priest. The story is about survival — what people are willing to risk, to lose, to fight for. There are no right choices, but plenty of wrong ones, and the characters are drawn with a simple clarity that belies the intensity of their situations. You are thrown into the midst of the plague city and left to wonder, "would I do that?" Written without sentiment or judgment, the book opens of the heart of a catastrophe to demonstrate the moral and ethical conundrum that is free will. I don't know why I ever read this, other than it has a very depressing title and I was a moody teen (certainly Mother did not recommend it, as she rarely recommended any male writers). I'm glad I did, as it aligned my personal perspective on the world with a higher order of perception. It also showed me what a truly gifted writer can do….I am not such a writer, so I love Camus all the more for it. If we were all hacks it would be a shallow, sterile world.
