Thoughts and References on The Plague by Albert Camus

Alain de Botton provides us with a timely review of The Plague, an existentialist classic by Albert Camus.

If you're interested in Camus, but reading The Plague might be a bit much at this point, try The Myth of Sisyphus or The Rebel.

If you don't have the NYT, then you can read up on The Plague on Wikipedia for free.

As I recall, when I read The Plague back in college, I thought it was mostly a metaphorical tale about the Nazi occupation of Europe.

In his NYT review, de Botton offers an expanded interpretation:

"""
He [Camus] was drawn to his theme because he believed that the actual historical incidents we call plagues are merely concentrations of a universal precondition, dramatic instances of a perpetual rule: that all human beings are vulnerable to being randomly exterminated at any time, by a virus, an accident or the actions of our fellow man.
...
For Camus, when it comes to dying, there is no progress in history, there is no escape from our frailty. Being alive always was and will always remain an emergency; it is truly an inescapable “underlying condition.” Plague or no plague, there is always, as it were, the plague, if what we mean by that is a susceptibility to sudden death, an event that can render our lives instantaneously meaningless. 

... 

This is what Camus meant when he talked about the “absurdity” of life.
"""

From de Botton's perspective, death is inescapable. So, along with Camus and others, he believes that this makes life meaningless and absurd.

On the other hand, I've read other philosophers who warn that if we somehow find a technological solution to death, that too will make life meaningless and absurd.

Personally, I'm starting to think that the Philosophy department wants to believe that life is meaningless and absurd since that would make their writing more profound and, pardoxically, meaningful.

In any case, I really enjoyed reading Camus back in college. And, I may give him another read even though I don't fully buy into the philosophical subtext (i.e. I do happen to think that life is meaningful and not too absurd).

References

----------------------------
de Botton, Alain


Camus on the Coronavirus
He reminds us that suffering is random, and that is the kindest thing one can say about it.

By Alain de Botton
Mr. de Botton is a writer and philosopher.

March 19, 2020

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/19/opinion/coronavirus-camus-plague.html


----------------------------
School of Life


The Plague by Albert Camus
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vSYPwX4NPg4


---------------------------
Wikipedia

The Myth of Sisyphus by Albert Camus
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Myth_of_Sisyphus

---
The Plague
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Plague

The Plague (French: La Peste) is a novel by Albert Camus, published in 1947, that tells the story of a plague sweeping the French Algerian city of Oran. It asks a number of questions relating to the nature of destiny and the human condition. The characters in the book, ranging from doctors to vacationers to fugitives, all help to show the effects the plague has on a populace.

The novel is believed to be based on the cholera epidemic that killed a large percentage of Oran's population in 1849 following French colonization, but the novel is placed in the 1940s.[1] Oran and its environs were struck by disease multiple times before Camus published this novel. According to a research report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Oran was decimated by the plague in 1556 and 1678, but all later outbreaks, in 1921 (185 cases), 1931 (76 cases), and 1944 (95 cases), were very far from the scale of the epidemic described in the novel.

The Plague is considered an existentialist classic despite Camus' objection to the label.[2][3] The narrative tone is similar to Kafka's, especially in The Trial whose individual sentences potentially have multiple meanings, the material often pointedly resonating as stark allegory of phenomenal consciousness and the human condition.

---
The Rebel by Albert Camus
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rebel_(book)