Camus's The Plague: Philosophical Perspectives (OXFORD STUDIES IN PHIL AND LIT SERIES)

La Peste (in English The Plague ), originally published in 1947 by the Nobel Prize-winning writer Albert Camus, chronicles the progression of deadly bubonic plague as it spreads through the quarantined Algerian city of Oran. While most discussions of fictional examples within aesthetics are either historical or hypothetical, Camus offers an example of “pestilence fiction.” Camus chose fiction to convey facts--about plagues in the past, his own bout with tuberculosis at age seventeen, living under quarantine away from home for several years, and forced separation from his wife who remained in Algiers while he was abroad in Nazi-occupied France. His own lived experiences undergird an imaginative account of shared human realities with which we can identify: vulnerability to the disease, isolation, fear, and finally humanitarianism. The Plague teaches us to neither covet nor expect what we so casually took for granted. This collection of original essays on philosophical themes in The Plague is of special relevance during and in the aftermath of Covid-19 but also provides reflections that will be of lasting value to those interested in this classic work of literature. The novel explores questions of enduring importance. Do we collectively meet the threshold of ethical behaviour posed by Camus who wrote, “What's true of all the evils in the world is true of plague as well. It helps men to rise above themselves”? Or does the absurd undermine the compassionate? Do “heroes” dutifully fight a plague with “common decency,” or does human nature resign itself to the normalization of uncontrollable suffering and death? There are myriad ways to approach the novel and this volume encourages readers to ponder human dilemmas in fictional Oran informed by our current pandemic. "Camus's classic narrative, La Peste (The Plague), is a timely philosophical read in an era when a deadly pandemic rages worldwide. An allegory rich with suggestion, it rewards an imaginative reader with innumerable meanings as our own lived experiences mirror the novel. We witness protesters who argue for individual freedom and the autonomy to defy government-imposed regulations. They openly clash with followers of science who recommend shared actions of self-sacrifice to mitigate the spread of infection. Choosing either to act in one's own interest or to sacrifice for the good of all has become a haunting theme of American life in which the "richest nation on earth" experienced the highest number of cases and deaths in the world while under the leadership of former president Donald Trump as well as through the first year, 2021, of the administration of President Joe Biden. Political divisions over wearing masks, social distancing, police killings, Black Lives Matter, the January 6, 2021 assault on the United States Capitol, and recommended or mandated vaccines, sow discord at a time when solidarity could have united the U.S. to lead the world against the pandemic. Instead, misinformation campaigns have stoked opposition among the populace and away from the virus. "We're all in this together," was repeatedly uttered by Dr. Bernard Rieux, Camus's narrator. How seldom did we hear that call for unity from the podiums of power, for example, the leaders of America, Brazil, and India (the three countries with the highest death counts in the world)? After two years into the coronavirus pandemic with over one million deaths in the U.S. and over 6 million worldwide, we might ask ourselves, do we measure up to Camus's optimistic assessment of human behavior under duress? Do we collectively meet the minimum threshold of ethical behavior posed by Camus who wrote, "What's true of all the evils in the world is true of plague as well. It helps men to rise above themselves"?"-- Provided by publisher Cover Half-Title Series Title Copyright Dedication Contents Series Editor’s Foreword Acknowledgments Contributors Introduction: The Relevance of Camus’s The Plague 1. The Plague and the Present Moment 2. Present in Effacement: The Place of Women in Camus’s Plague and Ours 3. The Meaning of a Pandemic 4. Grief and Human Connection in The Plague 5. Examining the Narrative Devolution of the Physician in Camus’s The Plague 6. Horror and Natural Evil in The Plague 7. “I Can’t Breathe”: Covid-​19 and The Plague’s Tragedy of Political and Corporeal Suffocation 8. Modern Death, Decent Death, and Heroic Solidarity in The Plague Index