The first pages of Part III are eerily back on track with our world again, as the narrator gives a sweeping summary of the way things are in the late summer of the plague in Oran. The highest numbers of victims are in the areas with the closest quarters – the less affluent districts, the prison. Revolts start to happen. The narrator spends a while telling us about the grim reality of burials, the details of which are not too different from what we are seeing: victims dying alone, families unable to attend the funeral. And then another chilling and prescient statement, when more “immediate concerns” prevents the town people from fixating on the burials: “Taken up with queuing, pulling strings and filling forms if they wanted to eat, people did not have time to worry about how others were dying around them and how they themselves would one day die. So these material difficulties which seemed like an affliction would eventually be seen to have been a boon.” 

FOR TOMORROW: Read to the end of Part III! And our next zoom call will be Sunday at 2pm – keep your eye on the blog for the zoom link to register!

At the end of part one (apologies for the missed post yesterday!) we have a very interesting conversation between Rambert, Tarrou, and the doctor. Rambert, who is still trying to escape the town, says he’s “‘had enough of people who die for ideas…What interests [him] is living or dying for what one loves.'” Rieux answers him, in a statement so important for our moment: “‘Man is not an idea.'” Rieux argues that the only way to fight the plague is through “decency,” and that in his case decency consists in doing his job. I appreciate the way the doctor makes clear that acts of decency are not the same for each of us, though the overlaying category stands. It is the collective decency, all of us acting together in tandem from wherever we are, that is our greatest weapon. “…The epidemic was everybody’s business and they all had to do their duty.”

FOR TOMORROW: Read first 7 pages of Part III, into second section, ending with Rieux’s statement “‘No one can deny that we’ve made progress.'”

In today’s pages we continue to follow the journalist Rambert’s attempt at escape from the town. I think this may be the longest section of the book so far where we remain in one scene; this makes me wonder about its significance to the novel’s larger project. Rambert’s supposed coming escape is complicated, involving many people and lots of moving parts. I suspect it will be thwarted somehow, but to what end, I wonder, and why is it important to the book as a whole? 

FOR TOMORROW: Read to the end of Part II! 

In today’s pages we begin to explore what feels like the next inevitability of the situation as Camus is unfolding it: the existence of a blackmarket, back-alley system for getting goods and services. Rambert, who is still wanting to get to his love in Paris, teams up with Cottard, who takes him to a café to see a man who can possibly arrange for his escape. To me this scene felt inevitable; if you set a ball rolling down a hill in a certain direction, you can be sure of certain outcomes. As we spoke about yesterday in our meeting, this is how Camus’ allegory seems to stay so closely aligned with our actual moment: because it is true that in any moment of large and systematic societal crisis, these themes (of good and evil, of communication, of love and death) inevitably arise, and they play out in both predictable and unpredictable ways.  

FOR TOMORROW: Read next 7 pages (in section 9 in Part II), up to “‘Very useful,’ said the journalist, drinking in his turn.” 

It was difficult to choose a quote from today’s pages because there are so many that resonate. The narrator discusses Tarrou’s “health groups,” made of civilians risking their health to take care of those suffering. He says he doesn’t want to “attribute more significance” to these groups because he believes that “by giving too much importance to fine actions one may end by paying an indirect but powerful tribute to evil, because in so doing one implies that such fine actions are only valuable because they are rare, and that malice or indifference are far more common motives in the actions of men.” We are all so heartened, in America, by the “fine actions” we see by so many around us — and of course we must continue to give them significance! — but it is against the backdrop of so much seeming indifference that we must not accept as more common. “…There always comes a time in history when the person who dares to say that two and two make four is punished by death. The schoolmaster knows this quite well. And the question is not what reward or punishment awaits the demonstration; it is knowing whether or not two and two do make four.” This quote speaks to us of the struggle between facts, science, and lies and spin. And finally: “…the conclusion was always what they knew it would be: one must fight, in one way or another, and not go down on one’s knees.” 

FOR MONDAY: Read next 7 pages, to the line (in dialogue), “‘That man…is Enemy Number One.” 

TOMORROW: JOIN OUR SECOND ZOOM CALL! 4pm Eastern. Register here: https://narrativemedicine.blog/blog/narrative-medicine-book-club/

The narrator does interesting work in today’s pages – we disappear into Tarrou’s notebooks, referencing a conversation with Dr. Rieux that we then see in scene a few pages later, again causing us to question who is telling the story. Again the need for “imagination” is raised; Tarrou says, in reference to the Prefecture asking for volunteers to help: “‘What they need is imagination. They never rise to the challenge of a disaster.'” Interesting that we have heard this call now from two different characters. I was moved, too, by the loving interaction between Rieux and his mother, who says, “I don’t mind waiting for you if I know that you will be coming. And when you aren’t here, I think of what you are doing.'” Such a simple statement, but so very touching in this moment. 

FOR TOMORROW: next 7 pages, to the end of the paragraph that begins “This is also why it was natural for Grand…”

AND JOIN OUR NEXT ZOOM CALL SUNDAY AT **4 PM**! Please note you must register in advance for this meeting! Link to register on the main Book Club page: https://narrativemedicine.blog/blog/narrative-medicine-book-club/

In today’s pages we see more of the townspeople adjusting to the new reality of life under the plague. Rambert, telling his “case” to everyone he can find as a way to pass the time, ranking their reactions into categories; the man who spits on the cats finding even his pastime is cut off; police patrolling to make sure people stay indoors. I was particularly moved by the paragraph that begins: “In the terrified minds of our fellow-citizens…everything became more important. For the first time, all of us became aware of the colors of the sky and the smells of the earth which mark the passage of the seasons.” Many of us now are experiencing something similar, as we long for the simplest things that we took for granted – the cup of coffee from the corner food cart, the hug from a friend. On another note, is anyone else surprised that all the cafés seem to still be open? That seems one thing that Camus didn’t correctly predict…

FOR TOMORROW: Next 7 pages, up to the line, in dialogue, “‘I’d rather it was done by free men.'” (This is page 95 in my edition!)

I’m curious to hear what readers make of the priest’s sermon, which goes on for four pages, quite a bit of real estate in the novel! What comment might Camus be making here about the ways the plague can potentially be moralized? The priest literally says ‘my brethren, you have deserved it’ – he likens them to the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah, to the population before the flood (and who else shivered at the reference to Lombardy, Italy, ‘ravaged by a plague’), implying that the plague has been visited on them because of their sins, then arguing that somehow, “‘through the paths of death, anguish and sighs, [it] still guides us toward the silence of God and the principle of all life.'” I wonder what will come of this sermon in the rest of the book, if it is here to show us an example of how suffering can be “used” in various ways, or if Camus will take it back up later and somehow show this thinking to be untrue (Perhaps Paneloux himself will get sick)? 

FOR TOMORROW: Read next 7 pages, to end of the paragraph that begins “On the other hand, when Tarrou came back…” 

In today’s pages we see the toll that the work is starting to have on Rieux. The “abstraction” (for those reading the French, I’m curious if this is the correct translation?) of the disease, and of the personal suffering that follows it, is taken up, the “monotony” of the plague and life under its tyranny. And we see Rieux’s capacity narrowing, in perhaps the most heartbreaking few sentences in the book so far: “[He] found his only consolation for these exhausting days in this feeling of a heart slowly closing around itself. He knew that it would make his task easier. That is why he welcomed it.” I wonder how many of us — healthcare providers or not — recognize ourselves in this statement?  “To struggle against abstraction, one must come to resemble it a little.” This is a statement that makes so much sense, and yet it seems clear this numbness, this “abstraction,” is exactly what we must continue to resist. 

FOR TOMORROW: read next 7 pages, to the section break, paragraph beginning with “But the sounds of running feet returned.”