Why live ?

Albert Camus wrote the book "The plague" in 1947 shortly after the end of the second World War.

The plot is very simple.

In the Algerian city of Oran (which at that time was part of the French colonies) plague erupts and forces the local authorities to close the city to the outsiders, and, very much, to the insiders as well, who are all "trapped" until the plague is won.

There are many ways of reading this book and i think this si what really makes it a challenging and beautiful book at the same time.

I read the book in French and I have read that the English translation is flawed. Camus style is solid, if the word can be used. Short sentences that forced me to stop reading and think over the content of the sentence itself and the book.

It is a kind of snappy narrative, and very descriptive too.

The dialogues between characters, as much as the narrative of the author flow regularly and I woudl say, even amicably, until when the reader is flashed with some kind of revelation, or deliberately challenging sentence.

You cannot disagree with most of these statements, unless you have faith in some ideal or in religion.

Nor surprizingly, one of the main 6 characters of this book will die alone in his faith, all the others have lost it. As one of the characters put it " I refuse to believe in a God which tortures children"

The main character is Dr. Rieux, he will fight to have the plague (which is the bad in our lives) eradicated from the town. Camus is not judging his characters and he bring us to sympathize with them, even with the profiter Cottard, with the apatic journalist Rambert who spend his time trying to escape the town, only to realize that once the possibility has arrived, he belongs to that city as to his destiny .

I have read many reviews and critics of this book since it really intrigued me and I found so many different interpretations of it.

I am happy I did this research only after I had finished reading the book, because I believe I would have been influenced.

This is why I am not giving my view on the "meaning" of this book.