Camus ~ The Plague (1947)

1
Camus The Plague (1947)

• The plague strikes Oran
• Setting is in the 1940s in Oran, a French port on
  the Algerian coast
• Oran is an ordinary, ugly, commercially-oriented
  place with an absurd lay-out (ML 23 VI 24).
• Plague begins
• Dr. Rieux sees his wife off to a sanitarium in
  the mountains

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Camus The Plague (1947)

• Reflects how he has been remiss in his attentions
  to his wife. Significance of this.
• Meanings of the plague
• Occupation of a city during time of war (ML 34
  VI 37)
• Resistance of nature to human choices (ML 35 VI
  37). Cf. Sartre

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Camus The Plague (1947)

• Encounter with nothingness--the absurd,
  meaninglessness
• Natural evil
• A boundary situation

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Camus The Plague (1947)

• Theme 1 - the absurd the experience of
  nothingness
• The Existentialists took this theme from
  Nietzsche
• For the Existentialists, there are two main
  sources for this experience
• 1. The rejection of God and of all
  transcendental values

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Camus The Plague (1947)

• 2. Epistemological skepticism
• There is no certain knowledge
• Scientific knowledge cannot answer the most
  important questions in life
• Camus in An Absurd Reasoning states Whether
  the earth or the sun revolves around the other is
  a matter of profound indifference.

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Camus The Plague (1947)

• Rejection of the Enlightenment faith in science.
• Knowledge cannot give meaning to life cannot
  answer the most fundamental questions about life.
• Cf. Plato - knowledge is salvation knowledge is
  one of the highest values and that which is most
  worth pursuing

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Camus The Plague (1947)

• Joseph Grand
• Occupation?
• Never gets raises or promotions because he
  couldnt find his words (ML 42 VI 45)
• Separated from his wife

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Camus The Plague (1947)

• Has a secret project
• Gentlemen, hats off! (ML 94 VI 102)
• Interpretation His way of fighting against the
  absurdity of life
• When plague begins, he works on sanitary squads
  his city job suffers

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Camus The Plague (1947)

• Rieux reflects that Grand is an insignificant
  and obscure hero who had to his credit only a
  little goodness of heart and a seemingly absurd
  ideal (ML 126 VI 137).
• Has a secret project

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Camus The Plague (1947)

• Does he get the plague?
• Does he survive?
• At end of plague, writes to his wife (ML 276 VI
  306).
• Theme 2 - boundary situation
• The plague causes a crisis in the lives of the
  people of Oran it forces them to reevaluate
  their lives. It coaxes them out of routine (ML
  22 VI 23).

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Camus The Plague (1947)

• Theme 3 - Resistance against life nature as we
  find it
• All persons encounter meaninglessness at some
  point in their lives
• How can this be faced and transcended?
• One must resist it, fight against it (see ML 122
  VI 133 - Many fledgling moralists . . .)
• The Myth of Sisyphus (1942)
• The myth

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Camus The Plague (1947)

• How does Sisyphus find meaning in his punishment?
• Resistance for the sake of what?

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Camus The Plague (1947)

• Raymond Rambert
• Occupation?
• Has mistress in Paris
• Tries repeatedly to escape
• His initial form of resistance
• Decides to stay joins Rieux in fighting plague
• This is his new form of resistance

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Camus The Plague (1947)

• Does he survive the plague?
• Theme 4 - transcending absurdity by commitment to
  other persons
• Rieux If there is one thing one can always
  yearn for and sometimes attain, it is human love
  (ML 271 VI 300).

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Camus The Plague (1947)

• Camus in Notebooks, 1942-1951 What balances
  the absurd is the community of men fighting
  against it. And if we choose to serve that
  community, we choose to serve the dialogue
  carried to the absurd against any policy or
  falsehood or of silence. Thats the way one is
  free with others (126).

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Camus The Plague (1947)

• Theme 5 - Theory of stages brings themes 1, 3,
  4 together
• Not a descriptive theory rather prescriptive - a
  moral theory
• Three moments or stages in achieving mature
  personhood
• 1. Awareness of absurdity
• 2. Resistance to this absurdity
• 3. To fellow human persons

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Camus The Plague (1947)

• Jean Tarrou
• The chronicler, diarist
• At the outset of the plague, immediately
  volunteers to help organizes sanitary squads
• Reveals to Rieux that he has already had the
  plague
• Story about his flight from home for the sake of
  creating a more perfect world

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Camus The Plague (1947)

• Then came to realize that no ideology could
  justify such butcheries (252).
• Even the best of the revolutionaries could not
  keep from killing because such was the logic by
  which they live (ML 228 VI 252).

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Camus The Plague (1947)

• In The Rebel (1950), Camus proposes that revolt
  must have limits.
• Revolt must never be for absolute (perfect)
  justice, but only for a measure of justice.
• The rebel must be a scrupulous, hesitant,
  careful, reflective.
• Does Tarrou survive the plague?

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Camus The Plague (1947)

• Paneloux
• Jesuit priest, learned militant
• 1st sermon (ML 86ff. VI 94ff.)
• The plague has come upon you because of your
  evil ways
• The plague is Gods punishment
• Problem of evil Calamity has come to you, my
  brethren, and my brethren, you deserve it (ML
  86 VI 94).
• Helps in sanitary camps witnesses death of
  Othons son.

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Camus The Plague (1947)

• 2nd sermon (ML 198ff. VI 220ff.)
• Opens with we
• Rejects explanation of plague given in 1st sermon
• Adopts a Kierkegaardian Christianity -- belief
  which goes beyond understanding
• Becomes ill refuses medical treatment

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Camus The Plague (1947)

• Dies
• Camus viewpoint Paneloux refused to resist the
  plague
• Othon
• Occupation?
• Has two children whom he marches into his
  favorite restaurant like performing poodles (ML
  106 VI 115).

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Camus The Plague (1947)

• Othon is very rigid, formal, unvarying in his
  habits
• Son gets the plague dies
• Othon volunteers to help in the camps becomes a
  camp manager
• Shoelaces untied
• Papers lost he accepts situation.
• Contacts plague dies

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Camus The Plague (1947)

• Cottard
• Role in novel
• At home with the plague
• After the plague is over, he goes insane
• Dr. Bernard Rieux
• Sees wife off to sanitarian before plague breaks
  out

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Camus The Plague (1947)

• Man of habit and routine
• Events like the plague help men to rise above
  themselves (ML 115 VI 125).
• Rieux says that he thinks he is on the right road
  in fighting against creation as he found it (ML
  116 VI 127).
• Rieuxs form of resistance is fighting the plague
  through the practice of medicine.

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Camus The Plague (1947)

• Comparison of the practice of medicine with the
  practice of life
• In both one must sometimes make choices based on
  insufficient knowledge
• A man cant cure and know at the same time, so
  lets cure as quickly as we can. Thats the more
  urgent job (ML 189 VI 210).

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Camus The Plague (1947)

• Theme 6 - Skepticism about reason the importance
  of choice
• On the really important questions of life, once
  must make choices which go beyond knowledge
• See beautiful closing paragraph ML 278 VI 308.