A GP reads ‘The Plague’ during the COVID-19 pandemic

Prof Gene Feder

 

 

by Gene Feder, GP and Professor of Primary Care, Centre for Academic Primary Care, University of Bristol

The Plague, a novel by Albert Camus, published in 1947, tells the story of Oran, a city struck by bubonic plague. It was an extended metaphor for living under fascism and the way society and individuals behave under occupation.

I found an English translation at the back of a book shelf, having first read it as a teenager over half a century ago. On the title page there is a stamp: ‘Rainbow Library Salzburg THIS BOOK IS A [sic] PROPERTY OF THE UNITED STATES’. My father – working with Holocaust* survivors in Germany and Austria – must have forgotten to return it.

In 2020, it turns out that the book – partially – exemplifies our response to the pandemic du jour: COVID-19.

Everybody knows that pestilences have

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