The Plague

When plague breaks out in the Algerian port of Oran, the town is sealed off and its people must reckon, each in their own way, with an absurd and impersonal death. Camus keeps the city real and specific: Dr Rieux's surgery in the ordinary streets, the closed town gates that turn Oran into a prison, the harbour and the sea that are suddenly forbidden, the cathedral where Father Paneloux preaches, and the municipal stadium turned into an isolation camp.

Dr Rieux

Dr Rieux's surgery

Part 1

Rieux, stepping over a dead rat on his landing, is the first to grasp what is coming and the first to name it plague against official reluctance. From his surgery in the drab, business-minded town, the quiet doctor organises the sanitary squads, choosing to fight not out of heroism but simple decency.

Part 1

explicit Dr Rieux practises in the ordinary streets of Oran, the real Algerian port; from his surgery he first notices the dying rats and the strange fevers that announce the plague.

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