2,000 words for term paper

Theme: courage in the face of hardship

The Plague, by Albert Camus, is a novel documenting the horrific affects of an epidemic of the plague on the small town of Oran. A central focus of the novel is on the plague’s progression through the population of the town and the effects it has its citizens. While some resort to “revolutionary violence” it the resulting disarray, other’s step forward to face their daunting opponent, willing to sacrifice everything to help fight it. Throughout the novel a central focus is placed on three character’s and their adaptation to their new plague-ridden surroundings: Dr. Bernard Rieux, Raymond Rambert, Joseph Grand, and Jean Tarrou are all characters that risk their lives daily to help those affected by the plague. Through these characters and their adaptation to the plague one of the underlying themes of the novel is illustrated: courage in the face of adversity of an underlying theme.

One of the characters that display courage in the face of hardship is Rieux. He works every day, all day, in the plague hospitals trying to fight the increasingly fatal epidemic. If not informed by the narrator, the reader would never know there was an underlying hardship in Rieux’s life. He commits himself so whole-heartedly to the job it appears as if it is the only thing in his life. His work appears to consume him entirely as he fights to save lives. However, this is a misconception created by his courage and work ethic in response to the epidemic. He has a sick wife in quarantine outside of the town. He is subject to the same sense of isolation and separation that the rest of the town feels. This is a feeling that drives many of the citizens, as seen with Rambert initially, into listless hopelessness. This despair felt by the citizens of the town who had been separated from a loved one is felt to acutely by the majority of the population that it is describes for about one hundred pages of the novel. This feeling is what dictates many peoples behavior throughout this time. This feeling leads to the increase in business in bars and restaurants during this time of plague; these isolated individuals flock to these places in an attempt to find some escape from their sense of loss. They think that if they go to highly populated areas they will feel as sense of community somehow, that their feeling of wholeness will be restored. Dr. Rieux, throughout the novel, suffers from this same sentiment that drives the majority of the town into desolation. However, Rieux doesn’t let it affect. He maintains complete control and focus over himself. Even when he has reason to believe his wife’s situation has worsened – through her increasingly friendly and optimistic telegraphs constructed to put him at ease – he never stops his battle against his faceless opponent.

“Grand was the true embodiment of the quiet courage that inspired the sanitary groups. He had said yes without a moment’s hesitation and with the large-heartedness that was second nature to him” (135).  Like Rieux, Grand is another character in this novel that exhibits courage in the face of the adversity provided by the plague. Joseph Grand is an elderly gentleman that has been stuck in the same temporary position at the post office for twenty-two years. He is complacent – not a man of action, never speaking up in regards to his boss’ exploitation of him. “All he desired was the prospect of a life suitably insured on the material side by honest work, enabling him to devote his leisure to his hobbies” (44).  

He is not a capitalist, something that distinguished him from the majority of the population of Oran. As seen described in the very beginning, and throughout the town’s battle with the plague, the citizens of Oran are inherently concerned with personal gain. This tendency of the town is so drastic that the narrator notes it is not a place for old people – for they will be left behind, unattended to by their families, as their families go off in pursuit of material gains. Despite the overwhelming majority of his peers’ behavior, Grand is never driven by a desire for material gains – he simply wishes to make enough to support himself. This attitude further highlights Grand’s complacency: he doesn’t care to take action even to benefit himself. He is neutral character is further defined by his trouble with language, seen in his inability to write his book. He is stuck on the first sentence; either because he is a perfectionist and is unable to move on until he finds it perfect or because he simply doesn’t have a firm grasp of the language in which he is writing. He is so reluctant to take action he cannot even finish a written sentence. All of these factors contributing to the total blandness of Grand’s character are why I found his bravery in the face of the plague so interesting; this form of action taking is almost out of character for him. He is actively standing up for what he thinks is right rather than letting external forces or people decide his fate for him; he volunteers himself to work in the sanitation squads. Granted, he is only helping with registry and statistics, but it is still an act to help the plague-fighting effort.  He even eventually goes one further in this newfound trend of taking action – doing much of his work in the actual hospitals alongside Reiux. When thanked for volunteering he replied: “Why, that’s not difficult! Plague is here and we’ve got to make a stand, that’s obvious. Ah, I only wish everything were as simple!” (134). Grand was a formerly neutral character, a man of little ambition or sustenance. However, when faced with the plague a change is seen in his character: he becomes more of a man of action, sacrificing his own time and possible health willingly in an effort to help fight the plague.

Raymond Rambert is another of the characters on whose character the plague has had a profound impact. He is a writer for a newspaper in Paris and happens to be in Oran on assignment when the outbreak of the plague beings. He is consequently trapped inside of Oran when the town is quarantined. He believes because he has no attachment to the city, and therefore he should be allowed to leave, despite the quarantine. He has left his wife behind in Paris and is desperate to return to her; it is this desperation that blinds him to his selfishness in his endeavors to escape the town. He first goes to the Prefect’s office, explaining how his “presence in Oran was purely accidental, he had no connection with the town and no reasons for staying in it [therefore] he was surely entitled to leave” (84).

He is unable to see the inherent selfishness in his actions: the whole town is in quarantine he can’t be the only one there by chance, yet he expects an exception to be made in his case. In his appeal to Dr. Rieux to write him a certificate of health Dr. Reiux explains to him that “there are thousands of people placed as [he] is in this town, and there can’t be any question of allowing them to leave it” (86). Entire families have been separated as a result of the quarantine, however Rambert is unable to gain perspective because of his central focus of his own escape. He is persistent in his desperation: appealing to every official in the town. His argument remaining “that he was a stranger to [the] town and, that being so, his case deserved special consideration” (106). He is always met, however, with a response adding that “a good number of other people were in a like case, and this his position was not so exceptional as he seemed to suppose” (106).  Despite being met with this response at every turn, he continues his frantic search for a way out of the town. The fact that, despite receiving a similar response from everyone whom he tries to evoke sympathy, he still maintains that his position is exceptionally important illustrates how blinded to reason as a result of his desperation he is. After exhausting all of his legal methods of escape, he beings contacting smugglers. Cottard volunteers in his quest for illegal transport out of the city, however, as Rambert is on the brink of escape the two smugglers with whom Cottard put him in contact back out of the deal. By their absence the smugglers, who typically brought lesser items such as notes in and out of the town, illustrate their comprehension of the gravity of the town’s situation: they understand that by smuggling one individual out of the town they could possibly be risking catalyzing the spread of the plague not just through surrounding areas, but because of its high level of contagion, possibly the world. That Rambert cannot realize that not only would his escape from the town be unfair to the families who have suffered separation as well, but could possibly cause a worldwide epidemic is incredible. More incredible still is that he could maintain the value he places on his escape while continuing his acquaintance with Dr. Rieux, and in turn being exposed to news of the devastation of the plague first hand as well as its brutality and ease in spreading. His relationship with Dr. Rieux serves to foil his character: he is desperate to fulfill his own selfish desires and escape the town to return to his wife, while Dr. Rieux steadfastly battles a seemingly endless plague while his wife’s condition worsens in a sanatorium outside of the city. Before his transformation as a result of the plague, Rambert’s weakness of character and morals is seen highlighted through the foil Dr. Rieux provides by his strength and devotion to fighting the plague, despite his own personal circumstances.

Rambert’s transformation does not occur all at once; it begins with his request to “work with [the sanitation squads] until [he found] some way of getting out of the town” (164). It is catalyzed after an argument Rambert has in defending his position of “living and dying for what one loves” – his wife. After Rieux vehemently reassures him that he is not wrong in his personal quest for happiness, Tarrou informs Rambert that Rieux’s wife is in a sanitarium over a hundred miles away. This display of silent strength on Dr. Rieux’s part – his encouragement of his friend to find the happiness he himself is deprived of – is what finally resonated with Rambert. After this argument Rambert comes to Dr.Rieux’s apartment the next day and signs on to help with the fighting the plague. However, his transition is not complete here for he still continues his quest to find a means of escape.

After working for some time with the sanitation quads Rambert is finally successful in his mission; he finds a way out of Oran. However, on the brink of escape his character completes its transformation: he is unable to leave the town. Even after Rieux “told him that was sheer nonsense; there was nothing shameful in preferring happiness” (209) to the suffering of the town, he chooses to stay. After working with Rieux and Tarrou, Rambert realizes that he belongs here “whether [he] want[s] it or not” (209); that, like Rieux and the majority of the town, he must sacrifice for the good of the whole. Be the sacrifice choosing to stay and prohibiting the possible spread of plague, or choosing to remain working in the hospital, Rambert finally realizes that his personal plight is of insignificance in comparison to the plague and the misery it has brought everyone. Through Rieux’s compassion and dedication in the face of the plague Rambert is finally able to gain a larger perspective on his situation. Rambert, out of all the other character’s seen in the novel, undergoes the most drastic transformation at the hands of the plague: from a person entirely focused on achieving his own selfish goals to one who demonstrates courage and chooses to sacrifice his own happiness and continue to battle the formidable opponent that is the plague.