Themes in Albert Camus quot;The Plague.quot; Essay

Albert Camus was born on the 7th of November 1913 in Mondovi, Algeria to Lucien Camus, whose family had settled in Algeria in 1871, and Catherine Sintes, of Spanish origin. During Camus high school years, he met Jean Grenier, the man who would influence Camus career to the greatest extent by opening his mind to the philosophy of thinkers such as Nietzsche and Bergson. He and Grenier focused much of their writing on the duality of mortality. Still achieving highly at school, Camus received his diploma from the University in philosophy in 1936, examining the legacies and conflicts of thought in his thesis, which would later inhabit his works. The philosophy of moralism he formulated led to his ideas of the absurd, a state which can†¦show more content†¦Individuals were regarded as free to determine themselves through such choices. A pessimist mood characterised the early post-war years reflected in Jean Paul Sartres philosophy of existentialism. This was the backdrop under which Camus wrote. The Plague is classified under the genre of Impressionistic realism. There is no doubt that the book was written as an allegorical experience of the author living in German occupied France during the Second World War. The book is also read as, the occupation of Algeria by France. Another interpretation of the book is that the book is a critique of totalitarian communist ideology, in which the plague symbolises the repression of the people by a ruthless government machinery. My attempt in this paper, though, is to bring out the various themes present in the novel. Through this book, Camus tries to portray mans fight against an all pervading and arbitrary enemy. The entire novel can be viewed as a statement about life and death, i.e. about human existence in general. As with his other novels, The Plague deals with conflicts and struggles, freedom and responsibility, alienation and the difficulty in facing life without belief in God or in absolute moral standards. Other major themes one finds interwoven into this novel are suffering, separation, sickness, rebellion, sympathy, and mechanisation of life. In the novel an epidemic ravages the commercial port town of Oran, in Algeria. The early symptoms likeShow MoreRelatedThe Portrayal of Society in Of Mice and Men and The Outsider Essay1430 Words   |  6 Pages(1902-1968). John Steinbeck writes mainly short stories and novels, he was born in Salinas California, which is the same area where the book of mice and men is set. He is became widely known thanks to his peace: tequila flat. Steinbecks novels have themes of social criticism in them, a lot about the economic problems in rural labor. Good examples of books written by John Steinbeck: dubious battle (1936), of mice and men (1937), the long valley (1938) and east of Eden (1952). The story line is writtenRead MoreExistentialism vs Essentialism23287 Words   |  94 Pages Existentialism can also be difficult to understand because it does not consist of a specific dogma, or a set of metaphysical claims. Existentialism is not a definitive claim about the world or the people in it. It is marked, instead, by a set of themes about the human condition and the struggles and freedoms that humans must endure, or perhaps embrace. Despite the various and often conflicting views held by many existentialist philosophers, there are several main concepts of existentialism that