Blinding you with science

Well, something strange is certainly happening in Oran - dead rats, a dead concierge, more dead rats, some very sick people... If you've made it to the end of Part One, then you know what Dr. Rieux and Dr. Castel suspected all along: It's the plague (pretty big twist, considering the novel is titled The Plague - huh?).

But what is the plague? Here's some background information for us non-doctors. The following tidbits are taken from Carol Turkington and Bonnie Lee Ashby's article "Plague" in The Encyclopedia of Infectious Diseases (3rd ed., 2007). This article - and many others on the plague - is available through Longview's Health Reference Center online database.

*** "The scourge of early history, plague is a serious infectious disease transmitted by the bites of rat fleas."

*** "Fleas found on rodents can carry the plague bacterium Yersinia pestis (formerly Bacillus pestis or Pasteurella pestis). More than 100 species of fleas have been reported to be naturally infected with plague." (image of oriental rat flea engorged with blood, from the CDC Plague Home Page - http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dvbid/plague/)

*** "There are three major forms of the disease: bubonic, septicemic, and pneumonic, each of which can occur alone or together, as the disease moves throughout the body. Bubonic plague is centered in the lymphatic system, creating swelling lymph nodes (buboes), from which it gets its name. Septicemic plague affects the bloodstream. Pneumonic plague occurs when the bacteria enters the lungs."

(shameful admission: I have a bachelor's degree in linguistics, and I didn't get the 'buboes'/'bubonic' connection until I looked up "bubo" in one of our medical dictionaries. Talk about your 'Well, duh' moments!)

*** "Two to five days after infection, patients experience sudden fever, shivering, seizures, and severe headaches followed by buboes—smooth, oval, reddened, and very painful swellings in the armpits, groin, or neck." (bubo image also from the CDC Plague Home Page)

*** "Pneumonic plague causes severe, overwhelming pneumonia, with shortness of breath, high fever, and blood in the phlegm. (Onset of these symptoms begins only one to three days after exposure.) If untreated, half the patients will die; if blood poisoning occurs as an early complication, patients may die before the buboes appear."

*** "Plague can be treated successfully if it is caught early. Untreated pneumonic plague is almost always fatal, and the chances of survival are very low unless specific antibiotic treatment is started within 15 to 18 hours after symptoms appear."

*** And, finally, the fact that surprised me the most: "Plague is ... found among ground squirrels, prairie dogs, and marmots in parts of Arizona, New Mexico, California, Colorado, and Nevada. Between 10 and 50 Americans each year contract plague during the spring and summer months." (plague distribution map from the CDC Plague Home Page)

For those interested in more information on the medical aspects of plague, here is a bibliography of scientific resources. All are available on the shelf at Longview Library, through our online databases, or from authoritative websites, such as the Center for Disease Control's and the World Health Organization's.

Next week: a look at plague outbreaks throughout history, including those mentioned by Father Paneloux in his first sermon.

"The town itself, let us admit, is ugly."

Well - how about that? First sentence of the novel's second paragraph. Camus - or at least his narrator - is pretty blunt about his feelings for Oran. Let's see what you think!

First, some background information:

Oran is located on the coast of the Mediterranean in northwestern Algeria, a country in northern Africa. (The maps below are from the Facts on File World Atlas database, available through Longview Library's Online Databases page.)

There are about 2 million people living in Oran and the surrounding region, which makes it the second-largest city in Algeria, trailing only the capital, Algiers. Because of its coastal position, Oran has been an important port ever since the city was founded by Moorish traders in the 10th century CE.

Its importance has, of course, led to the city being invaded, conquered, occupied, or otherwise controlled numerous times. The Spanish captured the city from the Moors in 1509. The Turks took over in 1708. The Spanish re-captured the city in 1732, but lost Oran to the Ottoman Empire in 1791. The French took over in 1831.

Several important developments occurred in the 1940s, the decade in which The Plague is set. In July 1940, France surrendered to Nazi Germany. The terms of the surrender gave Germany about three-fifths of France, including Paris and the enire Atlantic coast. The remaining two-fifths remained unoccupied and the French relocated their government from Paris to Vichy. Most historians now agree that the 'Vichy regime' was actually a puppet government controlled by the Nazis, but in any case, Vichy France controlled 'French North Africa', as it was called, until British and American naval troops reclaimed the area in November 1942.

So, some questions:

1) Do you think The Plague is set before or after November 1942? Why?

2) Judging from what he writes after the second paragraph, do you think that Camus (or his narrator) really believes the city is "ugly"? If not, why do you think he describes it that way on the first page of the book? (Feel free to come back and comment again if your feelings change as you read on)

3) And - most importantly - do you think Oran is ugly? Click here to look at pictures taken from the DHD Multimedia Gallery, the Wikimedia Commons, or the Visit Oran website - http://www.visitoran.com/photos/ - which has tons of other images in their Photo Galleries.

(Geographical and historical information adapted from Facts on File World Atlas and CultureGrams World Edition - both available through Longview Library's Online Databases page)

Welcome Back!

I hope everyone had a good, relaxing holiday break. Because we'll have some rather ugly business to attend to this semester...

How would you feel if you came to class one day and were told you wouldn't be allowed to leave campus at the end of the day? Then you were told the "authorities" weren't sure how long you'd have to stay put. Oh, and - by the way - you're also not allowed to communicate in any way with anyone off campus.

Pretty horrible, huh? But what if it gets worse? What if, after a few hours of being stuck on campus, people - the same people who are stuck here just like you - start getting very, very sick...

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These are some of the nightmarish scenarios that befall the townspeople of Oran, Algeria, in Albert Camus's The Plague. As we go through this discussion, we'll look at the different ways Camus's characters deal with their situation and talk about how we might handle it today.

Since The Plague is a campus-wide reading project, my hope for this discussion blog is to benefit from the various backgrounds and insights of all the different groups reading the novel. English students learning from Biology students, and vice versa. Math students learning from Psychology students, and vice versa. Faculty and staff learning from students, and - well, you get the picture.

So, without further ado, let The Plague begin!