The Plague

The first new translation of The Plague to be published in the United States in more than seventy years, bringing the Nobel Prize winner's iconic novel ("a redemptive book, one that wills the reader to believe, even in a time of despair" ―The Washington Post) to a new generation of readers.

The townspeople of Oran are in the grip of a deadly plague, that condemns its victims to a swift and horrifying death. Fear, isolation, and claustrophobia follow as they are forced into quarantine. Each person responds in their own way to the lethal disease: some resign themselves to fate, some seek blame, and a few, like Dr. Rieux, resist the terror. An immediate triumph when it was published in 1947, The Plague is in part an allegory of France's suffering under the Nazi occupation, as well as a timeless story of bravery and determination against the precariousness of human existence. In this fresh yet careful translation, award-winning translator Laura Marris breathes new life into the ever-resonant tale, granting English readers the closest access yet to the meaning and searing beauty of Albert Camus’s classic novel.