A young French man is a teacher of Arab students in a godforsaken rural area in the Algerian mountains. The land is so ungiving that the main ‘harvestA young French man is a teacher of Arab students in a godforsaken rural area in the Algerian mountains. The land is so ungiving that the main ‘harvest’ is obtained by plowing the soil for rocks. [image] Nationalism is stirring among the Arabs and the local gendarme brings an Arab prisoner to his schoolhouse. The prisoner is accused of killing another Arab man. The gendarme gives the teacher a gun and charges the teacher with taking the Arab man the last 20 kilometers to local authorities.
The teacher is sympathetic to the Arabs and their cause. What will he do? And what is that message he finds scrawled on his blackboard in Arabic?
An interesting short piece about a moral dilemma.
Thanks to Cecily who shared a link to this story in her review.
The image is a watercolor ‘Landscape, Algeria,’ Atlas mountains in the distance, by Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon, 1860-1861, on mutualart.com...more
Somehow Camus brings humanism, optimism and the role of love to an otherwise depressing story of bubonic pl[Edited, picture and shelves added 1/13/23]
Somehow Camus brings humanism, optimism and the role of love to an otherwise depressing story of bubonic plague in 1940s Oran, Algeria. First all the rats die and then we go from there. (At least with COVID we don’t have rats.)
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After much bureaucratic bungling and delays, the city is cut off from the outside world by quarantine. A lot of the story's focus is on those separated by chance from loved ones for several months. There is intrigue as some plot to escape the town. But mainly a dreary perseverance and indifference takes over many in the city.
Camus uses the suffering and deaths of children to reflect on the role of God and religion. The barren, dry, windswept, desolate town is so well portrayed that it is like a character in the story. I’m reminded of the religious theme and the desolation of the Mexican town in Graham Green’s novel The Power and the Glory.
If you are put off by the thought that this is an incredibly depressing book, don’t be. There’s a tone of optimism that balances the despair.
Photo of street scene in Oran by Ferhat Bouda on nytimes.com ...more
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