Journal of the Plague Year (Daniel Defoe)

I didn't realize the extent of the Black Plague's reach in history.  The largest outbreak occurred in the 1350s, but the plague continued to affect regions intermittently for the next three hundred years.  This book deals with the outbreak in 1665, called the Great Plague of London, which is believed to have claimed 100,000 lives.  Written by Daniel Defoe (though perhaps based on his uncle's journal), it offers a detailed account of life in London and the immediate surroundings during this dreadful time.  Defoe himself was alive during the plague, but was only 5 at the time, so though his writings are first-hand presentations, he relies heavily on other accounts, and no doubt at times presents fictionalized or unreliable material.  That has led some to question how this novel be classified- whether pure history, fiction, or a mixture of the two.  Personally, I'm inclined towards historical fiction.  There's a brief discussion of this here.

As an aside, this plague occurred shortly after the English Civil War, and the Great Fire of London occurred the very next year after the plague, in 1666.  And we think our lives are difficult.  But, I digress.

This book is a mixed bag.  There is a lot of good information here, from an account of (and daily life during) the situation itself, insights on humanity's behavior in times of crisis, to a brief discourse on the will of God, and determining His will in a stressful circumstance (the author wrestles with whether or not it's God's will that he remain in London during the crisis, or leave).  There's also good discussion of the secondary effects of such a plague- how even healthy people, with no loss of immediate kin, had their lives changed by sudden loss of employment, etc- and I feel I gained a lot from reading this work.

The novel had several deficiencies, too- with no chapters or breaks of any kind, the narrative was flowing in seemingly random directions, repeating concepts several times, and circling back on topics already covered; the details (ex: the number of dead per parish, per week) were overwhelming and at times distracted from the story.  With proper editing, the length could have been chopped in half with little loss of content, leaving me just waiting for the book to end.

Overall, there is value here, but there are probably better plague accounts to read, if the topic is of interest to the reader.

Rating: B