A Journal of the Plague Year - Softcover

Defoe, Daniel

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0140437851 ISBN 13: 9780140437850

Publisher: Penguin Classics, 2003

Synopsis

In 1665 the plague swept through London, claiming over 97,000 lives. Daniel Defoe was just five at the time of the plague, but he later called on his own memories, as well as his writing experience, to create this vivid chronicle of the epidemic and its victims. 'A Journal' (1722) follows Defoe's fictional narrator as he traces the devastating progress of the plague through the streets of London. Here we see a city transformed: some of its streets suspiciously empty, some - with crosses on their doors - overwhelmingly full of the sounds and smells of human suffering. And every living citizen he meets has a horrifying story that demands to be heard.

About this title

Review:

"Within the texture of Defoe's prose, London becomes a living and suffering being." (Peter Ackroyd)

From the Back Cover:

Defoe's classic reconstruction of the Great Plague of 1665 is the most compelling account of natural disaster in all literature. Narrated by an imaginary 'Citizen who continued all the while in London', A Journal of the Plague Year scans the streets and alleyways of the stricken capital in its effort to record the appalling suffering of plague victims. At once horrifying and movingly compassionate, it is a nightmare vision of the modern city laid to waste.

About this edition

• Publisher: Penguin Classics
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 0140437851
• ISBN 13: 9780140437850
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 336
• Editor: Bristow Christopher