How Is Imagery Used In The Plague

Relationships between people, animals, and different species can be very complex and multifaceted. The passage provided from “The Plague” by Albert Camus, employs literary elements such as vivid imagery, symbolism, and metaphors to demonstrate the multifaceted relationship between the townspeople and the rats of the city of Oran.

Throughout the passage and the book as a whole, the townspeople view the rats as a horrifying and disgusting presence, showing early signs of the plague. Camus uses vivid imagery to describe this horrifying setting, when the narrator describes how the "rats were piled up in garbage cans or lying in long lines in the gutters" (Camus). The narrator also describes how “their shrill little death cries could be clearly

As well as employing vivid imagery, Camus also conveys various symbols in the passage to demonstrate this relationship. The symbol of the rats themselves can have various interpretations in this passage. One, is that this symbol represents death and decay in the rats themselves. The narrator describes the dead rats as “a gout of blood, like a red flower, on its tapering muzzle” (Camus). The other interpretation is that the rats symbolize that there is another problem that goes on beyond the surface of the town of Oran. The passage describes how the rats would come out “From basements, cellars, and sewers they emerged in long wavering flies into the light of day” (Camus). This symbol can be a metaphor for an underlying political or social issue that could’ve been going on during this time period. One possibility is the immense war damage in France after the conclusion of the nazi occupation, and world war two, or another social issue that is undisclosed in the passage. This demonstrates how Camus uses various interpretations and examples of symbolism in the passage, to convey the fearful relationship between the townspeople and the rats.

The narrator recounts that the ways that the rats emerged “ as if the earth on which our houses stood were being purged of its secret humors” (Camus). This metaphor represents the rats as if they emerged from the foundations of the town itself. The rats' presence in the town demonstrates a malice that lurks underneath the town, referring to the plague, and in a way mirroring the anxiety and fears of the townspeople themselves. Moreover, the passage states that the “Randsdoc Bureau announced that 8,000 rats had been collected” (Camus). This growing problem in the town of Oran, forces the townspeople to come together to attempt to resolve this issue by transmitting an order “to the sanitary service to collect the dead rats at daybreak every morning” (Camus). This demonstrates how the townspeople are forced to adapt to the rats' presence in their daily lives. The narrator states in the passage that as the days go by “there were more and more dead vermin in the streets” (Camus). This example of vivid imagery, explains how the increasing number of rats symbolizes the townspeople's inability to stop it and the escalating nature of the disease. Not only does this represent the interconnectedness of the townspeople and the rats, but it also calls for the townspeople