By Norman Doidge, see the full article published by Tablet Magazine.
Journal of a Plague is a new column, by Dr. Norman Doidge, that aims to help readers to stand back from, reflect on, and make sense of the pandemic, both in terms of how it is transforming life around us, and how it is affecting our individual psyches—the plague without, and the plague within.
Our column takes its name from A Journal of the Plague Year, the English writer Daniel Defoe’s classic account of the Great Plague of London of 1665. Defoe’s book is full of vivid observations that still resonate: early bouts of denial as the plague first enters London; the rich fleeing the city; the fearful exploited by quacks and con men; the poor dying in the streets; weakly enforced quarantines; moments of hope and human affection amid the creeping desolation.