I finally finished the book last Sunday. My thoughts are most similar to Caleb's. Somewhere around 30% it really slowed down and I thought I'll never finish this.... But, it quickly turned around, and I read the rest of the book over 2 days. I really enjoyed it. I've never studied philosophy so it was a bit challenging to me to try to separate and analyze the overlapping and sometimes contradictory themes of existentialism, humanism and absurdism. Camus's life was filled with suffering and hardships so one can see from his biography how it influenced his thinking and attraction to these themes as well as loneliness and exile.
My appreciation has grown in the last several days as I've been reflecting on the roles and actions of the different characters. I didn't get an impression while reading that the characters were under-developed. Who would have guessed in the beginning that the asthmatic Spaniard and old man who spits on cats would be candidates for saint-hood? I found the transformation of the priest interesting as well as the proclamation of his death being a "doubtful case". The climax of the innocent child Jacques's death was very moving, and his magistrate father is changed by events. Interesting how Camus made one feel sympathetic towards the criminal Cottard and his tragic ending.
I think the book still has meaning today and did not seem out-dated. I could see myself reading this book again in the future as a reminder of its themes similar to how I like to reread some dystopian classics. I found this recent op-ed in the New York Times as an example of how one columnist suggests the book might be applied to today's current events.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/14/op...and-panic.html
Quote:
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He knew that this happy crowd was unaware of something that one can read in books, which is that the plague bacillus never dies or vanishes entirely, that it can remain dormant for dozens of years in furniture or clothing, that it waits patiently in bedrooms, cellars, trunks, handkerchiefs and old papers, and that perhaps the day will come when, for the instruction or misfortune of mankind, the plague will rouse its rats and send them to die in some well-contented city.
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