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Yeah, plagues and famines are really bad at driving solidarity. They tend to do the opposite. I also had high hopes in the beginning too. But I feared that it w
by Balgair 1y ago
Yeah, plagues and famines are really bad at driving solidarity. They tend to do the opposite. I also had high hopes in the beginning too. But I feared that it would be like the Plague of Milan in 1630.
That particular plague is in Il Promisi Sposi ( The Betrothed), the Italian national epic. Really, it's a bit picardesque. But the first hand descriptions of that plague are just so damn similar to what the COVID was like. I remember reading it years before the pandemic and thinking that I was glad we weren't so mideaval anymore. Now it read it again ( it's only a few chapters in the book) and I feel more like one veteran talking to another about their war.
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/45334 https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/45334
Chapter 31 is where the plague part starts, you needn't really read the rest, but it's a good summer book all the same
- tony69 1y ago*I Promessi Sposi (spelling)
- Balgair 1y agoGracias ;)
- ZeroGravitas 1y agoI checked to see if there was a Standard Ebooks version, as they're generally nicer to read than Gutenberg (though translated works are a weak spot in both projects as you need the translation to fall out of copyright too). However Standard Ebooks didn't have it. They did have a page about how they want sponsors or volunteers to help create it which I found interesting in itself: https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/alessandro-manzoni/the-betrothed https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/alessandro-manzoni/the-bet...
- igor47 1y agoWhoa thanks, I hadn't heard of standard ebooks, looks very useful
- evklein 1y agoCamus's 'The Plague' had me laughing when I read it last year - he basically nailed the feeling completely. Though I think where his diverges from reality is that in the Covid-verse we never really got back to any sense of normal. Vibes got shifted.