A Journal of the Plague Year

Written by Daniel Defoe

Narrated by Shea Taylor

“Another plague year would reconcile all these differences; a close conversing with death, or with diseases that threaten death, would scum off the gall from our tempers, remove the animosities among us, and bring us to see with differing eyes than those which we looked on things with before.”

In 1665, London was struck by the bubonic plague, an epidemic that was the last major instance of the bubonic plague in England. This instance of the plague killed 100,000 people over a year and a half, and was transmitted through rats that ran through the city.

A Journal of the Plague Year was presented as an eyewitness account of the epidemic through the eyes of Londoners, though Daniel DeFoe was only a child during the plague. This book was likely based on the journals and writings of his uncle, but is written with factual specificity and authority that place it among other contemporary accounts of the year. Whether it should be called fiction or nonfiction has been widely debated due to its astonishing amount of factual details, but its ultimate fictitious nature of the authorship.

This journal, whether considered fact or fiction, remains relevant centuries later in a world experiencing similar events and casualties. The words within the journal echo the same sentiments as those experiencing the modern pandemic have felt and expressed. Delving into the observations of the past generations gives current readers a sense of shared suffering through the centuries, and may impart retroactive wisdom that is remarkably relevant for current times.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Spotify Audiobooks
• Release date: Nov 17, 2020
• ISBN: 9781094254517

Daniel Defoe

Daniel Defoe was born at the beginning of a period of history known as the English Restoration, so-named because it was when King Charles II restored the monarchy to England following the English Civil War and the brief dictatorship of Oliver Cromwell. Defoe’s contemporaries included Isaac Newton and Samuel Pepys.

Reviews for A Journal of the Plague Year

[Paul Lyons · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Very interesting. Defoe gives graphic and humane anecdotes as well as a general overview of the 1665 plague in London. Many issues are comparable with COVID, particularly the locking up of houses and the difficulties of counting the numbers of dead and infected accurately. Defoe's style does good things to the brain and is very well read in this recording. Also--anyone who knows modern London will be interested in the various locales and street names mentioned in Defoe's description.