Books: Community of Death

THE PLAGUE (278 pp.)—Albert Camus —Knopf ($3).

The citizens of Oran found it something of a nuisance that their streets should be overrun with thousands of dying rats. "From basements, cellars and sewers they emerged in long wavering files into the light of day, swayed helplessly, then did a sort of pirouette and fell dead at the feet of the horrified onlookers."

Then, one day, the trek from the sewers ceased, and everyone felt absurdly lighthearted. Everyone, that is, but Dr. Bernard Rieux, leading character of Albert Camus' latest novel. A strange fever had...