Пандемия и литература
On Pandemics and Literature

Summary/Abstract: What marks the literature of plague, pestilence, and pandemic is a commitment to try and forge if not some sense of explanation, than at least a sense of meaning out of the raw experience of panic, horror, and despair. Narratives calm down and distract, but also state of the feebleness of our civilization. Telling of stories is a reminder that sense still exists somewhere, that if there is not meaning outside of the quarantine zone there’s at least meaning within our invented stories. Narratives manifest that plague upends society more than any revolution could and Illness sees no social stratification. They offers testimonies, explains, warns, confirms that we have been in this world and are still here. Fiction can preserve and recreate a world that is falling apart. Sickness reminds us that the world is not ours; the literature insists that it sometimes belongs to us.

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