'The Plague' & Listening to John Prine

by Bill Doughty–

The COVID-19 virus killed John Prine April 7, 2020.

Prine, one of the best American songwriters, was a military Veteran. He served in the Army in West Germany in the 60s during the Vietnam War and became a voice for justice, writing songs such as "Paradise," "Some Humans Ain't Human," "Unwed Fathers," "The Great Compromise," and "Sam Stone" ("Sam Stone came home/ To the wife and family/ After serving in the conflict overseas...").

Prine balanced humor and pathos, and always honored pure American country music. He wrote and sang "Please Don't Bury Me," "Illegal Smile," "Your Flag Decal Won't Get You Into Heaven Anymore," and "Dear Abby" ("Dear Abby, dear Abby/ My feet are too long/ My hair's falling out and my rights are all wrong/ My friends they all tell me that I've no friends at all...").

Next to Bob Dylan, as a storyteller-songwriter he perhaps had no parallel. Just listen to his sad-lonely "Hello In There," "Donald and Lydia," "Souvenirs," "Mexican Home," "Lake Marie," and "Far From Me": ("And the sky is black and still now/ On the hill where the angels sing/ Ain't it funny how an old broken bottle/ Looks just like a diamond ring...").

Prine circa 1970s

Prine also co-wrote, with Steve Goodman, David Allan Coe's "You Never Even Call Me By My Name." But one of his masterpieces is "Angel From Montgomery," performed by, among others, Bonnie Raitt and Emmylou Harris ("Just give me one thing/ That I can hold on to/ To believe in this livin'/ Is just a hard way to go...").

Those lyrics share the theme of Albert Camus's "The Plague" ("La Peste," 1948,  translated by Stuart Gilbert, Alfred A. Knopf; Vintage, Random House). Camus is a rewarding read and brief escape for these COVID days of mandated self-quarantine. Like Prine's lyrics, Camus's prose captures surreal slices of life, often with deep melancholy, and, to misquote Hanna Arendt, a "banality of reality in a time of pestilence."

Camus in 1957

Camus writes of an imaginary plague in the town of Oran, French Algeria, in the 1940s. "The Plague" follows Dr. Bernard Rieux and other characters who all delay facing reality and taking action at first, despite obvious signs highlighted by hundreds of dead rats. "...Many concessions had been made to a desire not to alarm the public." The Prefect (government official) refuses to realize the danger of the outbreak, pushes a failed plan, and then tries to avoid responsibility. Eventually people self-exile in their homes; "commerce, too, had died with the plague."

Camus writes of "manpower" shortfalls, overwhelmed mortuaries, mass graves, use of cotton masks, despondency, fatigue, and faux therapies, including "peppermint lozenges." The dignity and dedication of the health care provider is at the center of the narrative.

In a "Week of Prayer" in Oran, in which people are encouraged to gather in church, the local priest, Father Paneloux preaches a  passionate sermon that starts, "Calamity has come on you, my brethren, and, my brethren, you deserve it." The priest blames the "scourge" on nonbelievers and "enemies of God."

Rome plague angel of death Levasseur, Jules-Elie Delaunay

Paneloux says the people have been "sentenced, for an unknown crime, to an indeterminate period of punishment." But as the story unfolds, the priest has a revelation, especially after working closely with Dr. Rieux. "What's true of all the evils in the world is true of plague as well. It helps men to rise above themselves," Camus writes.

"The evil that is in the world always comes out of ignorance, and good intentions may do as much harm as malevolence if they lack understanding." As a result of the devastating outbreak, one of Camus's characters says, "All I maintain is that on this earth there are pestilences and there are victims, and it's up to us, so far as possible, not to join forces with the pestilences." People, including key character Tarrou, volunteer to be part of "sanitary groups" to help others as a "logical" way to confront the disease.

Though the people want to return to the life they'd known as soon as possible, the infection returns, evolving from bubonic to pneumonic. Poor people suffer proportionately more than the privileged, wealthy population. As people become more frustrated, it "made everyone aware that an ugly mood was developing among us."

"Meanwhile the authorities had another cause for anxiety in the difficulty of maintaining the food-supply. Profiteers were taking a hand and purveying at enormous prices essential foodstuffs not available in the shops. The result was that poor families were in great straits, while the rich went short of practically nothing. Thus, whereas plague by its impartial ministrations should have promoted equality among our townsfolk, it now had the opposite effect and, thanks to the habitual conflict of cupidities, exacerbated the sense of injustice rankling in men's hearts."

"The newspapers, needless to say, complied with the instructions given them: optimism at all costs," Camus writes. "To form a correct idea about the courage and composure talked about by our journalists you had only to visit one of the quarantine depots or isolation camps established by our authorities."

In his other fiction and nonfiction, Camus wrote for the French Resistance during World War II, and against totalitarian communism after the war. Knowing that, it's easy to see the symbolism and metaphors to war and peace, superstition and logic, terror and freedom, and fear and courage.
In "The Plague," Camus also paces his story with beautiful hues of prose. For example:

"Once they were on the pier they saw the sea spread out before them, a gently heaving expanse of deep-piled velvet, supple and sleek as a creature of the wild. They sat down on a boulder facing the open. Slowly the waters rose and sank, and with their tranquil breathing sudden oily glints formed and flickered over the surface in a haze of broken lights. Before them the darkness stretched out into infinity. Rieux could feel under his hand the gnarled, weather-worn visage of the rocks ... After the first shock of cold had passed and he came back to the surface the water seemed tepid. When he had taken a few strokes he found that the sea was warm that night with the warmth of autumn seas and borrow from the shore the accumulated heat of the long days of summer. The movement of his feet left a foaming wake as he swam steadily ahead, and the water slipped along his arms to close in tightly on his legs ... Rieux lay on his back and stayed motionless, gazing up at the dome of sky lit by the stars and moon. He drew a deep breath."

Among other themes explored in "The Plague": reality and illusion, life and death, love and friendship, knowledge, memories, separation, and good and evil. Similar themes can be found in the passionate lyrics of John Prine.

Prine's tender, funny, sad, and sometimes absurd revelations about life are a source of joy in these trying times. His song "Summer's End" about separation is especially poignant this weekend:

     Valentines, break hearts and minds at random
     That ol' Easter egg ain't got a leg to stand on
     Well I can see that you can't win for trying
     And New Year's Eve is bound to leave you crying

     Come on home
     Come on home
     No you don't have to be alone
     Just come on home

Thankfully, John Prine left us an impressive number of recordings, including great live performances and some recent duet collections, including with Iris Dement. "In Spite of Ourselves," sung with Dement, is one of his funniest, saltiest creations: ("She likes ketchup on her scrambled eggs/ Swears like a sailor when she shaves her legs/ She takes a lickin' and keeps on tickin'/ I'm never gonna let her go...").

Prine inspired other new Folk/Americana artists, including, among others, Jason Isbell, Brandi Carlile, and Prine protege Sturgill Simpson. Yesterday, Simpson announced he is self-quarantining till April 19, diagnosed with COVID-19. Simpson coupled his announcement with a passionate complaint about his inability to get a coronavirus test until April 6 even though he has had symptoms that brought him to the ER March 13.

Navy veteran Simpson's "A Sailor's Guide to Earth" album follows Prine and Camus themes of self-awareness, resilience and redemption. Simpson's "Guide" features a song, "Sea Stories," about a WestPac cruise and becoming a shellback ("Sailing out on them high seas/ Feels just like being born..."). Simpson describes what he still carries with him from his transition from "pollywog" to "shellback," wrote:

     Memories make forever stains
     Still got salt running through my veins
     I've got sea stories
     And my shellback, too

Camus and Prine wrote existential stories while carrying their own "shellbacks." World War II influenced Camus, who saw France invaded by the Nazis and witnessed the rise of Soviet communism after the war. 

Photo by Sgt. Ken Scar

The Vietnam War affected Army veteran Prine. In his concerts he would tell stories and provide commentary, including what it was like visiting the Vietnam War Memorial, looking up the names of friends he lost in the war and the power of seeing ones own reflection in the black marble.

Both creators faced multiple life's traumas. Both painted their words from a surrealistic, sometimes absurdist, palette. Case in point: both Camus and Prine brought parrots in bars into their stories. From "The Plague": the room was empty, the air humming with flies; in a yellow cage on the bar a parrot squatted on its perch, all its feathers drooping." From Prine's "Space Monkey": "In a karaoke bar having a few drinks with some of his friends/ There was the dog that flew Sputnik/ And a blind red-headed, one legged parrot/ Who had done some minor research for Dow Chemical..."

In this time of COVID, we remember Camus, who can help us understand what has happened and how we react, logically and thoughtfully and with a sense of humor intact, making informed decisions based on science.

And we remember John Prine for his existential story songs that could make us laugh, cry, contemplate, and imagine, tongue-in-cheek, life and beyond. From "When I Get to Heaven": "When I get to heaven, I'm gonna shake God's hand/ Thank him for more blessings than one man can stand... // Yeah when I get to heaven, I'm gonna take that wristwatch off my arm/ What are you gonna do with time after you've bought the farm?..."

"Pollywogs" aboard the amphibious assault ship USS Wasp (LHD 1) run the obstacle course Nov 25, 2017 to become "shellbacks" during a crossing the line ceremony. The crossing-the-line ceremony is a naval tradition which recognizes when members of the crew cross the equator for the first time. Wasp transited to Sasebo, Japan to conduct a turnover with the USS Bonhomme Richard (LHD 6) as the forward-deployed flagship of the amphibious forces in the U.S. 7th Fleet area of operations. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Levingston Lewis/Released)