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The Great Plague: A People's History
In this intimate history of the extraordinary Black Plague pandemic that swept through the British Isles in 1665, Evelyn Lord focuses on the plague’s effects on smaller towns, where every death was a singular blow affecting the entire community. Lord’s fascinating reconstruction of life during plague times presents the personal experiences of a wide range of individuals, from historical notables Samuel Pepys and Isaac Newton to common folk who tilled the land and ran the shops. She brings this dark era to vivid life through stories of loss and survival from those who grieved, those who fled, and those who hid to await their fate.
192 pages, Hardcover
Published April 29, 2014
126 people are currently reading
465 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 42 reviews
February 21, 2017
As someone with several degrees in microbiology, I find it aggravating that the author apparently didn't research the causative agent of the plague. In the final pages of this text, it is referred to as "the plague virus".
It has been well established that the plague was not a viral epidemic, in fact, it is widely considered to be one of the largest non-viral epidemics to have occurred in human history. Bubonic plague is caused by a bacteria...Yersinia Pestis..if the author can't even get such a basic fact right well I'd question the rest of it, considering that information is widely available on the internet and one would only be required to google it.
The book itself while tallying the deaths in Cambridge lacks warmth. I think at times it is forgotten that behind the names of the death toll there were people who suffered terribly. It reads almost like a list rather than a people's history of one of the greatest epidemics to strike humanity. There was no feeling to this book, no sense of loss as families were wiped out. While I don't expect history to be softened or indeed fictionalised, I think that the subject matter could have been handled better.
Overall an uninspiring read with at least one major factual inaccuracy. Not impressed.
It has been well established that the plague was not a viral epidemic, in fact, it is widely considered to be one of the largest non-viral epidemics to have occurred in human history. Bubonic plague is caused by a bacteria...Yersinia Pestis..if the author can't even get such a basic fact right well I'd question the rest of it, considering that information is widely available on the internet and one would only be required to google it.
The book itself while tallying the deaths in Cambridge lacks warmth. I think at times it is forgotten that behind the names of the death toll there were people who suffered terribly. It reads almost like a list rather than a people's history of one of the greatest epidemics to strike humanity. There was no feeling to this book, no sense of loss as families were wiped out. While I don't expect history to be softened or indeed fictionalised, I think that the subject matter could have been handled better.
Overall an uninspiring read with at least one major factual inaccuracy. Not impressed.
March 6, 2023
An interesting and quick read on the evolution of the plague in the late 1600s. It was not an in-depth view of what happened in specifics, but generalities. We must allow us to look at our dark days in our history that we may learn to do better in our future. Otherwise, we will only repeat the sorry mistakes of our past, some of which were very devastating to a great number of people. I believe this is worth the time to read, if not to just see some of the foolish beliefs we possessed in past years.
March 28, 2025
Putting names to numbers is so important when it comes to these histories. I appreciated getting to know these families. A tough read, but important.
November 25, 2019
As someone intrested in the science aspect of the plague at that time, I couldn't find what I was looking for. The book is more about families lived in that era, personally, it was really boring to read.
January 6, 2024
A very satisfying book.
To learn of the individuals of Cambridge in the 17th century whilst dealing with the plague was both heartbreaking and heartwarming. Heartbreaking from the tales of so much death and disease, heartwarming from the tales of love, friendship and community spirit in one of the worst parts of human history.
This book turned a few of the victims of the plague from statistical numbers to individual stories of people like you and me. Who thought exactly the same and would act exactly the same.
A good book!
To learn of the individuals of Cambridge in the 17th century whilst dealing with the plague was both heartbreaking and heartwarming. Heartbreaking from the tales of so much death and disease, heartwarming from the tales of love, friendship and community spirit in one of the worst parts of human history.
This book turned a few of the victims of the plague from statistical numbers to individual stories of people like you and me. Who thought exactly the same and would act exactly the same.
A good book!
May 21, 2024
Pretty niche but that’s my bag
June 28, 2023
Evelyn Lord took an interesting route to telling about The Great Plague of 1665 in England. Using journals and diaries as well as town and church records, she pieced together the human stories of what happened to the townspeople when the Black Death came. She names names, occupations, specifics about the events, but most particularly, she put faces to those who suffered and died during this pandemic.
While I thought the premise was a good idea, the execution came up short, and after a few chapters, the book became tedious, so I'll admit to a lot of skimming.
While I thought the premise was a good idea, the execution came up short, and after a few chapters, the book became tedious, so I'll admit to a lot of skimming.
July 29, 2021
Part factual history and part historical fiction. I think you would need to have general knowledge of Cambridge to truly appreciate this book. Not sure I would have given it four stars if it covered the plague in a city I didn’t know.
April 6, 2022
Well researched look into life in Cambridge in the mid 1600’s and the super bummer that was the Black Plague.
September 22, 2023
[3.5 stars]
May 9, 2025
Facts and interesting analysis was interspersed with long lists of names that often only appeared in the paragraph they were mentioned in. There was also a break down of different parishes and streets that felt too granular to understand what was going on.
January 10, 2025
Very well written and brief history of the 1665-6 plague outbreak in Cambridge. 1666 was the last major plague outbreak in Britain. There are various theories why, such as herd immunity, the cold winters of the Little Ice Age, and improvements in nutrition.
Cambridge had been affected by various plagues since the Black Death. Henry VI cancelled a visit to King's College due to the 1447 outbreak, and Erasmus fled to Cambridge after an outbreak in London in 1511
By 1665, there were 4 pest houses in Cambridge for the infected. Households were also quarantined for around 40 days / 5 weeks. The Privy Council's Plague Orders were implemented, with strangers forbidden from entering Cambridge without a certificate of health, 'searchers' appointed to locate victims and stray cats & dogs killed. Many fellows fled to manor houses in the countryside that their colleges owned, leaving the poor worst affected. Overall, 12% of the population died (920). St Clement's (Quayside area) was the worst hit in 1665.
Some anecdotes about Isaac Newton are included. He was a bad roommate apparently, staying up late (2-3am) conducting experiments. He almost burned down his accomodation by leaving candles lit when he wasn't there. On the other hand, Newton called his roommate 'a drunken sot'. The apple story first occurred in writings by his niece's husband, who claimed Newton had recalled the incident later in his life.
Cambridge had been affected by various plagues since the Black Death. Henry VI cancelled a visit to King's College due to the 1447 outbreak, and Erasmus fled to Cambridge after an outbreak in London in 1511
By 1665, there were 4 pest houses in Cambridge for the infected. Households were also quarantined for around 40 days / 5 weeks. The Privy Council's Plague Orders were implemented, with strangers forbidden from entering Cambridge without a certificate of health, 'searchers' appointed to locate victims and stray cats & dogs killed. Many fellows fled to manor houses in the countryside that their colleges owned, leaving the poor worst affected. Overall, 12% of the population died (920). St Clement's (Quayside area) was the worst hit in 1665.
Some anecdotes about Isaac Newton are included. He was a bad roommate apparently, staying up late (2-3am) conducting experiments. He almost burned down his accomodation by leaving candles lit when he wasn't there. On the other hand, Newton called his roommate 'a drunken sot'. The apple story first occurred in writings by his niece's husband, who claimed Newton had recalled the incident later in his life.
November 25, 2021
Descriptive history of the 1666 plague outbreak in England about primarily how it affected Cambridge and surrounding areas. Not just a list of who died, but instead a view of how daily life was disrupted and how people reacted. Pieced together from Cambridge archives, Lord richly recites a timeline of personal stories of how different people suffered during this immensely chaotic and tragic time.
October 18, 2022
Very well researched and seemed to be a thorough depiction of the 1665-1666 plague in Cambridge. For me, too much tedious details, but it gave me a very good overview of the horrible tragedies experienced in that era due to the plague.
December 11, 2025
I was disappointed by this book. Expecting something along the lines of The Five, by Halle Rubenhold, where we hear the voices of some of the people affected by the plague, what we actually got was a collection of information gathered that didn’t seem to have any point to it at all. It was as if the research was done incredibly well, but then all of the notes were printed with no editing, no storytelling and no joy.
The first part of the book is a detailed description of historic Cambridge. We hear about every shop, every house, every inn. Then there is some detail about some of the residents of Cambridge: their jobs, their fashions, their homes, their servants. But we don’t actually get to the plague really until chapter five. So much extra detail is added that I lost interest in the wider topic. I didn’t need a full list of Cambridge’s pubs. I also didn’t need an in depth explanation of metric and imperial conversions. An inch is an inch. I know that a pound is written lb. In fact that wasn’t the only part that came across as patronising and unnecessary. When you over-explain to that degree, your reader is lost to you. Unfortunately, on top of this, the audiobook narrator didn’t help the situation. On 1.5 speed it was still very droning and dry.
The information we do get about plague victims is at times sensitive and detailed, but for the most part comes across as cold, and often just a list of deaths. There really needed to be some considered structure and some story telling here. There is so much wider context, in seemingly random order, that the focused context for each family is lost, and this is a shame. The research has been done, the information is there, but this isn’t a book so much about the plague as a chaotic history of Cambridge in a particular era. The plague could have been one part of a book about Cambridge in the 1600s. I’m sure that residents or students might enjoy the history of a place they know, and take a lot from comparing then and now.
The first part of the book is a detailed description of historic Cambridge. We hear about every shop, every house, every inn. Then there is some detail about some of the residents of Cambridge: their jobs, their fashions, their homes, their servants. But we don’t actually get to the plague really until chapter five. So much extra detail is added that I lost interest in the wider topic. I didn’t need a full list of Cambridge’s pubs. I also didn’t need an in depth explanation of metric and imperial conversions. An inch is an inch. I know that a pound is written lb. In fact that wasn’t the only part that came across as patronising and unnecessary. When you over-explain to that degree, your reader is lost to you. Unfortunately, on top of this, the audiobook narrator didn’t help the situation. On 1.5 speed it was still very droning and dry.
The information we do get about plague victims is at times sensitive and detailed, but for the most part comes across as cold, and often just a list of deaths. There really needed to be some considered structure and some story telling here. There is so much wider context, in seemingly random order, that the focused context for each family is lost, and this is a shame. The research has been done, the information is there, but this isn’t a book so much about the plague as a chaotic history of Cambridge in a particular era. The plague could have been one part of a book about Cambridge in the 1600s. I’m sure that residents or students might enjoy the history of a place they know, and take a lot from comparing then and now.
August 7, 2025
3.5⭐️
I made the mistake of not reading the preface, and spent much of the book confused about where the author was getting her information about the temperaments and everyday lives and quirks of random poor people who were illiterate and could not have recorded their experience. Eventually, I decided to read the preface to see if the author was making an intentional choice to make up little stories to make the lives of the people in statistics more colourful and seem more real, or if she maybe had some sources she was not citing. The former turned out to be the case. I’m not sure how I feel about the rewriting of the lives of people who don’t have the ability to leave a record of their lives, particularly when the descriptions are negative.
I think most of my enjoyment of this book came from having lived in Cambridge, and feeling a little connected to the locations. The little stories the author made up to flesh out the names from records were very hit or miss, but did occasionally get a strong emotional response. Reading about entire families devastated by the plague really makes you reconsider your own blessings and feel very sorry for the people affected, even when they lived so long ago.
I made the mistake of not reading the preface, and spent much of the book confused about where the author was getting her information about the temperaments and everyday lives and quirks of random poor people who were illiterate and could not have recorded their experience. Eventually, I decided to read the preface to see if the author was making an intentional choice to make up little stories to make the lives of the people in statistics more colourful and seem more real, or if she maybe had some sources she was not citing. The former turned out to be the case. I’m not sure how I feel about the rewriting of the lives of people who don’t have the ability to leave a record of their lives, particularly when the descriptions are negative.
I think most of my enjoyment of this book came from having lived in Cambridge, and feeling a little connected to the locations. The little stories the author made up to flesh out the names from records were very hit or miss, but did occasionally get a strong emotional response. Reading about entire families devastated by the plague really makes you reconsider your own blessings and feel very sorry for the people affected, even when they lived so long ago.
November 16, 2023
*** Possible Spoilers ***
I quite enjoyed this book but I don't think I can recommend it. It's dry, dry, dry. Most of it consists of naming people who died during the plague and giving some account of their possessions based on their will or some accounting. I think it might be best to treat this as a reference book, useful perhaps for acquiring an academic knowledge of the period and possibly for writing papers, but hardly the sort of thing you'd want to sit and read of an evening. I listened to the audio recording and although I can't say I liked it, it had it's uses. I could do chores and the narrator would be chatting in the background listing events and various deaths. It made for a certain ambient background noise I found quite pleasing. If you want someone to rattle on while you go about other things I think you might find this book quite useful but it's not for entertainment.
I quite enjoyed this book but I don't think I can recommend it. It's dry, dry, dry. Most of it consists of naming people who died during the plague and giving some account of their possessions based on their will or some accounting. I think it might be best to treat this as a reference book, useful perhaps for acquiring an academic knowledge of the period and possibly for writing papers, but hardly the sort of thing you'd want to sit and read of an evening. I listened to the audio recording and although I can't say I liked it, it had it's uses. I could do chores and the narrator would be chatting in the background listing events and various deaths. It made for a certain ambient background noise I found quite pleasing. If you want someone to rattle on while you go about other things I think you might find this book quite useful but it's not for entertainment.
July 7, 2023
As a read I quite enjoyed this book. Certainly the fictional elements made the opening section engaging as the author tried to make the victims human.
The problem is that the repeated made up stories become samey and the book becomes a catalogue of victims, which is what I think the author was trying to avoid. The fake empathy created by the fictional elements wears out.
The fake stories are also frustrating: they distract from the real stories where we have them. Several times I looked to see the source of a story in the endnotes and found it was parish records or the hearth tax. I find it unlikely they contain information on the character of people.
I stress I enjoyed it, but it isn't history. I feel there could have been a good novel using this information or a good history book. This is neither. Enjoyable despite this.
The problem is that the repeated made up stories become samey and the book becomes a catalogue of victims, which is what I think the author was trying to avoid. The fake empathy created by the fictional elements wears out.
The fake stories are also frustrating: they distract from the real stories where we have them. Several times I looked to see the source of a story in the endnotes and found it was parish records or the hearth tax. I find it unlikely they contain information on the character of people.
I stress I enjoyed it, but it isn't history. I feel there could have been a good novel using this information or a good history book. This is neither. Enjoyable despite this.
July 13, 2023
I bought this when I was in Cambridge about a month ago. The book sounded interesting as it was written by a local historian. Have to say that it sounds more interesting than it actually is. The book is meticulously researched but incredibly dry and boring. It kind of read like a list of people who died because of the plague but I didn't learn nearly enough of them to actually care about them which is kind of bad because they were actual human beings who died on plague. I think I would have enjoyed reading fictional book about this topic more. Anyway, super interesting and well researched topic and the book offers interesting tidbits about life in Cambridge in 17th century but bit of a drag to read.
June 20, 2025
There were a fair amount of errors in my kindle edition of this book, e.g., missing words, extra words, incorrect punctuation usage, and factual errors such as referring to bacteria as a virus, which should have been caught in editing.
I also feel that the premise of this book is a bit misleading. I would argue that the majority of the information refers to Cambridge before the Great Plague, not during, and the during bits I felt a little unsure about because it didn't reference a lot of literature, so I was left wondering how much of it was fiction? what was the guesswork based on?
Still, i gave 2 stars because i did get a bit of interesting info on daily life of more middling and working class families.
I also feel that the premise of this book is a bit misleading. I would argue that the majority of the information refers to Cambridge before the Great Plague, not during, and the during bits I felt a little unsure about because it didn't reference a lot of literature, so I was left wondering how much of it was fiction? what was the guesswork based on?
Still, i gave 2 stars because i did get a bit of interesting info on daily life of more middling and working class families.
November 11, 2023
A disappointing and fairly boring read. Though the author states at the beginning that some scenes will be embellished to bring characters to life this is few and far between and occasionally so fanciful that it became a little cringeworthy. For the most part this book merely contains facts from the record presented in a fairly monotonous way. The listing of plague deaths is one thing but there is also a lot of superfluous material in here - some of it does serve to round out the understanding of seventeenth century life but a lot of it felt to me as though the author was padding out the book as there simply wasn’t enough to say about the actual plague.
January 10, 2024
This is clearly a meticulously researched book but sorry to say that it isn't an engaging read. It feels that there are just too many unrelated snippets and there is quite a lot of repetition. Indeed I read the first three and a half chapters then skipped to the last chapter 'The final toll'. These were definitely worth reading but that was enough for me. This is despite living in Cambridge and recognising many landmarks.
It is a pity since I'm sure Lord put in an enormous amount of time and scholarship into this work.
It is a pity since I'm sure Lord put in an enormous amount of time and scholarship into this work.
November 4, 2024
A thoroughly researched documentation of the 1665 plague in England, focusing on the Cambridge area. It gave me a vivid picture of life in Cambridge in the 1660s and how that got devastated by the Great Plague. Would give it a 5-star , if some of the chapters towards the end were fleshed out a little more, rather than being more like just factual data of death.
February 25, 2025
I listened to it via audible and it was hard to keep track of. I think simply because it the organization didn’t lend to a narrator so well, but it was also not as exciting as I had hoped. As exciting as a book about a plague would be. Though clearly well done I just felt it could use some more explanation in a few places and less in others.
August 31, 2025
3.75/5 stars
I think it did a decent job what it set out to do, bringing the everyday lives of the common people to the forefront when discussing the great plague. I do think it's limited in what could be explored because so much is just names and numbers. I do think it humanized what people went through during this time and enjoyed it.
I think it did a decent job what it set out to do, bringing the everyday lives of the common people to the forefront when discussing the great plague. I do think it's limited in what could be explored because so much is just names and numbers. I do think it humanized what people went through during this time and enjoyed it.
September 20, 2023
the Plague in Cambridge Eng in 1665
Fascinating telling of how Cambridge England and its citizens survived or didn’t through the Plague of 1665 and 1666. The book brings the statistics and turns the cold numbers into families, and individuals.
Fascinating telling of how Cambridge England and its citizens survived or didn’t through the Plague of 1665 and 1666. The book brings the statistics and turns the cold numbers into families, and individuals.
November 2, 2023
This was meant to show what it was like when the plague of 1665-1666 hit a small town. Instead of making us feel like we were there, it really was a dry list of who died when. Glad to know a little more about this time and place, but felt like a chore to read.
August 25, 2024
Interesting bc I live here but never went into depth about anything just recounted a bunch of random people’s lives in sparse detail who died of the plague. There wasn’t much substance either scientifically or anthropologically
August 11, 2025
This was more about logging the families who died rather than really interact with the nature of the plague itself and how it affected society at large. Interesting, but there are better options out there, so I wouldn’t recommend it.
December 28, 2025
Cambridge Great Plague
Different levels of Plague from the for infections of London to the mid-sized infections of the towns, to the small rural farms of the country side of farm workers! Plague disrupted life at all levels!
Different levels of Plague from the for infections of London to the mid-sized infections of the towns, to the small rural farms of the country side of farm workers! Plague disrupted life at all levels!
Displaying 1 - 30 of 42 reviews