Scott Martin

“Thus, in a middle course between these heights and depths, they drifted through life rather than lived, the prey of aimless days and sterile memories, like wandering shadows that could have acquired substance only by consenting to root themselves in the solid earth of their distress.”
― Albert Camus, The Plague

“Our fellow citizens had fallen into line, adapted themselves, as people say, to the situation, because there was no way of doing otherwise.”
― Albert Camus, The Plague

“Without memories, without hope, they lived for the moment only. Indeed, the here and now had come to mean everything to them. For there is no denying that the plague had gradually killed off in all of us the faculty not of love only but even of friendship. Naturally enough, since love asks something of the future, and nothing was left us but a series of present moments.”
― Albert Camus, The Plague

“It was done through official channels, and half-heartedly. What they’re short on is imagination. Officialdom can never cope with something really catastrophic.”
― Albert Camus, The Plague