L'etat

I hope that I read this correctly otherwise this is going to be a completely irrelevant and useless comment.

When I was reading L'etat de siege, I noticed that the character of 'la peste' is also sometimes referred to as 'l'homme'. If you check the 'distribution' at the beginning of the play, I think that this is correct because there isn't a character listed as 'l'homme'. As 'l'homme' translates as man or mankind, it is interesting that Camus decides to parallel mankind with la peste in such an obvious fashion. Camus clearly suggests that man is its own downfall and this would have been particularly pertinent at the time as an allegory about totalitarianism, Franco etc. As others have previously commented, L'etat de siege is much more obvious in the points it makes, especially with the strong binary opposition of good/evil and I think the way in which Camus equates 'la peste' and 'l'homme' together is an important part of this.