The history of the great plague in London in the year 1665

Written decades after the event, this book is a fictional eyewitness account of the plague epidemic that struck London in 1665. A narrator, signing himself H. F., describes the city's fear, the closing up of infected houses, the carts for the dead, and the flight of those who could afford to leave. Mixing figures, rumours, anecdotes and reflection, it gives a gripping sense of a city under strain. It is often read as both a historical record and a work of imaginative reporting.