The coronavirus, fair to say, isn't good for the economy: not for the economies of individual nations, and not for the world economy as a whole. But that's not to say that every industry has taken a hit. This is hardly the worst time in history to produce and sell toilet paper, for instance, nor to furnish the packages of necessities demanded by "preppers" who foresee the end of society as we know it. One probably wouldn't wish to take the place of the makers of Corona beer right now, but despite the now-unfortunate brand name, their sales, too, have stayed strong. And for publishers around the world who have been considering a reprint of Albert Camus' La Peste, now is most assuredly the time.

The Plague, as it's titled in English, "follows the inhabitants of Oran, an Algerian town that is sealed off by quarantine as it is ravaged by bubonic plague," writes The Guardian's Alison Flood. "Penguin is rushing through a reprint of its English translation to meet demand," but last week stock had already sold out on Amazon.

"The publisher added that sales in the last week of February were up by 150% on the same period in 2019." The novel has also become a bestseller in Italy — a country especially hard hit by the virus — and sales "have also risen sharply in France, according to the French books statistics website Edistat," to the tune of "around 300% on the previous year." I live in South Korea, one of the countries most severely hit by the coronavirus, and recently wrote an essay about reading The Plague here in the Los Angeles Review of Books.

Though Camus tells a story set in real city and about a specific disease, his literary rendering of a community isolated and under invisible siege has the universal quality of myth. Each main character — the tireless doctor Rieux, the suicidal-turned-gregarious Cottard, the humanist outsider Tarrou — exemplifies a different arc of individual reaction to the crisis. Even in Seoul I noticed certain parallels: Camus' description of the "commercial character of the town" and the work habits of its people, of the sudden runs on particular items thought to have preventative properties (peppermint lozenges, in the novel), of the fierce public attacks on the government whenever the struggle turns especially harrowing. Readers the world over will feel a grim sense of recognition at the Oran authorities' unwillingness to call the plague a plague, due to "the usual taboo, of course; the public mustn’t be alarmed, that wouldn’t do at all.”

Camus wrote The Plague in 1947, five years after his best-known work The Stranger and just three years after the real Oran's most recent outbreak of the bubonic plague. (You can get a primer on Camus' life, work, and reluctantly existentialist philosophy in the animated School of Life video above.) Like The Stranger, and like all great works of art, The Plague permits more than one interpretation: J.M. Coetzee suggests one reading of the novel "as being about what the French called ‘the brown plague’ of the German occupation, and more generally as about the ease with which a community can be infected by a bacillus-like ideology." But each era has its own reading of The Plague — in the year 2003, for instance, critic Marina Warner offered it up as a "study in terrorism" — and of all its readers and re-readers in this historical moment, how many could resist an entirely more literal interpretation?

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Based in Seoul, Colin Marshall writes and broadcasts on cities, language, and culture. His projects include the book The Stateless City: a Walk through 21st-Century Los Angeles and the video series The City in Cinema. Follow him on Twitter at @colinmarshall or on Facebook.

Why You Should Read The Plague, the Albert Camus Novel the Coronavirus Has Made a Bestseller Again is a post from: Open Culture. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Google Plus, or get our Daily Email. And don't miss our big collections of Free Online Courses, Free Online Movies, Free eBooks, Free Audio Books, Free Foreign Language Lessons, and MOOCs.

All images © Shane Drinkwater

Australian artist Shane Drinkwater writes on his website that when it comes to painting, he’s interested in the “making.” Using a system of lines, dashes, numbers, and circles, Drinkwater creates works that often appear as astronomical maps of imagined star systems. Abstract stars form repeated patterns around vibrant planets. The artist allows the act of painting to dictate how the cosmic compositions land on his canvas, and the results are visually arresting.

“I delve into the act of painting with a minimum repertoire of visual elements aiming for a maximum visual intensity,” Drinkwater writes. “Ideas and images appear through the making of the work, language becomes unnecessary, I let the work speak for me.” To see more of these cool maps and other paintings by Shane Drinkwater, follow the artist on Instagram. (via This Isn’t Happiness)

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Medicinal and industrial ochres being processed and archived, Greece. All Images: Heidi Gustafson

Washington-based artist and researcher Heidi Gustafson forages, processes, and catalogs natural mineral samples for the Early Futures Ocher Archive. Ranging in color based on its elemental structure, ochre is crushed into a powder and used in various applications from art to medicine. With over 550 samples, Gustafson’s ever-growing archive has become a collaborative project with contributions from archaeologists, scientists, and creatives from around the world.

As each sample enters the collection, it is labeled with a corresponding number. In a notebook, Gustafson records where the ochre is from, who sourced or collected it, any historic or contemporary uses, and other relevant information. Gustafson grinds the iron-rich ochre into pigments, which she sells to artists and also uses for her own work. Processed samples are added to glass vials and organized by region or dominate mineral type. Gustafson also considers the material for its artistic, spiritual, and scientific properties. “More importantly, I build a relationship to the materials,” she tells Colossal. “I’m trying to understand their unique behaviors, the microbial communities they host and support, their tonal ranges, their historical uses and many other diverse features.”

Pigment studies, Left – foraged pigments from northern Washington, USA, Right- foraged pigments from Hormuz, Iran.

The archive was officially formed in 2017 when Gustafson relocated to the Pacific Northwest, but working with the material is more than a hobby or intellectual pursuit—it is a calling. After having a dream about ochre, she initially wrote it off. Other experiences and anxieties about climate change inspired her to research exactly what ochre was and what it was used for. “I realized that ochre and pigments were at the heart of art and aesthetic experience,” Gustafson tells Colossal, adding that the mineral has been linked to complex mental processing in modern homo sapiens. “Protecting ochre’s vast capacities and impact on human creativity, feels like Earth’s mandate to me,” Gustafson continued. “I didn’t ‘come up’ with the idea for this project, it came to me and I felt responsible to do my best to understand and listen to that call.”

To tag along on foraging trips and for updates on the archive, follow Heidi Gustafson on Instagram. To shop for pigment sets and other products from the project or to contribute samples of your own, visit the Early Futures website.

Gathering orange ochre, Oregon, USA.

Ochre contribution, protective isibomvu used by healers, from Johannesburg, South Africa.

Gathering blue ochre, with artist Scott Sutton, Oregon, USA.

Ochre contributions, gathered by Caro Ross, England.

Pigment study, red ochre, world-wide.

Ochre Archive (close-up)

Gathering yellow ochre, Arizona, USA.

Gathering various ochre, British Columbia, Canada.

Oh, email. Love it or hate it, email remains “the backbone of what we do, especially when you get into a managerial position,” for most professionals, says Victor Pineiro, the creative director of Big Spaceship, a marketing agency in Brooklyn. 

This extends to connecting two people who have never met IRL, which is often the only realistic way to introduce two busy people. While a good email intro “makes you feel seen,” says Erin McKean, the founder of the online dictionary Wordnik.com, “a bad introduction makes you feel like a subcontractor in a business you don’t run. I’ve gotten some intros in the past that were essentially ‘Please do some tedious and unrewarding work for this person so I don’t have to.’”

Luckily, how to write and respond to introductions over email is a skill that can be learned. Below, professionals who have sent (and received) their fair share of introductory emails share tips for mastering the craft.

But first, a note: When receiving an introductory email, it’s important to remember the stakes, which are usually, in the grand scheme of things, quite low. Yes, receiving a poorly constructed introduction is annoying and potentially time-consuming. “But we need to be much more vigilant about our own behavior and much more forgiving of others’ behavior,” says William Schwalbe, who co-wrote Send: Why People Email So Badly and How to Do It with David Shipley. “As a fundamental rule, there are worse problems in the world than people we know trying to introduce us to someone.”

On to strategies for how to do email introductions right. 

***

Ask for opt-ins.

As a general rule, check that both parties are receptive to the introduction before facilitating the connection. “Make sure the people being intro-ed know this email is coming,” says Polina Marinova, an editor at Fortune Magazine and the creator of The Profile, a newsletter that rounds up the best profiles on the Internet each week. “Do not surprise.” 

In other words, the first step in a successful email introduction is rarely the introductory email itself. Instead, start by messaging the sought-after party and asking “‘Hey, I’d love to introduce Jane to you; she’s working on a new project that I thought you’d love to hear about, and she has questions about X, Y, and Z that you could be really helpful in answering for her,’” McKean says. “And then you wait.” You can follow-up once or twice, “but if you don’t hear back, you drop it.”

Pre-intro checks don’t always have to be formal. If you know one of the parties well, it can be as simple as sending a text or a message on Slack. No matter the method, “it’s great to get a heads up, especially if someone is very busy or super senior to make it easier on everybody,” Pineiro says. 

As the connector, it’s also good protocol to make the mechanisms of the introduction clear to both parties: “I don’t mind if someone asks for a favor, but don’t pretend you are doing me a favor if I am doing you a favor,” Schwalbe says. And if you are asking for a favor, make sure it’s a request worth making. “Most bad intros are bad because either the person making the intro or the person being introduced conveys a sense of unwarranted entitlement to your time and energy,” McKean says. 

Should you receive an intro request you’d like to decline, go ahead and say no. “‘Gosh, I wish I could,’ is a great universal response,” Schwalbe says. You can explain yourself if you’d like, “but you don’t have to give a reason.”

Evaluate the power dynamics.

Like snowflakes, no two introductory emails are exactly the same. One of the most important variables is the power dynamics between the two people being introduced. Oftentimes, there is a clear imbalance, such as when you are connecting a job seeker with a potential job giver, Schwalbe says. In cases like this, it’s crucial to privately check in with both parties beforehand, especially the person with more power to ensure they are up for the introduction. 

In instances where the power dynamic is equal, Schwalbe says he doesn’t always pre-clear an introduction because it’s less transactional in nature. Just make sure the power dynamics are truly level. “If one person is immediately going to want something from the other person, even if they are of equal standing, then it reverts to case one,” Schwalbe says. 

State the reason for the introduction.

A good introductory email makes its purpose clear. “The hardest thing is when you don’t know why someone is introducing you,” Schwalbe says, a situation in which it’s easy “to disappoint just because you didn’t know what was expected of you. It’s awkward.”

After explaining why he is making the introduction, Pineiro sometimes likes to nudge one person to take the next step. Often, this is the person who has more to gain from the exchange: If, for example, Pineiro was to introduce his nephew to a CEO of a company, he’d make it clear that his nephew should reply first.

Either way, after making the initial intro, make it clear that your job is done. “End it with ‘I’ll let you guys take it from here’ and don’t involve yourself more,” Marinova says. 

Schwalbe’s go-to sign-off is a firm but polite: “I’ll leave it to the two of you to be in touch with one another. Please feel free to leave me off the thread going forward.”

Provide context.

This ties directly back to the previous strategy: Not only should your introductory email’s purpose be clear, but you should explain who each person is and, when necessary, what they do. “‘This person is really cool!’ is not context,” McKean says “Don’t make me try to glean from LinkedIn or Twitter what kind of questions might be asked of me.”

Often, this means including a brief professional bio. Hyperlinks, to websites or bodies of work, are your friend here. “If I say someone is an amazing writer, I’d link to one great story she did,” Marinova says. 

Under the right circumstances, this is also the place to include personal details. When making an email introduction, Pineiro tries to include one fact about each person that is not work-related. It could be a shared interest, or something out of left field, like “John knows Mick Jagger.” In Pineiro’s experience, such details, no matter how random, make it easier for people to kickstart a conversation that sounds human rather than robotic. 

Keep it short.

“Always ask yourself: What’s the point of this email? Cut out the small talk that normally clutters the beginning of emails,” Marinova says. “No one wants to read big blocks of text…especially for a first email.”

In addition to being time-consuming, a wall of words can be intimidating. “The longer you make your email, the more pressure it creates,” Pineiro says. As he’s gotten older and climbed the corporate ladder, he’s learned to pare down his email style. “When I was younger, the impetus was ‘let me write out my biography and send it to this person,’” he says. He now recognizes the value of keeping it friendly, but concise. 

Avoid hyperbole.

Connecting two people can come with the well-intentioned impulse to talk up both parties, which explains why so many introductory emails are riddled with superlatives. 

This is often unnecessary. “I don’t need to hear too much praise in your intro, especially not of myself,” McKean says. “If I trust you enough to be interested in your introduction, I don’t need to be flattered to take it.”

Taken too far, hyperbole can be counterproductive. Overselling, particularly when it comes to someone’s job title, is a recipe for awkward moments. (Erroneously promoting someone from an associate at a law firm to a partner, for example, creates a situation in which they are forced to clarify.) 

“Everyone doesn’t have to be amazing. It’s a sweet impulse, but it can actually makes people feel badly,” Schwalbe says. If you must embellish, “you can exaggerate someone’s personal qualities without exaggerating their professional qualifications.”

It may never lend a catchy title to a steamy TV hospital drama, but Avicenna’s 11th-century Canon of Medicine has the distinction of being “the most famous medical textbook ever written.” It has remained, as William Osler wrote in a 1918 Yale lecture, “a medical bible for a longer time than any other work.” Completed in 1025, the compendium drew Greek, Roman, Arabic, Indian, and Chinese medical science together in five dense volumes of material informed by the theories of Galen and structured by the systematic philosophy of Aristotle, whom Avicenna (Ab?-?Al? al-?usayn ibn-?Abdall?h Ibn-S?n?) called “The First Teacher.”

Translated into Latin in the 12th century and “often revised,” the Canon, notes the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, “formed the basis of medical instruction in European Universities until the 17th century.” A copy of excerpts from the text has even been found translated into 15th-century Irish, demonstrating a link between medieval Ireland and the Islamic world. Avicenna’s influence generally on the intellectual culture of medieval and early modern Europe and the Arab-speaking world can hardly be overstated.

Born in 980 A.D., the Persian philosopher and physician was instrumental in the recovery of Hellenic thought, first in the Islamic world, then later in Europe. He took to the study of medicine very early in his extraordinary career. “I became proficient in it in the shortest time,” he says, “until the excellent scholars of medicine began to study under me.” He also became a practicing physician, inspired by a desire to put his learning to the test. “Through my experiences I acquired an amazing practical knowledge and ability in methods of treatment.”

The practical knowledge in The Canon of Medicine was largely the basis for its continued use for centuries. It lays out rules for drug testing, which include an insistence on human trials and the importance of conducting multiple experiments and showing consistent results across cases. Like most classical scientific texts, it weaves empirical observation with metaphysics, theology, scholastic speculation, and cultural biases particular to its time and place. But the practical outlines of its medical knowledge transcend its archaisms.

The work presents “an integrated view of surgery and medicine,” notes the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine. In addition to his imminently useful guide for assessing the effects of drugs, Ibn Sina tells his readers “how to judge the margin of healthy tissue to remove with an amputation,” an intervention that has saved countless numbers of lives. “The enduring respect in the 21st century for a book written a millennium earlier is testimony to Ibn Sina’s achievement.”

One of the defining features of the text is its insistence on the practice of medicine as a systematic scientific pursuit of equal merit to the theorizing of it:

Someone might say to us that medicine is divided into theoretical and practical parts and that, by calling it a science, we have considered it as being all theoretical. To this we respond by saying that some arts and philosophy have theoretical and practical parts, and medicine, too, has its theoretical and practical parts. The division into theoretical and practical parts differs from case to case, but we need not discuss these divisions in disciplines other than medicine. If it is said that some parts of medicine are theoretical and other parts are practical, this does not mean that one part teaches medicine and the other puts it into practice – as many researchers in this subject believe. One should be aware that the intention is something else: it is that both parts of medicine are science, but one part is the science dealing with the principles of medicine, and the other with how to put those principles into practice.

Of course, much of the medical theory in the Canon has been disproven, but it remains of keen interest to students of the history of medicine and of European and Islamic intellectual cultural history more generally. Avicenna towers above his contemporaries, yet his work also bears witness to the larger “intellectual climate of his time,” as the site Medical History Tour points out. He emerged from a milieu “shaped by centuries of translation and cross-cultural scholarship” of Greek, Roman, Indian, Chinese, Persian, and Arabic literature. “A rich Persian medical tradition began 200 years before Avicenna.”

Nonetheless, “however the world came by the genius of Avicenna, his influence was lasting,” with The Canon of Medicine remaining a definitive “best practices” guide to medicine for centuries after its composition. See full scans of several Arabic copies of the text at the Library of Congress’s World Digital Library and read a full English translation of the massive 5-volume work, with its extensive chapters on definitions, anatomy, etiology, and treatments, at the Internet Archive.

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Josh Jones is a writer and musician based in Durham, NC. Follow him at @jdmagness

Discover the Persian 11th Century Canon of Medicine, “The Most Famous Medical Textbook Ever Written” is a post from: Open Culture. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Google Plus, or get our Daily Email. And don't miss our big collections of Free Online Courses, Free Online Movies, Free eBooks, Free Audio Books, Free Foreign Language Lessons, and MOOCs.