Class distinctions in a diary of the plague yearSay no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay Defoe returns repeatedly to how different classes experienced the plague of 1660 in his pseudo-journalistic account, A Journal of the Plague Year. Defoe contrasts the experience of the poor and the “middle class” with that of the rich. His account answers a number of important questions. If the rich were more immune to the plague. Was there an extra class responsible for its spread? How did different classes respond to the plague? Considering Defoe's politics and personal circumstances (he was said to have died while hiding from creditors), his focus on class is not surprising. His ruthless journalistic pen pierces rich and poor alike and reveals much about class distinctions in 17th-century England. Defoe contrasts how different classes are involved in the spread of disease. He begins by noting that "the plague affected the poor above all." (68) Much of the spread of disease resulted from the activities of the poor because they were “the bravest and bravest, and did their work with a kind of brutal courage.” (68) In “going about their business,” the poor provided the few services available because merchandising, building and repair, shipping, and many other activities had been completely stopped. Available jobs often involved caring for the sick – through clearing bodies, tending homes, or nursing – which further spread the contagion. Defoe is very specific on this point; he strongly emphasizes that “if it had not been for the number of poor people who wanted a job”, the authorities “would never have found people to hire. And then the bodies of the dead would have remained above ground." (78) However, the rich were not entirely spared because they were often exposed to disease from their servants. Defoe notes that “the infection generally entered the homes of the citizens through their servants whom they [the rich] were obliged to send up and down the streets for necessities; that is, for food or physical use, to bakeries, breweries, shops, etc." (56) Defoe speaks of the inevitability of cross-class contamination because servants met “with distraught people, who carried the fatal breath within them and carried it home to the families to which they belonged.” (56) Different classes also reacted differently to the threat of infection. The rich fled the cities into the supposedly safer countryside 14). Once safely ensconced, they donated generously to charities that helped the poor. Defoe repeatedly credits them with that charity, which supported important functions such as clearing the dead and other activities that minimized infection or benefited those left behind. Curiously, escape was only an option for those who could secure their homes. Defoe notes that those who fled “generally found some of their neighbors or relatives to look after those houses”… “which were entirely locked up” (66). The middle classes and the friendless faced a different dilemma because they risked the loss of their livelihoods if they fled. Defoe's narrator was himself in this situation; the reader sees him struggle to balance suggestions that he leave with what would happen if he lost his saddle shop – and with it, his entire livelihood. The choice to flee (and how to do so without losing one's livelihood) was not open to the poor. Rather, i.