The Plague was an immediate success with the reading public, and the first edition of twenty-two thousand copies rapidly sold out. It was quickly reprinted, and in the four months between publication in June 1947 and September, more than one hundred thousand copies were sold. Reviews, including one by the existentialist philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre, were also positive, and the book established Camus's reputation as a major writer. The Plague was awarded the French Critics' Prize and was one of the reasons that Camus was awarded the Nobel Prize in literature in 1957.

The book proved to have more than ephemeral success. In 1980, it was still high on the list of best sellers, having sold 3,700,000 copies. Translations had appeared in eleven languages.

Critical approaches to The Plague have varied. When it was first published, only two years after the end of World War II, much of the explication was...