<p align="center"><a href="http://irisonbooks.files.wordpress.com/2010/05/candide1.jpg">http://irisonbooks.files.wordpress.com/2010/05/candide1.jpg</a></p>
<p align="center">Voltaire’s Candide</p>
Born on November 21, 1694, in Paris, France, Voltaire was exiled to Tulle in 1715. Two years later, in 1717, he returned to Paris, only to be arrested and exiled to the Bastille for a year. He was sent to the Bastille again in 1726, before being shipped off to England. In 1733, he fled to Lorraine, and in 1759, he wrote the satirical novella Candide. In 1778, Voltaire returned to Paris, where he died there on May 30 of that year. Widely considered one of France's greatest Enlightenment writers, Voltaire was born Francois-Marie Arouet to an upper-middle class family on November 21, 1694, in Paris, France. He was the youngest of five children born to Francois Arouet and Marie Marguerite Daumand. When Voltaire was just 7 years old, his mother passed away. Following her death, he grew closer to his free-thinking godfather. In 1704, Voltaire began to show promise as a writer while receiving a classical education at the College Louis-le-Grand, a Jesuit secondary school in Paris.

“Candide, ou l'Optimisme” is a French satire first published in 1759 by Voltaire.  Candide is the illegitimate nephew of a German baron. He grows up in the baron’s castle under the tutelage of the scholar Pangloss, who teaches him that this world is “the best of all possible worlds.” Candide falls in love with the baron’s young daughter, Cunegonde. The baron catches the two kissing and expels Candide from his home. On his own for the first time, Candide is soon conscripted into the army of the Bulgars. He wanders away from camp for a brief walk, and is brutally flogged as a deserter. After witnessing a horrific battle, he manages to escape and travels to Holland. Candide I guess is Voltaire’s expression of his exile from Paris during his own time and how he experienced many historical events that took place. Candide is the protagonist of the novel, but he is bland, naïve, and highly susceptible to
the influence of stronger characters. Like the other characters, Candide is less a realistic individual than the embodiment of a particular idea or folly that Voltaire wishes to illustrate. Candide’s name is derived from the Latin word “<i>Candidus</i>”, which means “white” and connotes fair-mindedness or a lack of corruption. As that name suggests, Candide begins the novel as a perfectly innocent-“wide-eyed in his worship of his tutor Pangloss’s wrongheaded optimistic philosophy, and completely unfamiliar with the ways of the world, man.

Pangloss and his student Candide maintain that “everything is for the best in this best of all possible worlds.” This idea is a reductively simplified version of the philosophies of a number of Enlightenment thinkers, most notably Gottfried Wilhelm von Leibniz (German mathematician and philosopher. He occupies a place in the history of mathematics and the history of philosophy.)  To these thinkers, the existence of any evil in the world would have to be a sign that God is either not entirely good or not all-powerful, and the idea of an imperfect God is nonsensical. These philosophers took for granted that God exists, and concluded that since God must be perfect, the world he created must be perfect also. According to these philosophers, people perceive imperfections in the world only because they do not understand God’s grand plan. Because Voltaire does not accept that a perfect God (or any God) has to exist, he can afford to mock the idea that the world must be completely good, and he heaps merciless satire on this idea throughout the novel. This would be the folly of optimism.

The earthquake in Candide is based on a real earthquake that leveled the city of Lisbon in 1755. Before writing Candide, Voltaire wrote a long poem about that event, which he interpreted as a sign of God’s indifference or even cruelty toward humanity. The earthquake represents all devastating natural events for which no reasonable justification can be found, though thinkers like Pangloss might do their best to fabricate flimsy justifications in order to maintain a philosophical approach to life.

When Francois-Marie came of age (Voltaire), the French aristocracy ruled with an iron fist. At the same time, however, the intellectual movement known as the Enlightenment was spreading ideas about the equality and basic rights of man and the importance of reason and scientific objectivity.

Voltaire’s words attacked the church and the state with equal fervor, and earned him widespread repute. During his lifetime, trenchant writings attacking church or government were often attributed to him whether he had written them or not. A lifelong champion of the poor and downtrodden, he wrote against tyranny and religious persecution with unmatched audacity. Despite his relentless criticism of powerful individuals and institutions, Voltaire became good friends with King Frederick of Prussia. They often quarreled, as Voltaire inevitably quarreled with anyone in power, but the ties of their friendship were lasting.

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In the 1750s, Voltaire grew increasingly appalled by the specters of injustice and disaster that he saw around him. Many terrible events influenced his composition of Candide (a disastrous earthquake in Lisbon in 1755, about which he wrote a poem; the outbreak of the horrific Seven Years’ War in the German states in 1756; and the unjust execution of the English Admiral John Byng in 1757, against which Voltaire spoke out.) In 1759, Voltaire purchased Ferney, an estate near the border between France and Switzerland, so that he might easily flee across the border to escape French authorities. Ferney quickly became a retreat for important European intellectuals. In his later life Voltaire was involved in a wide variety of campaigns for social and political justice. When he returned to Paris at the age of eighty-three the populace hailed him with a hero’s welcome. The strain of the trip was more than his failing health could support, however, and he died in May of 1778. Overall I loved reading Candide because it was hilarious yet riveting and the satire never stopped so it was funny continuously. Things got a bit out of hand faster then I’d expect in most novels. In Voltaire’s time optimism was seen as a philosophical system, so therefore it was not taken lightly, for optimism was “an enemy”.

The implications of Candide’s decision can be interpreted in different ways. Nevertheless, certain aspects of the story’s conclusion are inescapable. Philosophical optimism is not an explanation for life, the evil in the world has no satisfactory explanation (evil can’t always be explained) and observation and experience are better teachers than philosophy. I believe many people today would agree with that conclusion, though there is still much debate on the proper responses to the injustice, poverty and evil in the form of war and genocide. As some say this evil will always exist in this cosmic dance of bursting decadence and withheld permissions. Others may believe that a radical solution will fix this. And those, like Candide, may see it fit that gradual improvements are the solution only. Those questions are still with us, such as “What solutions would you propose for problems in your community, like crime, poverty, or ignorance?”

Candide, in my opinion compares distinctively to Milton’s Paradise Lost. Paradise Lost is an epic poem in blank verse by the 17th century English poet John Milton (1608-1674). It was originally published in 1667 in ten books, with a total of over ten thousand individual lines of verse. A second edition followed in 1674, changed into twelve books with minor revisions throughout and a note on the versification. It is considered by critics to be Milton's "major work", and the work helped to solidify his reputation as one of the greatest English poets of his time. The poem concerns the Biblical story of the Fall of Man: the temptation of Adam and Eve by the fallen angel Satan and their expulsion from the Garden of Eden. Milton's purpose, stated in Book I, is to "justify the ways of God to men".

In relation to the novel, Candide, my interpretations of the his final words “ ‘All that is very well,’ answered Candide, ‘but let us cultivate our garden’” can be applied to the rest of the novel and Candide’s life. At the end of the novel Candide is accepting that his wife is no longer beautiful and becomes disagreeable too, his friends are debating philosophy when they are invited to dinner by a farmer and decide to imitate that life. Farming is hard work to make a good living and for Candide and his wife and friends decided it was the best way to settle down now that all their exploration days are gone. When Candide says his final statement he has embraced the past which is all the misfortunes that have happened but him working on his farm and cultivating his garden to make the best of what he has. This shows Candide knows where he has been and what he has done and even though he doesn’t have the best wife, the most money, or the greatest friends he still has agreed to cultivate and work towards the future and try to be content with what he has.

Candide’s final statement can again be applied, but to the contemporary society of the United States because it works into part of the American Dream of working hard for a better life and building one’s career and self-up. The American Dream is in many ways similar to the cultivating of one’s garden, because it incorporates present, past, and future. Most Americans have a heritage that traces back through generations with many ethnicities, which is the past, and then the present is the cultivating that is happening right now, which may or may not produce crops. However there hope for a better tomorrow and working towards it in the future, which is part of the American Dream. But it also connects to contemporary America through the pursuit of happiness that hopefully through cultivating one should find or make happiness.

I love reading these type of novels cause it really gives me a different look on the aspects of life and makes me feel kind of spiritual in a way, makes me think a lot about what the world may hold for the future.
<p style="text-align: center">Works Cited</p>
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