Candide, a narrative prose written by politically-active philosopher Voltaire, is a narrative that really brings to life the search for truth and happiness. The entire story tests the philosophies of that time period and really brings into question the choice of optimism or pessimism that we all face on a day to day basis. Candide, the main character, is a young hero who represents many young people in search of the love they want or the finding of the love they once had as well as the strive for a perfect life most of us dream of.
In the second part of Candide, the story begins with Candide and his friend Cacambo setting off on an adventure or “search” to find the girl he is and has been in love with since he was little. When Candide was just a boy, he and Miss Cunegonde fell madly in love. However, they both lived in the same house and Candide, a ward of the household at the time,
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was not considered to be high enough pedigree to be with her. When her father caught them kissing, he threw Candide out. During their trip; Candide, adamant on finding her and rekindling their old love, was faced with many different obstacles. Many of which brought him face-to-face with those who had fallen on hard times. Faced with the choice to think life is always good (optimism) or to think that life is horrible (pessimism), Candide begins the search for truth. Candide and Cacambo eventually run into Pangloss, a tutor who is always talking and has an eye for optimism, and Candide begins to choose a side. As Voltaire ends the story Candide, we readers are not really given clarification on what path Candide chose to believe. While I do not believe that Candide ever actually chose between the two, I do know he does find that in all matters of life, good or bad, you can always make it good. A saying we went over in class is a perfect example, “greener pastures will always be in our own backyard, we just have to make it that way”. The main goal for Candide was to find Miss Cunegonde. Unfortunately, when he finds her he realizes that she is not the same woman he used to know. Now, as readers, we are given the opportunity to decide for ourselves whether or not he still is in love with her. However, Voltaire leads us to believe that while he loves her because of their past, he is no longer attracted to her and because of the path he had been on for so long he went ahead and married her. In the narrative Candide, Voltaire uses several literary devices. Literary devices are used to show connections to other things. For Voltaire, I believe he did that to show the corruption the colonial governments took part in. He subtly critiques war by using Candide in the early part of the story (gone over in class) when Candide is drafted to show how destructive war is. He pointes out how once Candide believed it had value, but after being part of the war, he switches sides and shows just how bad it is. The themes of this story, as discussed in class, would be simplicity, greed, love, and adventure. In every situation Candide faced, he always took the side of “tend to your own garden”. Meaning that whatever happens in your life is your situation to face, not someone else’s. Voltaire shows the greediness in people by telling stories that prove moderation in all things (an idea of the enlightenment) is how life should be in the beginning of the second half, Candide is robbed by a pirate, eventually “karma” gets to the pirate and the pirate loses his ship to a battle. Candide, however, is given one of his lost sheep with treasures on it. Voltaire uses a comedy of errors to bring to light the greed that people face on a day to day basis. Voltaire’s Candide really shows the ideas of the Enlightenment period.
He does this by using satire. Voltaire uses Candide to call into question the idea of optimism in such a corrupt society. It seems as though he uses Pangloss as the idea of optimism and then throws in situations to question that optimism through Candide. This is a brilliant idea for this time in literary history. As I mentioned above, throughout the story Candide is faced with this choice between optimism and pessimism when shown the true evil that is present in the world. Voltaire uses Candide to “open the curtain” on what is really going on during this time and how the world is not always a happy or right place. It is full of corruption, evil, and lies and acting like everything is good is not the right way to deal with situations. It is a cover up because during that time no one was courageous enough to stand up and fight for what would be considered right. That’s why Voltaire got in some trouble with the government, they did not want him to expose the truth through his writing because it reached so many
people. Voltaire’s Candide does a great job at making me as a reader look at my own life and how I feel about the world. It makes me question the wants I have and the decisions I make as well as if I should be optimistic or pessimistic. If I choose to be optimistic, am I doing that because there is an actual bright side to the situation or am I using happiness to ignore something detrimental in my life? Voltaire really makes it possible for any reader to immerse themselves in the work and make them question why they think what they think. The search for truth and happiness is in everyone’s life as some point. I know for me personally, most of my life has been choosing to do things that make me happy. Candide seems to be a character that everyone can relate to in some way. The fact that this also has the element of love involved, makes it that much better. Puchner, M. (2013). The Norton anthology of world literature (3rd ed., Vol. 2). New York: W.W. Norton & Company. p. 131-159.
The author, Voltaire, wrote in the Enlightenment period, a literary movement characterized by the rising concern of philosophy, science, and politics. Voltaire’s writing was influenced by the Enlightenment movement to create awareness of global issues. This is evident in the repeated tragedies Candide stumbles upon. Social issues, corrupt authority figures, and war are real world topics that Voltaire chooses to address in Candide. The satirical nature of Candide allows for an in-depth discussion between the characters regarding the problems they face and the problems of the people they meet, creating a perspective that the audience is forced to look through. It is also a coming of age story, not just for Candide, but for the rising awareness in global issues. Voltaire’s inclusion of the issues of his time reflect the severity of those issues. Satire is used as a reaction to a society’s hypocrisy. Candide as a satirical piece reflects what people have neglected to pay attention to. Coming into a new era of awareness and responsibility leads Candide to reflect on the live he lived in Westphalia and the people he encountered across
Throughout Candide the author, Voltaire, demonstrates the character’s experiences in a cruel world and his fight to gain happiness. In the beginning Candide expects to achieve happiness without working for his goal and only taking the easy way out of all situations. However, by the end of the book the character
Voltaire’s Candide is a satirical novel that addresses common issues in society through a series of outrageous events. Voltaire, the author, wrote about Candide who is extremely naïve and views the world from an optimistic point of view despite the constant troubles him and the people around him encounter. Voltaire points out specific struggles of society including views on philosophy, religion, social power, love, etc. He uses the outrageous events to awaken laughter in the audience but also spark thought on the issues we face in life every day. For example, Candide is stuck on the philosophical standpoint that everything in life happens for a reason and for the overall good. In chapter 16 of the novel, Candide assumes two naked women were being attacked by monkeys, so he proceeds to kill them in hope of saving the women. However, Candide was not aware that the monkeys were actually the girls’ lovers. “Master,” replied the knowing valet, “you have
The experiences that we face in life vary from person to person and one of the greatest differences occur between men and women. In Voltaire 's novel Candide a great deal of the experiences that each of the characters face is unique to them, but the experiences of the women differ greatly to those of the men. The way the two sexes handled those experiences also varied and reflected a satirical view of the times in which Voltaire lived. The differences in events between the men and women can be seen in a few key points that are seen throughout the Novel.
Voltaire had a very opposite point of view in that he saw a world of needless pain and suffering all around him. Voltaire, a deist, believed that God created the world, yet he felt that the people were living in a situation that was anything but perfect. Thus, the major theme of Candide is one of the world not being the best of all possibilities, full of actions definitely not determined by reason or order, but by chance and coincidence.
In Candide, by Voltaire, Candide struggles through a world torn by constant bloodshed and crime. As he travels, he and other characters are deceived, injured, and abused by the world around him. Voltaire’s Candide reveals another side of human beings’ hearts as he portrays humanity’s hamartias as greed, lust, and religion.
Candide was written in 1759 by Voltaire and is a timeless classic illuminating the day to day life of three women that lived in that century. This story focuses on the struggles that the women of this time period faced. Every female character in this story has had a difficult life that consisted of lose-lose situations that had a major impact on their lives. But are they victims? Or, are they simply just natural survivors? These women are natural born survivors because they do what is needed to survive in the harsh circumstances they are forced into.
Voltaire’s Candide can be understood in several ways by its audience. At a first glance it would appear to be simply a story blessed with outrageous creativity, but if you look deeper in to the novel, a more complicated and meaningful message is buried within. Voltaire uses the adventures of Candide as a representation of what he personally feels is wrong within in society. Written in the 18th century (1759), known commonly as the age of enlightenment, Voltaire forces his audience to consider the shift from tradition to freedom within society. He achieves this by exploring the reality of human suffering due to traditions which he mocks throughout Candide. In particular he focused on exploiting the corruption he felt was strongly and wrongfully present within three main aspects of society these being religion, politics and morals. Each chapter represents different ways in which Voltaire believes corruption exists providing the audience with the reality of society’s problems due to its fixation on tradition. As a philosopher of the Enlightenment, Voltaire advocated for freedom of religion, freedom of expression and the separation between church and state. Voltaire successfully presents these ideas within Candide by highlighting why they are a significant problem in 18th century Europe.
In Candide, Voltaire sought to point out the fallacy of Gottfried Leibniz's theory of optimism and the hardships brought on by the resulting inaction toward the evils of the world. Voltaire's use of satire, and its techniques of exaggeration and contrast highlight the evil and brutality of war and the world in general when men are meekly accepting of their fate.
Candide is an outlandishly humorous, far-fetched tale by Voltaire satirizing the optimism espoused by the philosophers of the Age of Enlightenment. It is the story of a young man’s adventures throughout the world, where he witnesses much evil and disaster. Throughout his travels, he adheres to the teachings of his tutor, Pangloss, believing that "all is for the best in the best of all possible worlds." Candide is Voltaire’s answer to what he saw as an absurd belief proposed by the Optimists - an easy way to rationalize evil and suffering. Though he was by no means a pessimist, Voltaire refused to believe that what happens is always for the best.The Age of Enlightenment is a term applied to a wide variety of ideas and advances in the fields of philosophy, science, and medicine. The primary feature of Enlightenment philosophy is the belief that people can actively work to create a better world. A spirit of social reform characterized the political ideology of Enlightenment philosophers. While Voltaire’s Candide is heavily characterized by the primary concerns of the Enlightenment, it also criticizes certain aspects of the movement. It attacks the idea that optimism, which holds that rational thought can inhibit the evils perpetrated by human beings.
Voltaire's Candide is a philosophical tale of one man's search for true happiness and his ultimate acceptance of life's disappointments. Candide grows up in the Castle of Westfalia and is taught by the learned philosopher Dr. Pangloss. Candide is abruptly exiled from the castle when found kissing the Baron's daughter, Cunegonde. Devastated by the separation from Cunegonde, his true love, Candide sets out to different places in the hope of finding her and achieving total happiness. The message of Candide is that one must strive to overcome adversity and not passively accept problems in the belief that all is for the best.
Throughout the story of Candide, the author Voltaire uses many of the characters to portray important things in life. The two characters that Voltaire used the most were Candide and Pangloss. Voltaire used these two characters to represent a particular idea or folly that he had about the world. In the story Candide, Voltaire is always portraying his own ideas by using the characters to illustrate his own ideas. Candide and Pangloss represent the main idea of the story, which is Voltaire’s folly of optimism. Even though they both represent the main idea of the story Candide and Pangloss have many similarities and differences.
... Conclusion, all of the previously discussed topics were put together by Voltaire in an ingenious way to ridicule the philosophy that everything is exactly as it should be and that everything bad happens for the greater good. All the tragedies Candide underwent were introduced in the novella with the purpose of disproving this notion. The book Candide made me think a lot about everything that is wrong with humankind. Voltaire was very successful and Candide's story accomplished his goal because It is hard to imagine that someone would still believe this philosophy after reading this very ingenious, funny, and entertaining novella.
Candide may have started as an innocent boy that believed the world to be perfect, but he soon adapts his beliefs and opinions to the world around him as he realizes that there is nothing perfect of the world he lives in. This is just how people start their lives in the world and learn to adapt to their surroundings as they experience life. Therefore, Candide can be seen as an interpretation of the life of people by Voltaire in his novel Candide. That is because just like Candide, people adapt to the world through life experiences and may do good and bad things.
Voltaire's Candide is a novel which contains conceptual ideas and at the same time is also exaggerated. Voltaire offers sad themes disguised by jokes and witticism, and the story itself presents a distinctive outlook on life. The crucial contrast in the story deals with irrational ideas as taught to Candide about being optimistic, versus reality as viewed by the rest of the world.