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Optimism and Pessimism in Voltaire's Candide Essay
Candide voltaires criticism of optimism
Critiques of candide
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As a novel which ingeniously skewers the fashionable misinterpretation of doctrinal optimism, Candide succeeds in disgusting, amusing and surprising its audience. With unending bounds of irony and sarcasm, Candide thrusts us into a world where we meet numerous characters that endure rather exaggerated misfortune. As a result, we see several doctrinal beliefs, such as that of Pangloss and Martin. Pangloss, Candide’s mentor and philosopher, is a man of optimistic sentiment. Maintaining the belief that all is for the best in this “best of all possible worlds” (1.4), Pangloss is later found to be rather fool headed in his complacency. In a stark opposite to our rather sanguine philosopher, we come across Martin, a well traveled and experienced scholar who holds stock in extreme pessimism. Though a more honest rendition of Candide’s philosopher, Martin’s unenthusiastic outlook on the world doesn’t consistently serve him right. As can be seen throughout the text, both doctrines of thinking contain imperfections, due to the extremities that they are pushed. Rather than mold to dogmatic declarations based on generalizations, it is beneficial to adopt a flexible philosophy so that a reasonable and less erroneous stance can be taken.
Throughout this novel we witness the naïve protagonist Candide, and later on his mentor Pangloss, venture into a world of horrors. Holding close to his mentor’s beliefs, Candide’s innocent nature and mentality fail to realize the wrongheadedness of Pangloss’s optimistic and causal philosophy. Having been ravaged by syphilis, nearly hanged, dissected and incarcerated, Pangloss’s doctrine is spearheaded with overwhelming evidence from the real world, though to it he remains true. In the midst of incredible co...
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...ide’s once faithful friend will have changed motives and will most certainly deceive him. Yet Cacambo’s unbending honestly to Candide succeeds in defying Martin’s pessimistic doctrine.
Because of Pangloss and Martin’s closed-minded philosophies, an overabundance of indifference and irrationality were allowed to spew forth. Absolute optimism and absolute pessimism both fall into the category of dogmatic assertions based on concepts which aren’t meant to be rigid. Rather than admit no exceptions, it is important to carry a flexible philosophy based on real evidence. In holding an absolute belief, Pangloss and Martin believed in something that encouraged them toward a lackadaisically skewed outlook. In this novel, rigid philosophical speculation repeatedly proves to be useless and destructive, an important point Voltaire was trying to make through satirical means.
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
In chapter 5 of Candide, the Enlightenment and the birth of tolerance were on full display. In Candide, the Enlightenment thinkers’ view of the optimum world is challenged through the shipwreck and the satiric explanations of the Lisbon Bay and Lisbon Earthquake. Voltaire continues to use ironically tragic events to test Pangloss’s optimistic philosophy, which attempts to explain evil. The use of grotesque and naive behavior between individuals in this chapter makes the reader question Pangloss’s irrational thinking with the cause and effects of the events.
...reflected critically on the events of his life—even just the two examples used in this essay--, he would probably find that this is not the best of all possible worlds as it is rife with evil and suffering. With this novella, Voltaire made the point that some spend a lifetime justifying—not rationalizing—the events of the world because those same people are too busy attempting to prove one theory rather than develop others that may fit reality more. When Candide dismisses Pangloss at the end of the novella by saying, “Let us cultivate our garden,” he is rejecting Pangloss’ philosophy, turning over a new leaf, and taking charge of his own life and giving it its own meaning free of Pangloss’ influence.
Unlike the Buddha, though, Candide has to learn these painful lessons over and over. Candide, who “was trembling like a philosopher” throughout the enormous battle in which tens of thousands died, shortly afterward appears to have forgotten the trauma when he tells another that “… all events are linked by the chain of necessity and arranged for the best” (104). Gradually, however, he frequently looks outside his paradigm for answers. The perfection of El Dorado prompts him to question Pangloss’ teaching that every scenario is the best possible, and he swears off metaphysico-theologico-cosmoloonigology for good after his exchange with the disfigured slave on arriving in Surinam (131).
However, along the way Voltaire introduces characters with distinctive worldviews and philosophies. Unique to the story of Candide is the character Pangloss, a philosopher of metaphysico-theologico-cosmolo-boobology and Candide’s teacher. In chapter one, Pangloss abruptly shares his philosophy that, “for since everything is made for an end, everything is necessarily for the best end.” The tail goes on to say, “Candide listened attentively and believed innocently.” During their journey together certain situations cause Candide to question many of Pangloss’
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 uses anti-heroism as an object of mockery against the philosophers of the Enlightenment. Candide, the hero of the novel travels around the world where he encounters many difficulties. During his travels, he sticks to the teaching of his tutor, Doctor Pangloss, believing that "everything is for the best" (3). Voltaire points out the illogicality of this doctrine, "if Columbus had not caught, on an American island, this sickness which attacks the source of generation [...] we should have neither chocolate or cochineal" (8). The sheer stupidity of these illogical conclusions points out Voltaire's problem with most optimists: the illogical degree to which they would carry their doctrine. Voltaire would argue that noses were not designed for spectacles, but rather spectacles were designed for preexisting noses. Pangloss's interpretation of cause and effect is so ignorant as to be comical. While Candide tells an interesting story, it is more important as a satire. However, this does not prove Voltaire is a pessimist.
The tone of the work is one of optimism maintained despite frequent misfortune and continuous suffering. The optimism can exist because, in the context of the Enlightenment, the suffering represents the opportunity for human progress through the application of reason. If the miserable people of the middle ages lived for the promise of relief of suffering in the afterlife, the miserable people in the Enlightenment lived for promise of a better life through progress resulting from the application of reason to the human situation. Voltaire's message was this optimism (for that is the translation of the title of the work), but he made his point by satirically making fun of many of the elements of the Enlightenment, itself, including this philosophical optimism. He could do this, and laughingly get away with it, because the optimism he was poking fun at is the abuse of the Enlightenment as a popular movement.
Throughout the entirety of Candide, he makes comments on optimism and its faults. By framing the novel around a biblical story and having Candide lose and regain paradise, Voltaire suggests that one must cultivate their own perfect world as opposed to optimistically enduring the present in the hopes of a better future. In the novel this is evident, Candide pursues his own paradise, goes through hell, and cultivates his own garden once more. Through the cyclic nature presented, Voltaire shows that optimism does not a paradise make and that the only way one can truly have paradise is to take their destiny into their own hands and cultivate their own
The book Candide by Voltaire is a humorous satire constructed of many themes. Through his book, Voltaire expresses his views on life by criticizing many aspects of humanity at that time. He focused in war, religion, and love, but the main target of Voltaire's satire was a certain philosophy. All of the previous topics unite to ridicule the philosophy that, as the character Pangloss said, "things cannot be otherwise than as they are; for as all things have been created for some end, they must necessarily be created for the best end" (1).
Candide or Optimism, written by Voltaire in 1759, was created to satirize the a priori thinking that everything is for the best in the world. Candide, the guileless and simpleminded main character and his companions are exposed to the very worst the world possibly has to offer with rape, murder, whippings, war, earthquakes, shipwrecks, cannibalism, thievery, disease, greed, and worst of all, human nature. Through these horrific events, Pangloss, the philosopher maintaining a priori thinking, stubbornly upholds the idea that everything is for the best. It is Pangloss’s influence above all else that is imprinted upon Candide and that as the novel progresses, is slowly replaced in Candide’s mind by others characters’ viewpoints. Rather than assertive
Two major themes that are shown throughout the book is Optimism and Disillusion and Hypocrisy of Religion . Voltaire included Optimism and Disillusion as a theme to prove that everything is not for the best and that when bad things happen, they are not for the greater good of this world. In Candide, Pangloss and his student Candide believed in the philosophy that “all is for the best in this world”. Several times throughout the book whenever a terrible event occurred they would say that it was for the best. In chapter 4, Pangloss attempts to explain that him contracting syphilis was for the greater
Defining optimism and redefining the philosophies of the fictional Pangloss and the non-fictional Leibniz, Candid embarks on a mishap journey. From the very onset, Voltaire begins stabbing with satire, particularly at religion.
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.