Candide

Rating:
Summary: Cynicism as poetry.
Review: Diamonds, they say, are made from graphite. Voltaire has here written a gem of a story from the unpromising material of cynicism and farce. Don't try this at home -- apart from genius, it will fall flat -- but Candide ripples with wit.

Leibnetz, it is true, is hardly a household name today. But I expect Candide was also meant to be a sword-thrust into the soft underbelly of theism, the "Problem of Pain." While orthodox Christians do not claim this to be the "best of all possible worlds" (rather, a fallen one), the chaotic and apparently senseless troubles in it seem to a lot of us, too, to be the best argument against our faith. Voltaire twists the knife well. I was glad to see that though he excels, and delights, in mockery, the story functions ultimately as what may be an honest question, like that of Job or of Solomon. (In fact, ironically, the book Candide most reminds me of is Ecclesiastes.)

In one regard, at least, Candide is less true to life than the Biblical point of view, however. Thousands die here, but no one is begotten. The insanity of life is celebrated to the full, but its beauty and wonder are not squarely faced. The one-sidedness of Voltaire's approach lessens it as a work of philosophy, in my opinion. I couldn't help but reflect that many in the 20th Century went into the hell-holes of communist prisons, where every horror Candide and his friends experienced occurred, and more (the atheists of the 20th Century were also, in their own ways, ingenious), yet emerged with a strong belief in God. (Even some, like Solzhenitsyn, who went in as atheists.) Why is that? Philosophy, it seems to me, needs to face all sides of a question. This Voltaire hardly pretends to do: the book is a question, not an answer. But as satire on premature answers, it sizzles.

If all Voltaire's books contain cannabalism, libel, bestiality, and philosophical arguments based on slapstick humor, I can hardly blame the authorities for burning them. Being something of a Puritan myself, I docked Voltaire a star. Let that be a lesson.

The introduction by Andre Maurois is excellent.

author, Jesus and the Religions of Man

Rating:
Summary: Still a good read
Review: As a closet pessimist, I have often come across - and scoffed at - the notion that we live in the "best of all possible worlds." The must be so, of course, because the great God almighty is omniscent, omnipotent, omnibenevolent - in short, perfect, and cannot make a mistake. Therefore, all the seemingly needless suffering, trials, and tribulations that are inherent in our world - i.e., airplanes crashing into buildings - are actually for the better, for the greater good, because everything, EVERYTHING - no matter how seemingly cruel and inhumane - is part of the Big Guy's Great Cosmic Plan. Every action has a purpose, and that purpose is (perpetually) benign.

All of which is fine, except...

Have you looked at the world lately? I have, and, it seems to me that there are, to put it delicately, Several Flaws In This Plan. I watched two airplanes crash into two major American buildings, needlessly killing thousands, and I find it somewhat hard to believe, to put it lightly, that this is the "best of all possible worlds." I'm sure most you do as well... or else you probably wouldn't be reading this, now would you?

And yet, in the 18th Century time period when this book was written, just such a philosophy was popular (perhaps "rampant" is a more accurate term) among the heavy, high-brow philosophers of the day. Candide (subtitled "Optimism") is Voltaire's refutation of the notion. The writing is heavily sarcastic and burlesque - not to mention dark - as any good satire must be. It contains much delicate gallows humor. It reminds me of nothing (and I realize this is an obvious case of putting the carriage years before the horse) so much as our dearly beloved 20th century Doomsday Prophet Laurete, Kurt Vonnegut. Certainly, as this was in essence an ephermal political satire of the time in which it was written, Candide is not, perhaps as technically valid to our present "modern-day" society as the work of a, say, Vonnegut. As the book is primarily a reaction to the notion in question (that of all-pervading and naive optimism), and not an explanation of it picking its faults specifically (which is to say, it does not explain the nature of what it is refuting, assuming the reader already knows), much of the sarcasm has been lost through the years. One would need a general knowledge of 18th century philosophy to appreciate all the points that the book tries to make. However, Voltaire's main messages are certainly clear enough, and just as valid today as they ever were - and always will be. Read Candide - it's a dark, funny, irrevently hilarous and enlightening satire on man and his naive, optimistic folly and fallacious outlook. Even if you don't like the book - unlikely, if you have already waded through my review this far - I guarantee that you will respect it, and that it will make you think - and, perhaps, get you to question certain notions that you may have held unquestioningly throughout your life. Essential 18th century literature.

Rating:
Summary: It's all for the greater good.
Review: Review of Candide published in the Dialogike Society Journal by Daniel De-L'amlow, philosophe extraordinaire, February 1760

Upon reading Monsieur Voltaire's short novel Candide, I thought, "My lack of God, has he shed his wings of logical investigation?" He has strayed from the pleasures of that path, due to the fact that he has failed to take into account the unpredictability and fallibility of man in a not-yet fully rationalized world. Emotion has surpassed logic as the driving force in his novel.

As for Candide, Aristotle would have placed him as one driven by moral virtue. He is a blank slate upon which is later written the words of his professor, Pangloss. He also shares the quality of Dante in the Divine Comedy in that he is afflicted with fainting whenever experiencing something that his fragile psyche cannot take. In Chapter 4, he faints twice in a row, once when hearing of the death of the object of his affection, Cunégonde, and of the barbarities committed on the civilian populations by both Bulgars and Abars. There is no mistaking Candide for a book; books have spines.

My favorite character is the scholar Martin, who accompanies the hero from South America back to Europe. Here, we can recognize Voltaire the realist, or, for those who feed deeply in the trough of idealists, a cynic. He is the symbiotic link between two extremes, the idealistic Candide and the hyper-rational Pangloss. We are further told that Martin is a Manichean, with a dualistic view implying a balance worked out by God and the Devil. Like Pangloss, he is a rational, curious and calm, a realist.

In Chapter 21, there is a discussion between Candide and Martin on the innate predatory nature of man, akin to hawks whenever they see pigeons. Candide tries to differentiate this by humans having free will, but frustratingly, Voltaire cuts off to "As they were theorizing, they arrived in Bordeaux." This quick cut annoyed me to no end, as I was anticipating an interesting discussion between the "young" and "old" Voltaire.

Martin has the best line after he and Candide visit Voltaire's dark side, Poconcurate, a bored nobleman who has accumulated knowledge for the sake of collecting and not learning. The scholar denounces Poconcurate's choleric attitude by quoting Plato: "the best stomachs are not those which refuse all food."

The other character for whom I have a liking to is the Anabaptist Jacques, who appears only in Chapter 4 and is killed off in the subsequent chapter. Where Pangloss says that the evils of the world in the end serve the common good, Jacques hinges his point on how God did not give them anything destructive, such as cannons or bayonets, yet man developed them to slaughter each other. Indeed, man should concentrate on expanding one's intellectual horizons instead of butchering each other.

In his misadventures throughout the globe, Candide finds the utopian, primitive, non-European society of El Dorado. Is Monsieur Voltaire trying to say that Europeans, at the height of sophistication and intelligence, are nothing compared to this underdeveloped society? It would appear so, as the king of El Dorado expresses his puzzlement of the white man's addiction to "our yellow mud."

To give credit to Candide, he strives for Pangloss' utilitarian viewpoint, but the turning point comes when he and Cacambo leave El Dorado and meets the maimed slave in Suriname. So horrified is he with the Negro's plight that he renounces Pangloss' optimism, which he describes as "a mania for insisting that all is well when one is suffering."

By tale's end, Candide has gone from being an idealist to an industrious and careful guardian. He has given up theorizing in exchange for tending his garden, by doing the best one can. I have no quarrel with this proposal if it were not for the religious implications, a clear reference to the fall of Adam and Eve from Eden. Candide has stooped to religion, an opiate of comfort for those who desire security. His master Pangloss provides his best words at the end, speaking of the chain of interconnected events that led from point A to B. Candide's feeble answer? "That is well said, but we must tend our garden." That is as deplorable as the easy road taken by Socrates, who, after discussing in length the root of virtue in the Euthyphro, declares that virtue must be God-given.

Do not mistake me, mes amis. Voltaire's work does have a few sanguine points, but he seems to forget that the world, the universe, itself embodies mechanistic perfection.

Monsieur Voltaire may think he is being funny, but with a few exceptions, he has the wit of a dull nail. I will credit him in describing the sex between Pangloss and Paquette as giving her "an experiment in physics" in the bushes, and the analogical reference Cacambo gives to Candide when he shoots the monkeys. Cacambo tells him that these monkeys are a quarter human in the same way that he is a quarter Spanish. I see this as a direct reference to the percentage of ignorant laypersons in our society in contrast to we fully human philosphes.

What is plainly clear is seeing the romantic-turned-philosophe-turned realist towards the end of his career. In short, I do not totally dismiss it, but Monsieur Voltaire does not know which side his croissant is buttered on. Candide can be summed up as Voltaire having a disillusioned existence and has decided to write a novel about it.

Fin.

Rating:
Summary: Amusing in the best possible way
Review: One of the most popular philosophical ideas in Europe during the eighteenth century was that of "all is for the best in the best of all possible worlds". It was the catch-phrase for Leibniz's argument that because god had created the world, everything was made to occur for the best because god's creations couldn't be evil. So even events that seem tragic and pointless are actually part of some larger, cosmically good plan that mere humans can't see. Therefore we should all accept our fate, and know that everything happens for the best, because we live in the best of all possible worlds.

Voltaire, a man who had twice been imprisoned in the Bastille and then exiled, thought this was a crock of you-know-what. Candide, subtitled Optimism, is his satirical response to this idea. Clearly humour was one of Voltaire's strong assets; Candide is quite funny. Many critics say that the characters aren't well developed, but I think that they're broadly drawn on purpose. I believe that one of the reasons Candide still works in our time is that we can identify the characters with people we know, and so we can follow their relationships and actions. For example, the old woman (who is never named) has seen what life has to offer, and cannot be surprised by anything anymore. I'm sure we all know at least one person like this. And Pangloss is basically a self-help guru, spouting out feel-good nonsense and getting paid a lot of money for his time. Candide is also somewhat short on dialog versus explication, but I didn't mind it.

However, the major drawback is that Candide was written in the eighteenth century, when the idea of the best possible world was so popular. Therefore the book is not an explanation and then rebuttal of it. Candide is only Voltaire's shout of disgust with it, and so the original idea is not addressed in any depth. In order to recover a large amount of the sarcasm, one would have to be fairly proficient in eighteenth-century philosophy.

Even with this weakness, I still found Candide a funny, enjoyable short read, and that Voltaire's basic ideas came through in the end.

Rating:
Summary: Life is a Hogwash of Toils
Review: In Candide, Voltaire chronicles the travels and travails of a group of perenial optimists despite the many harsh and cruel blows life deals these people. By experiencing murder, beating, torture, censorship, banishment, theft, and slavery this group of loosely tied adventurers inquire about the most intricate details of life's philosophies in the most lighthearted and witty quips centering around God's general plan for the betterment of society as a whole and the individual sacrifices and seemingly absurd happenstances needed to occur for this greater progress to occur.

This seems to culminate in discussions around drunken card games held at baron's and other highly-esteemed officials pallaces where there thousands of dust-collecting books seems to be the ultimate symbolic farce of the pointlessness of societal mores and trivial critical establishments. Afterwards, after many unlikely events and quick turnarounds from despair to wealthy gleeming back to gloomy hopelessness, Candide and his journeyman Martin come across other mentors and enemies from his past, as well as his long sought after lover Cunegonde, to find them in the most deplorable conditions and with many regrets, but yet with unflayling blind optimism.

The book greatly picks up from their journey into the utopian like village of El Dorado onwards and then gains the respect that has been hyped upon it. However, I still think this is overrated and maybe the translation has lost some of the supposed wit and fancy of the original Frenchman's work and his rhyme and prose style.

In the end, we are all left to create our own Garden of Eden from whatever limited/superfluous environments affordable and available to us and make the best of the people, places, culture, and tools to us. You can loose your mind and you will be among the many who have lost their minds, certainly in the majority and only by crossing that boundary of supposed weakness can you transcend the peculiar weaknesses of the mind and body.

A toast to Voltaire for his lively and everlasting work!

Rating:
Summary: More satire please...
Review: I had to read this book for my world literature class, and was absolutely blown away. Voltaire's satarical tone on philosophical optimism and organized religion in the Enlightenment era leaves you laughing for days. I don't recommend this book to light readers. It can be very in-depth, and somewhat insulting. Definitely one of the best books I have ever read, though.

Rating:
Summary: Have you ever read Volatire's Candide?
Review: It says live life at Benny Hill freak out speed.
--- The Bloodhound Gang
Not quite, but on to the review.

Candide may be both difficult and easy for people to read; it's a very quick novel and can be finished within two hours, but the scope of said novel is huge. The protaganist, Candide, is a young German nobleman who experiences many things in a very short period of time; finding love, losing love, finding love, losing lose, finding ugly love, etc. Meanwhile, he experiences earthquakes, storms, whippings, the death of friends and even comes across the fabled city of El Dorado when he happenstances upon the Americas. Candide shouldn't be read for it's character development - it should be read for it's message. One thing I must add is the virulent anti-semitism which is found in this book. Apparently, Voltaire was a strong anti-semite. This discovery greatly lowered my opinion of him.

Still, Candide is a must read for anyone interested in classical literature of important medieval thought.

Rating:
Summary: so-so
Review: I studied philosophy in college. A professor who taught us about Leibniz, theodicy, and similar subjects mentioned Candide to the class. Ten years later, I still am interested in philosophy but with the challenges of career and life in general, I'm interested in readable, not overly long books in philosophy to read. I thought Candide fit the bill. Well, it is very readable and brief. As far as being an entertaining read, it was only so-so. The story moves very quickly but the narration style is very weak. The author tells you that things happened, without showing you. The story is funny occasinally, but as a whole it was a very mediocre read. As philosophy, it makes its main point about the existence of evil (that things do not always work out for the best) very well, but that point is not too difficult to make. Voltaire is a great figure in the intellectual history of the west, but I don't think that a lot of what he wrote is still widely read (Candide is an exception) because the battles he wages (the anti-clerical, pro-scientific, etc.)have been won. So, the end result seems banal and not at all daring, which in its day I imagine it was. If you want to read something to expand your mind or if you want a good literary experience, I would pass.

Rating:
Summary: Start here!
Review: Hillarious and timeless, the important thing about this book is that it is highly accessible to young adult or casual readers and may serve them well in opening the door to further investigation of the classics. And short? Why, Norman Mailer has written sentences longer than this book! :) In his marvelous introduction to "The Antichrist," by Friedrich Nietzche, H.L. Mencken (translator) compares Nietzche's conflict (with Holy Church) to that of Voltaire's, characterizing Voltaire as a "mere fancy swordsman." To which I must humbly add: Enjoy the fancy footwork! :-)

Rating:
Summary: Cultivating the Garden of Satire
Review: Though, in my humble opinion, Voltaire is not one of history's greatest philosophers, "Candide" is indeed one of history's greatest works of philosophy. It is also one of the greatest satires ever written. I believe that even Leibnitz would have found something eminently enjoyable in this work.