Social Criticism In Voltaire's Candide

“Candide” by Voltaire is a controversial satirical novella that tells the story of a man named Candide, a naïve man, who goes through a series of events resulting in an adventurous journey. Candide meets various people on his way while he visits several different areas on his journey. Voltaire uses additional characters and locations to emphasize the representation of topics like religion, class and the goodness of nature. He uses these aspects to portray his opinions which relate to his attack on these ideas. For instance, the baron is a character that epitomizes the idea of following the laws of a social hierarchy. As a character, he continues to look at social hierarchy as the only thing that matters in his life. Voltaire uses him to attack

Voltaire uses the episode of “The storm, the shipwreck, the earthquake, and what became of Dr. Pangloss, of Candide, and of Jacques the Anabaptist” to speak about the idea of nature being good being false. Through the use of various characters and episodes, Voltaire criticizes and attacks religion, social class structure, and the idea that nature is good by creating situations in which he shows his opinion on the overall flaws of society. Voltaire creates the character of the Baron in “Candide” to symbolize his attack on class or more specifically; the structure of social hierarchy. As a character, he is the sibling of Cunégonde, the woman that Candide is in love with but they are both from a different class. Ultimately, he completely stands by strictly following class structure and he disagrees against straying from the idea. He finds the love that Candide has for Cunégonde is unacceptable and forbidden because of Cunégonde is higher on the “social ladder” than Candide. Initially, he celebrates seeing Candide once more until he finds out