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Thesis statement Voltaire's Candide
Voltaire in candide
Thesis statement Voltaire's Candide
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Quest for Enlightenment in Candide and Dream of the Red Chamber Seventeenth-century Europe saw the end of the Renaissance and ushered in the Neoclassic era. During this period, which is also called the Enlightenment and "The Age of Reason," society advocated rationalism and urged the restraint of emotion. Writers modeled their works after the Greco-Roman satires and picaresque novels. At around the same time in China, the author of Dream of the Red Chamber explores a different kind of enlightenment, whose roots are in religion. Buddha is called "The Enlightened One," and one of the major concerns of Buddhism is "Why do we suffer and feel pain?" Candide by Voltaire and Dream of the Red Chamber by Cao Xuegin introduce characters and motifs that have become illustrations of the quest for enlightenment. Candide, in the spirit of the European Enlightenment, is a satire on philosophy and religion. Voltaire uses this work to candidly criticize irrational optimism and thought control. Interestingly, the word "candid" even makes up a part of Candide's name, and Voltaire uses hyperbole to contribute to his concept of extremes. After being kicked out of his home, Candide wanders and drags "himself toward the neighboring town . . . dying of hunger and fatigue." Later, he "embraced the Baron and Pangloss a hundred times." Pangloss, Candide's tutor, teaches a strange subject called "metaphysico-theologo-cosmolo-nigology," and one of the towns Candide visits is named "Valdberghoff-trarbk-dikdorff." It is these details that accentuate Voltaire's criticism of irrational behavior. He further stresses his point with the characters' rationalization of hardship as being "everything is for the best." regardless of how ... ... middle of paper ... ...eam of the Red Chamber is also related to the happiness material things can bring. Chen Shih-yin gives up his material possessions and begins a journey to enlightenment. While both author seem to renounce or denounce the world, they also appear to espouse the "seize the day" philosophy, so that one will not have regrets. Works Cited Voltaire. Candide or Optimism. Trans. Donald M. Frame. The HarperCollins World Reader: The Modern World. Ed. Mary Ann Caws and Christopher Prendergast. New York: HarperCollins, 1994. 1933-1997. Other versions have also been consulted. Cao Xuegin. Dream of the Read Chamber. An excerpt and adaptation. Trans. Chi-Chen Wang. The HarperCollins World Reader: The Modern World. Ed. Mary Ann Caws and Christopher Prendergast. New York: HarperCollins, 1994. 1469-1478. Other versions, including the original, have also been consulted.
Why is it that we as human beings feel the need to blame someone for every negative situation, which occurs? If we really look at the situation with any great depth, we may discover that an almost endless amount of things may be 'blamed' for the tragedy blaming an individual is pointless - only fate can really be blamed.
CANDIDE By Voltaire 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 towards his goal and only taking the easy way out of all situations. However, by the end of the book the character realized that to achieve happiness a lot of work, compromises, and sacrifices are necessary. Candide is a person of privilege who began life in the Castle of Westphalia.
Voltaire. Candide. New York: Boni and Liveright, 1918. Project Gutenberg. Web. 11 January 2014. http://www.gutenberg.org/files/19942/19942-h/19942-h.htm
In Voltaire's satire Candide the reader follows the travel of the main character Candide. Candide dynamically develops through the book by adsorbing multiple philosophies,and eventually concluding his own design. Throughout his journeys he encounters three major philosophies: optimism, pessimism and realism. The first philosopher is Pangloss and he teaches about optimism. The second philosopher that he meets is cacambo, and he is a person who accepts the world as it actually is. The last philosopher that candide encounters is a pessimist, and the despises everything in the world. As these three philosophers travel with Candide, they helped him see different viewpoints of the world. As a result, Candide’s development is greatly affected by the philosophies of Pangloss, Cacambo, and Martin.
An enlightenment philosopher François-Marie Arouet, commonly known as Voltaire, wrote Candide. Voltaire “was a French Enlightenment writer, historian and philosopher famous for his wit, his attacks on the established Catholic Church, and his advocacy of freedom of religion, freedom of expression, and separation of church and state (Wikipedia).” He was born November 21st 1694 into an upper-middle class family. Voltaire started showing an interest in writing at a young age. Candide was published in 1579. It was a French Satire. A satire is “the use of humor, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose and criticize people’s stupidity or vices, particularly in the context of contemporary politics and other topical issues (Oxford Dictionary).” Candide mocks the ideas of the philosopher Leibnitz though the character of Pangloss because Leibnitz believed in an optimistic world and Voltaire feels that thinking this way makes one a hypocrite. Candide defines optimism as “a mania for insisting that all is well when things are going badly (Voltaire, p. 48).” Throughout the book, many themes and symbols are present.
Of course, because it is a satire, Candide continues to have a badly founded and overly optimistic view on the world, even though there are piles of evidence that would point to the contrary. Candide’s complete inability to form his own philosophies and views without adopting others’ is an element of the text because again, it is a satire, but also to highlight the absurdity of thinking that everything happens in order to maintain balance and keep things for the best. Candide’s naivety and almost painfully deliberate simplemindedness is used to represent mankind. At the time this was written, many people displayed similar much less exaggerated traits. By highlighting the complete absurdity of this way of thinking through Candide’s childlike repetition of other characters’ values and ideas, Voltaire illustrated that everything is not for the best in this not best of all possible worlds. He stated that one cannot simply float through life expecting good things to happen to him, not making any decisions for himself and relying on others for his ideas. It is crucial that we work for our happiness in life, that we cultivate our
Voltaire therefore exhibits both sides of the spectrum, Pangloss, the unchanging, and Candide the "developed." These adventures broadened the horizons of Candide, and with him, the reader also undergoes many thought provoking dilemmas, cultivating himself in many of the same ways. This tale doesn't flounder all hope of "perfection," but it does present, in laymen's terms the ideas behind Murphy's Law.
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.
Candide is written to show human vices but also show Voltaire’s counter ideas to Leibniz’s optimism. Each one of the characters that Candide interacts with has their own specific folly that proves the world maybe isn’t all for the best. Pangloss is so optimistic that he is naive and conceded, the abbe in France is extremely greedy when she steals gems from Candide, and the Dervish who doesn’t question things is so passive that he isn’t very likeable. The ending of the novel concludes when Candide finds peace in the garden where he is working to escape the three evils in the world according to the Old Turk. Candide’s finding of peace can correlate with Voltaire being okay with life and the earth even though he sees suffering happen. Though the novel bashes on optimism, Voltaire’s acceptance life and of the world is a good example for anyone.
Voltaire. Candide. In Candide, Zadig and Selected Stories.Trans. Donald Frame, New York: Penguin Group, 1961.
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.
Blind optimism has concealed the eyes of human beings from the defects of the world since the age of Enlightenment. Defying the archaic thinking of society, Voltaire searched for practical and useful knowledge to explain the world he lived in. Voltaire mocked philosophers, such as Leibniz ,who believed in the “best of all possible worlds” ,and presupposed that all things happen for a reason rather than convincing himself that good and bad are one and the same( 12). The term blind optimism refers to naievty, or having a tendency to expect the best of all possible outcomes and never accepting conclusions in a negative way. In the novel Candide, Voltaire strikes his major characters with atrocious events to challenge the unquestionable optimistic view of the world, showing how ludicrous blind optimism truly is. Voltaire exemplifies this notion by utilizing characterization of his characters Candide, Pangloss, and Martin to satirically demonstrate how blind optimism hinders the perception of reality
the king as a sign of the moral and divine justice of his own choice.
Candide: A Satire On The Enlightenment. Works Cited Missing 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 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.
Voltaire, , and Roger Pearson. Candide: And Other Stories. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990. Print