Candide
by Voltaire
Political satire doesn't age well, but sometimes it contains enough art and universal joy to survive long after diatribe timespan has passed. Candide is one such book. Written by Voltaire, the Renaissance man of the Enlightenment, Candide is replete with the political and philosophical debates of the 1750s. But for the general reader, the novel's driving principle is quite clear: the idea that we live in the best of all possible worlds (endemic in Voltaire's time) and the apparent stupidity, misfortune, and strife are in fact harbingers of a greater good that we cannot accept. is the washing of pigs. Telling the story of a good-natured but interstellar Candida (imagine Mr. Magoo armed with deadly force), the novel breaks such ill-conceived optimism for shrapnel as she travels the world trying to reunite with his love, Lady Cunegonde. Candida's mentor, Dr. Pangloss, is steadfastly committed in his philosophical good humor in the face of a growing fantastical misfortune; Other satellites of Candida always provide common sense in the nickname of the time. Still, breaking down optimism, Voltaire praises human resilience and also gives the book a pleasant unyielding inability common to comedy. One of the characters, a princess who was transformed into a one-sided hag by a rough fate, says: "I wanted to kill myself a hundred times, but somehow I am still in love with life. This senseless weakness is perhaps one of our most melancholic tendencies; for is there anything more foolish than to carry a burden that pleases us to throw away, to hate the creature itself, and yet to hold it firmly, to feast on the serpent that devours us until it eats our hearts?
