candide by voltaire - Aprenda.info

CANDIDE
BY VOLTAIRE INTRODUCTION BY PHILIP LITTELL Ever since 1759, when Voltaire wrote "Candide" in ridicule of the notion
that this is the best of all possible worlds, this world has been a gayer
place for readers. Voltaire wrote it in three days, and five or six
generations have found that its laughter does not grow old. "Candide" has not aged. Yet how different the book would have looked if
Voltaire had written it a hundred and fifty years later than 1759. It would
have been, among other things, a book of sights and sounds. A modern writer
would have tried to catch and fix in words some of those Atlantic changes
which broke the Atlantic monotony of that voyage from Cadiz to Buenos
Ayres. When Martin and Candide were sailing the length of the Mediterranean
we should have had a contrast between naked scarped Balearic cliffs and
headlands of Calabria in their mists. We should have had quarter distances,
far horizons, the altering silhouettes of an Ionian island. Colored birds
would have filled Paraguay with their silver or acid cries. Dr. Pangloss, to prove the existence of design in the universe, says that
noses were made to carry spectacles, and so we have spectacles. A modern
satirist would not try to paint with Voltaire's quick brush the doctrine
that he wanted to expose. And he would choose a more complicated doctrine
than Dr. Pangloss's optimism, would study it more closely, feel his
destructive way about it with a more learned and caressing malice. His
attack, stealthier, more flexible and more patient than Voltaire's, would
call upon us, especially when his learning got a little out of control, to
be more than patient. Now and then he would bore us. "Candide" never bored
anybody except William Wordsworth. Voltaire's men and women point his case against optimism by starting high
and falling low. A modern could not go about it after this fashion. He
would not plunge his people into an unfamiliar misery. He would just keep
them in the misery they were born to. But such an account of Voltaire's procedure is as misleading as the plaster
cast of a dance. Look at his procedure again. Mademoiselle Cunégonde, the
illustrious Westphalian, sprung from a family that could prove seventy-one
quarterings, descends and descends until we find her earning her keep by
washing dishes in the Propontis. The aged faithful attendant, victim of a
hundred acts of rape by negro pirates, remembers that she is the daughter
of a pope, and that in honor of her approaching marriage with a Prince of
Massa-Carrara all Italy wrote sonnets of which not one was passable. We do
not need to know French literature before Voltaire in order to feel,
although the lurking parody may escape us, that he is poking fun at us and
at himself. His laughter at his own methods grows more unmistakable at the
last, when he caricatures them by casually assembling six fallen monarchs
in an inn at Venice. A modern assailant of optimism would arm himself with social pity. There is
no social pity in "Candide." Voltaire, whose light touch on familiar
institutions opens them and reveals their absurdity, likes to remind us
that the slaughter and pillage and murder which Candide witnessed among the
Bulgarians was perfectly regular, having been conducted according to the
laws and usages of war. Had Voltaire lived to-day he would have done to
poverty what he did to war. Pitying the poor, he would have shown us
poverty as a ridiculous anachronism, and both the ridicule and the pity
would have expressed his indignation. Almost any modern, essaying a philosophic tale, would make it long.
"Candide" is only a "Hamlet" and a half long. It would hardly have been
shorter if Voltaire had spent three months on it, instead of those three
days. A conciseness to be matched in English by nobody except Pope, who can
say a plagiarizing enemy "steals much, spends little, and has nothing
left," a conciseness which Pope toiled and sweated for, came as easy as wit
to Voltaire. He can afford to be witty, parenthetically, by the way,
prodigally, without saving, because he knows there is more wit where that
came from. One of Max Beerbohm's cartoons shows us the young Twentieth Century going
at top speed, and watched by two of his predecessors. Underneath is this
legend: "The Grave Misgivings of the Nineteenth Century, and the Wicked
Amusement of the Eighteenth, in Watching the Progress (or whatever it is)
of the Twentieth." This Eighteenth Century snuff-taking and malicious, is
like Voltaire, who nevertheless must know, if he happens to think of it,
that not yet in the Twentieth Century, not for all its speed mania, has any
one come near to equalling the speed of a prose tale by Voltaire. "Candide"
is a full book. It is filled with mockery, with inventiveness, with things
as concrete as things to eat and coins, it has time for the neatest
intellectual clickings, it is never hurried, and it moves with the most
amazing rapidity. It has the rapidity of high spirits playing a game. The
dry high spirits of this destroyer of optimism make most optimists look
damp and depressed. Contemplation of the stupidity which deems happiness
possible almost made Voltaire happy. His attack on optimism is one of the
gayest books in the world. Gaiety has been scattered everywhere up and down
its pages by Voltaire's lavish hand, by his thin fingers. Many propagandist satirical books have been written with "Candide" in mind,
but not too many. To-day, especially, when new faiths are changing the
structure of the world, faiths which are still plastic enough to be
deformed by every disciple, each disciple for himself, and which have not
yet received the final deformation known as universal acceptance, to-day
"Candide" is an inspiration to every narrative satirist who hates one of
these new faiths, or hates every interpretation of it but his own. Either
hatred will serve as a motive to satire. That is why the present is one of the right moments to republish "Candide."
I hope it will inspire younger men and women, the only ones who can be
inspired, to have a try at Theodore, or Militarism; Jane, or Pacifism; at
So-and-So, the Pragmatist or the Freudian. And I hope, too, that they will
without trying hold their pens with an eighteenth century lightness, not
inappropriate to a philosophic tale. In Voltaire's fingers, as Anatole
France has said, the pen runs and laughs. PHILIP LITTELL. CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I. How Candide was brought up in a magnificent Castle, and how he was
expelled thence 1
II. What became of Candide among the Bulgarians
5
III. How Candide made his escape from the Bulgarians, and what afterwards
became of him 9
IV. How Candide found his old Master Pangloss, and what happened to them
13
V. Tempest, Shipwreck, Earthquake, and what became of Doctor Pangloss,
Candide, and James the Anabaptist 18
VI. How the Portuguese made a Beautiful Auto-da-fé, to prevent any further
Earthquakes: and how Candide was publicly whipped
23
VII. How the Old Woman took care of Candide, and how he found the Object he
loved 26
VIII. The History of Cunegonde 30
IX. What became of Cunegonde, Candide, the Grand Inquisitor, and the Jew
35
X. In what distress Candide, Cunegonde, and the Old Woman arrived at
Cadiz; and of their Embarkation 38
XI. History of the Old Woman 42
XII. The Adventures of the Old Woman continued
48
XIII. How Candide was forced away from his fair Cunegonde and the Old Woman
54
XIV. How Candide and Cacambo were received by the Jesuits of Paraguay
58
XV. How Candide killed the brother of his dear Cunegonde
64
XVI. Adventures of the Two Travellers, with Two Girls, Two Monkeys, and the
Savages called Oreillons 68
XVII. Arrival of Candide and his Valet at El Dorado, and what they saw
there 74
XVIII. What they saw in the Country of El Dorado
80
XIX. What happened to them at Surinam and how Candide got acquainted with
Martin 89
XX. What happened at Sea to Candide and Martin
98
XXI. Candide and Martin, reasoning, draw near the Coast of France
102
XXII. What happened in France to Candide and Martin
105
XXIII. Candide and Martin touched upon the Coast of England, and what they
saw there 122
XXIV. Of Paquette and Friar Giroflée 125
XXV. The Visit to Lord Pococurante, a Noble Venetian
133
XXVI. Of a Supper which Candide and Martin took with Six Strangers, and who
they were 142
XXVII. Candide's Voyage to Constantinople 148
XXVIII. What happened to Candide, Cunegonde, Pangloss, Martin, etc.
154
XXIX. How Candide found Cunegonde and the Old Woman again
159
XXX. The Conclusion 161
I HOW CANDIDE WAS BROUGHT UP IN A MAGNIFICENT CASTLE, AND HOW HE WAS EXPELLED
THENCE. In a castle of Westphalia, belonging to the Baron of Thunder-ten-Tronckh,
lived a youth, whom nature had endowed with the most gentle manners. His
countenance was a true picture of his soul. He combined a true judgment
with simplicity of spi