Candide

by Amy Watton

Upon first reading Candide, I immediately dubbed it a vague ‘big ideas novel’ because I’ll be frank, it’s not a book I would read for the sake of reading: it’s a book I would read because I would be subjected to studying it, specifically, exploring the philosophy of optimism and a theory prominent in the age of enlightenment (hence the time it was written, 1759). Whilst not initially enjoying the style of writing, the general plot and the very flat characters, I came to appreciate Candide a lot more after mulling it over in my head for a few months. Fortunately, time during lockdown allowed me to go beyond my Pinterest-level questioning and philosophising, and scrape just the surface of the ‘big ideas’ in this novel.

Voltaire wrote this book with the intention of making a mockery of philosophical optimism, and he constructs an entire character (Pangloss), to satirize the ideas of Gottfried Wilhelm Leibnitz who “believed that the world was perfect and that all evil in it was simply a means to a greater good.” 1. Essentially, we are apparently living in ‘the best of all possible worlds’. So, Pangloss’ absurd justification of living the best of all possible worlds being, “noses are made to wear spectacles, and so we wear spectacles” just strikes readers as something inherently detached from reality. Voltaire ridiculed this idea further through constructing a literal journey for his main characters in order to “systematically poking holes in the theory” 2. To create the mocking and satirical nature of the novel, he employed parody. This is shown by the excessive violence and general absurdity of each coincidence-led situation in which the protagonist, Candide, lands.

Pangloss presents optimism as too easy and as Candide commits to his seemingly neverending journey, it is unsurprising his trust in his teacher’s theory diminishes significantly. He is exposed to death, war, torture and natural disasters. The episodic nature of the novel really shines through here as Voltaire’s use of devastating real life events, such as the Great Lisbon earthquake, hits like a series of punches. Life itself comes across very combative and openly antagonistic towards poor, innocent Candide. Surely the world would surely be fairly devoid of suffering if everything were truly the best of all possible outcomes. Then again, maybe the more indirect assumption I am making here is that good will always triumph over evil or at least there is some sort of dynamic equilibrium involved.3. I get the impression that every time the situation improves for Candide, Voltaire undermines it with somewhat cruel glee through

a veil of pessimism to ‘disprove’ optimism. It is like watching sweets being snatched from a child on repeat.

However, something that probably triggered my initial confusion and dislike of this book is that it is not the simple polemic against optimism; it is also just as valid an attack on pessimism. Satire is not only the component used to disgrace optimism but ironically pessimism as well. Take for example the Old Woman’s conversation with Cunégonde; she recounts her suffering in a way of pessimist competition. As Wood (2005) notes, her suffering in the numerical form is twofold everything Cunégonde has suffered, “if you haven’t been raped by at least two Bulgars, been stabbed in the belly twice, seen two of your castles destroyed, witnessed two mothers and two fathers having their throats cut and watched as they whipped two of your lovers…I don’t see how you could possibly beat me.” Having numerical value applied to suffering is made somewhat comical at the end of this extensive list of pain because despite it all, she claims to have still “loved life”. It presents suffering as something immeasurable and the pessimism associated with it almost irrelevant.

The novel ends with Candide giving up on his journey so therefore, the final fight of ‘optimism v pessimism’ is inconclusive. In fact all that remains is rejection because Candide settles to ‘cultivate our garden’. I say rejection because Candide’s retreat to the garden seems to symbolise an abandonment of optimistic idealism or rather, philosophy itself. As a result, it also brings to light a motif I wasn’t really aware of until the end: the uselessness of philosophy. So after reading, I was a bit like ‘well what was the point in that?’ because I wanted a side to be chosen, a grand finale of ‘optimism sucks, so there’. I definitely did not expect a finale of ‘philosophy sucks, so there’ (especially coming from a philosopher).

In my opinion, Voltaire deliberately ensures Candide is a book in which nothing happens… sort of. Don’t get me wrong; Candide is definitely an episodic, picaresque novel where the protagonist goes on a series of adventures with something to prove. However, there’s no resolution to any of the events that proceed and there’s a definite lack of closure to the point the ending is just full of bathos. It’s dissatisfying and frustrating, but that’s the brilliance of it: you are left with more questions than answers so the reader almost has a mini journey of their own after reading it.

References

1. Course Hero. 2016. Candide Discussion Questions & Answers - Pg. 5 | Course Hero. [online] Available at: <https://www.coursehero.com/lit/Candide/discussion-questions/page-5/> [Accessed 12 September 2020].

2. Shmoop.com. 2020. Dr. Pangloss In Candide | Shmoop. [online] Available at: <https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/ candide/dr-pangloss> [Accessed 12 September 2020].

3. Wood, M. and Cuffe, T., 2005. Notes on “Candide.” New England Review (1990-), [online] Vol. 26(No. 4), pp.pp. 192-202 (11 pages). Available at: <https://www.jstor.org/stable/40244764> [Accessed 17 November 2020].