Bryan C. Barr
Professor Walls
World Literature
27 March 2014 Candide: Voltaire

Candide is a French Satire published in 1759 by a young man by the name of Voltaire, a philosopher of the age of enlightenment. Candide is a genre of literature that is sometimes graphic, and performing arts, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule ideally with the intent of shaming individuals, corporations, governments or society itself, into improvement. The Age of Enlightenment was a cultural movement of intellectuals beginning in late 17th- and 18th-century Europe emphasizing reason and individualism rather than traditions. Its purpose was to reform society using reason, to challenge ideas grounded in tradition and faith, and to advance knowledge through the scientific method. It promoted scientific thought, skepticism, and intellectual interchange. The Enlightenment was a revolution in human thought. This new way of thinking was that rational thought begins with clearly stated principles, uses correct logic to arrive at conclusions, tests the conclusions against evidence, and then revises the principles in the light of the evidence.

It begins with a young man, Candide, who is living a sheltered life in an Edenic paradise and being indoctrinated with optimism by his mentor, Pangloss. The work describes the abrupt cessation of this lifestyle, followed by Candide's slow, painful disillusionment as he witnesses and experiences great hardships in