Voltaire , Catherine Lusurier, 1718

Voltaire was the son of Marie Marguerite Daumard, the daughter of a wealthy, well-connected politician, and François Arouet, a successful attorney and businessman.

Young François was the youngest of five children. His mother died when he was seven, leaving him a substantial inheritance. Because of her death, his schooling was delayed. Rather than being sent away like the sons of other wealthy families, his godfather, the Abbé de Châteauneuf (a church position of some authority) tutored him at home.

From the ages of 10-16, Young François attended the exclusive Jesuit College of Louis-le-Grand in Paris. There he received an excellent classical education. Though he would later be quite merciless to the Jesuits in his writings, he developed strong attachments to some of his teachers.

By the time he left formal schooling, François was determined to become a writer.

François’ father, however, had other ideas. He wanted the boy to study law, and he sent his son to Holland in 1713 to serve as a page to the French ambassador.

Rather than becoming interested in a legal career, François fell in love with the daughter of an older colleague, Olympe de Noyer, and attempted to elope with her. Their plans were thwarted by her mother, however, and the boy was sent home in disgrace.

Threatened with disinheritance and exile to America, Voltaire finally gave in and agreed to study law. He continued to write on the sly, however.

His father arranged a series of secretarial positions for him with influential friends, jobs the bored young law student neglected.

In 1717, two poems criticizing the regent of the country, Phillipe d’Orleans, were attributed to François. Though their true authorship remains in dispute to this day, the young writer was convicted of treason and sent to the Bastille prison in Paris.

While in prison he wrote his first play, Oedipe, a tragedy, and also created his pen name, Voltaire.

The Bastille prison as it might have looked in Voltaire’s day. No author,

after 1650.

After his release from prison in 1718, Voltaire learned better how to court royal favor. He began to gain attention with influential people for his many writings, which included plays, poetry, and philosophical works.

His father’s death in 1722 left him free of paternal control. But his troubles did not end with the elder François. Voltaire’s frequent championing of such radical ideas as deism and democracy gained him many powerful enemies.

A feud with the Chevalier de Rohan, a powerful and vindictive nobleman, caused Voltaire to be beaten and threatened with more time in the Bastille. He chose exile instead.

From 1726-1729 he lived in Bolingbroke, England.

He made good use of his time there, learning the English language and befriending many writers and intellectuals of the day. He also developed an interest in the work of Shakespeare, which would later greatly influence his own dramatic efforts . Much of Philosophical Letters, one of his most famous writings, was conceived during his time in England.

Voltaire returned to France in 1729 and to Paris in 1733. He was not there long, however. When the French government banned another of his works, Letters Concerning the English Nation, for being too pro-British, he left Paris again.

He settled in Lorraine, France at the estate of Émilie du Châtelet.

Émilie du Châtelet, Maurice Quentin de la Tour, n.d.

Many of the important works of his middle years were written at Émilie’s estate. A wealthy, well-born woman who had borne her husband three children and was now free to pursue her own interests, she became Voltaire’s lover, patron, and muse. Though their affair waxed and waned, the two remained attached until her death from childbirth in 1749.

Frontispiece from Voltaire’s translation of Newton’s work. Émilie appears as Voltaire’s muse, transmitting Newton’s wisdom to him. No author, after 1738.

While still based in Lorraine, Voltaire frequently traveled. While at the royal palace at Versailles, He gained the attention of Louis XV and his mistress, Madame de Pompadour. This relationship led to several plum royal appointments, including official historiographer of France (with a nice salary) and membership in the elite Académie Français.

Louis XV, Maurice-Quentin de la Tour, 1748

After Émilie’s death, Voltaire traveled to Berlin to attend the court of Frederick of Prussia. Though he was kept in style by the King and wrote several major essays while in Prussia, he and Frederick did not get along: Voltaire considered the King a tyrant.

After Berlin, Voltaire settle in Switzerland for three years. He angered the Swiss people when he published a rather critical article on the city of Geneva. After an absence of six years total, he returned to France.

Voltaire finally found the perfect spot to live, a small town near the French border called Ferney. He bought an estate there which he called “Les Delices” (The Delights).

His companion and mistress during these later years was his niece Marie-Louise Mignot Denis, who would remain with him until his death.

Though he’d found a happy retreat, Voltaire was deeply affected by the dark political events of the 1750s, including the Seven Years War and the Lisbon earthquake. These events would lead him to write his satiric masterpiece, Candide.

Voltaire and Madame Denis, Charles-Nicolas Cochin, c. 1760

Voltaire kept busy in Ferney. He developed an interest in farming. He single-handedly made the town into a model city, establishing a successful watch manufacturing center. He also successfully defended several people who were accused of various legal injustices, restoring their good names. His continued correspondence with influential figures throughout Europe no doubt aided him in these matters.

His most important work during this time was the Philosophical Dictionary. He published other, more inflammatory works under pen names. These pen names allowed the authorities, who had long grown used to the old man’s antics, to ignore the writings.

Voltaire’s Chateau at Ferney, Kassandra Kasparek, July 2007

Voltaire returned to Paris for the triumphant opening of his last play, Irene. During his time there he fell ill, dying on May 30, 1778, age 83.

He was buried in a convent

outside the city, though later he would be reburied in the Paris Pantheon, an impressive mausoleum in the Latin Quarter of France which houses other luminaries like Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Victor Hugo, and Marie Curie.

Voltaire’s tomb at the Paris Pantheon, no author, 2007

During his lifetime Voltaire dominated the Parisian theater, writing 52 plays total. He was the major dramatist of his day and was principal author for the Comédie-Française, the national theater of France. Voltaire kept classical theater alive during this time, but he also incorporated elements of English drama into his work, which paved the way for a revolution in French theater.

These days, however, he is more known for his philosophy than his plays. The Philosophical Dictionary influenced later important French theorists like Jean-Paul Sartre, and his satirical novel Candide is still widely studied. But the Comédie-Française only rarely performs his plays.

Candide was written in response not just to the disastrous historical events of the 1750’s, but to philosophers like Blaise Pascal and Gottfried von Leibniz, who believed that a benevolent and infallible God watches over us all.

Philosophers like Leibniz theorized that all events, good and evil, were part of God’s plan. Evil was necessary so that individuals could exercise free will, and faith had to be tested in order to have meaning. In the words of another benevolent philosopher, Englishman Alexander Pope, “Whatever is, is right.”

In response, Voltaire said that such optimistic sentiments

“only insult us in our present misery.”

Voltaire’s novella asks the tricky philosophical question, “What is the best viewpoint for dealing with life?” At the beginning of the story the innocent hero, Candide, is only acquainted with Dr. Pangloss’ ideas of benevolent optimism (based quite obviously on the work of Leibniz).

Candide must attempt to reconcile this optimism with the

terrible things he experiences during his adventures in the world. His optimism is tested more and more as he meets with all manner of vice and misery.

By the end, Candide decides that we do not inhabit a perfect

world, and the only way to sanely survive it is to keep busy and do useful work. His other world-weary friends, even Dr. Pangloss, join him in these modest efforts to “tend our gardens.”

A picaresque novel is centered around the adventures of a picaro, or central hero, who lives by his wits. Picaresque novels consist of a series of linked episodes detailing his rambling adventures out in the world, wherein he moves from innocence to experience. In the end, he usually (but not always) settles down to peace and plenty. Other famous examples of picaresque novels are Henry Fielding’s Tom Jones (1748) and Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn (1884).

Although Candide was published in 1759, Voltaire did not actually admit to writing it until 1768.

The novella is highly critical of all religions, including

Islam and Judaism, but Catholicism is its main target. As Voltaire would later write to Frederick the Great, ruler of Prussia: “As long as there are rogues and fools, there will be religions. Our own is, without gainsay, the most ridiculous, absurd and bloody which has ever infected the world.”

The Roman Catholic Church condemned Candide, and

the book was banned in France soon after it was published. These acts did nothing to diminish the novella’s popularity.

Killed 40,000

Followed by tsunamis and fires, and most of the city was destroyed.

Blamed by many on Portugal’s sins: After the fire, inquisitors roamed the streets looking for heretics to punish.

Led to widespread debate among Europe’s intellectuals about the nature of faith and divine justice. Voltaire remarked, “If the Pope had been at Lisbon, would he have dared say all is well?” Lisbon during the earthquake, 1755 copper engraving

The struggle involved every major European country.

War arose over struggles to hold and wield power in colonial states like Africa, India, the Caribbean and North America. Fought in these places and all over Europe.

A huge and bloody war, it killed around 1,000,000 people.

Considered by many historians to be the first true “world war.”

The Battle of Kunersdorf, Alexander Kotzebue, 1848

He lost the Battle of Minorca, one of many conflicts during the Seven Years War, due to being undermanned, badly equipped, and under confusing orders.

Despite these circumstances, he was taken into custody after the battle, court-martialed, and shot.

When Voltaire was exiled in England, he had met and befriended Byng. He tried to intervene with the British government and save his friend’s life, but was unsuccessful.

Byng’s execution is considered one of the worst blunders in British military history.

Portrait of John Byng, Thomas Hudson, 1749

French mathematician and Jansenist philosopher

He is still known for “Pascal’s Wager”: Faith is a better bet than disbelief, because you lose more if God exists and you don’t believe, than if you believe in him and he doesn’t.

He believed faith lay in feeling, not in rational thinking.

He argued that human beings cannot truly understand the mind of God and the way his universe works. We must simply trust and believe.

“Happiness is neither without us nor within us. It is in God, both without us and within us. “

Portrait of Blaise Pascal, Philippe de Champaigne, n.d.

German mathematician and philosopher with Jansenist connections in France

He believed the universe was created by an infinitely wise and perfect being. Because God is infallible, the universe he created must be “the best of all possible worlds.” Everything in this universe happens for a reason, because God has built rational order into his universe.

“We must concede that God always acts wisely . . . anyone who knew his reasons would know and worship his supreme justice, goodness, and wisdom.”

Portrait of Wilhelm von Leibniz, Christoph Francke, 1700

Voltaire considered himself a deist; He believed in God but was highly critical of organized religion with its emphasis on blind faith: "What is faith? Is it to believe that which is evident? No. It is perfectly evident to my mind that there exists a necessary, eternal, supreme, and intelligent being. This is no matter of faith, but of reason."

His personal religious beliefs centered around respecting nature and working hard: “An almost infallible means of saving yourself from the desire of self-destruction is always to have something to do.”

He thought spirituality was a necessary part of the human

consciousness: “If God did not exist, it would have been necessary to invent him.” But this should always be balanced by good sense and the realization that not everything can be explained by belief in God. He believed God should be present but not foundational to society.

Discuss three incidents in the story which disrupt Pangloss’ “best of all possible worlds” theory. Do you find Voltaire’s view of the world to be realistic or pessimistic? Use three citations from the story (with page numbers) to support your answer.

One-two pages in length. This can be typed or handwritten on white notebook paper in blue/black ink. Due at the beginning of class on Monday, February 7.

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Part 3

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Part 8

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Part 10

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Part 12

Clips from the Broadway concert performance of the operetta, 2005