Candide by Voltaire Analysis

Keywords: candide by voltaire themes

According, to Candide by Voltaire, he describes the transformation of the protagonist Candide, throughout the story. Voltaire utilized satire, characterization, and techniques of exaggeration and contrast to represent Candide’s point of view in life. Basically the protagonist endures the human suffering to get his final destiny. Moreover Voltaire demonstrates the character development over the course starting with an innocent personality as a child who does not have responsibility to know into a great man. In the text the language shows Candide’s progress towards maturity. In the beginning of the novel the reader finds compact, colorful and crisp sentences as Candide, the hero rushes through life. Later Voltaire adopts a calm and reflective style analogous to Candide’s mental development. Also, the author disproves the overly optimistic philosophy that Candide and Pangloss represent. While the experiences of Candide and Pangloss conflict dramatically with this philosophy, both choose to maintain their beliefs in this regard.

Candide to get his change goes through many adventures and gradually matures into an experienced and practical man. Some of his adventures were sad and some not. He was expulsed from the palace for his love to Cunegonde, but it help him to faces the cruelty of life with the philosophical view that all things in life are necessary for some greater good. Candide is a simple person who has not had much real life experience. He is banished from his home and unexpectedly introduced to the reality of the outside world. Throughout his travels he develops a new philosophy of life. His eyes open to reality, He sees that everything does not happen for the best as the philosophers and metaphysician Pangloss had told him in the Baron’s castle. In Europe as well as in America, he encounters misery. He meets a number of people from various walks of life. He comes across many philosophers ranging from extreme optimism of Pangloss to the pessimism of Martin. He experiences the love with Ms Cunegonde but it was not accept for their different social classes.

One of some changes of Candide was his philosophy really optimistic mind” everything is for the best”.It was a phrase of his teacher Pangloss He taught that everything was for the best and Candide, having never heard any other philosophies, agrees blindly. While at sea, Candide sees a man who saved his life by nursing him back to health thrown overboard. Candide is ready to jump into the raging waters after his “benefactor,” but Pangloss stops him. He demonstrates that “the Bay of Lisbon had been made… for the Anabaptist to be drowned,”(p.386) . This begins to clash with Candide’s ideologies: if this is the best of all worlds, how was this man who was so kind and generous thrown to his death and Candide not to save him? Candide begins to doubt in this philosophy.

Candide eventually learns how to achieve happiness in the face of misadventure. He learns that in order to attain a state of contentment, one must be part of society where there is collective effort and work. Candide spends a great deal of time traveling the world and learning of many different idealogies in “metaphysics.” Finally, he decides to settle down and live by farming his own garden-this symbolizes his surrender to simple self-preservation. After a long and difficult struggle in which Candide is forced to overcome misfortune to find happiness, he concludes that everything is not as good as it seems the way Dr. Pangloss, his tutor had taught him.

During his adventures he realize that things not always happen for the best, he understand that it just happen in his innocent mind. However, Candide always keep in his heart goodness amd love. Also, he knows that at the end, he is going to find the best for his life.”We are destined , in the end , for another universe, no doubt that is the one where everything is well.”(p.391).Also, Candide begins to experience human suffering in many different ways as love, loneliness and disasters. He understands that no matter who are you, always going to experiment the both sides happiness and sadness because is part of human life, “It’s true, and you see how people make mistakes who have not received a measure of education”(p.402).Make mistakes is of humans and those mistakes make the experience, that later help us to take decisions.

Furthermore, others important characters that contribute for Candide’s change are The Old Woman and Martin. Both of them help Candide to get more knowledge in outside world and contrast the Panglos’s philosophy. The old woman, she was a suffered woman that had to survive of many obstacles.” My last post was as servant to the Jew don Issachar; he attached me to your service, my lovely one; and I attached myself to your destiny, till I have become more concerned with your fate than with my own.”(p.396).In the other hand Martin is a very pessimist man who had been experienced bad situations; he was really offended with life. It was another event that makes Candide changes his philosophy.

In his amazing journey he finds that every event in the world has a reason, and whether there are positive or negative moments you have to live them.” There is no effect without a cause, all events are linked by the chain of necessity and arranged for the best. I had to be driven away from Miss Cunegonde, I had to run the gauntlet, I have to beg my bread until I can earn it; none of this could have happened otherwise”(P.381). However, by the end of the story the protagonist realized that to achieve happiness a lot of work, compromises, and sacrifices are necessary. Though life does not become any easier, at this point Candide begins to grow from a naive young person into a grown realist. Candide realizes he must take responsibility for his life. He must accept situations and try to change obstacles that may be hindrances. Candide learns that labor will eliminate the three curses of mankind: want, boredom, and vice. Candide realizes he must build his own life, however simple it may be.

Voltaire says through Candide’s ultimate discovery that happiness in many ways depends on a person’s attitude. When meeting a man that is happy with a simple garden to tend and a family to love, Candide realizes life does not have to be full of wealth in order to be happy. At the end he realizes that everything in life is not evil, especially when a person strives to make changes and not simply accept what comes their way.

Voltaire’s philosophy expressed through Candide’s final realization is that “We must cultivate our garden,”(p.4380, which is the key to happiness. By cultivating our garden, Voltaire means that we must make the best of our situation in the present moment. We accept what we are given in life and work to make the best of it. It all has to do with our perspective on life. Candide finally realizes that he must try to make his own happiness even while battling hardships. Candide’s happiness is finally realized when he too becomes a man of simple means with a garden to tend and a loved one at his side.