VOLTAIRE • UNIT 1 OF 4

LECTURE NOTES

Pangloss, preceptor (tutor) at Westphalian castle = satire of Leibniz’s religious theory, called theodicy • Leibniz a philosophe (i.e. Enlightenment polymath): mathematician (especially famous for discovering differential and integral calculus); scientist; inventor of early computers, among other things; philosopher; theologian; and more • Element of Leibniz’s work that Candide focuses on = book called Théodicée (1710) • In Théodicée, Leibniz claims that good, omnipotent (all-powerful) God must have made world from best of all possible options—no better configuration is possible • As Pangloss says, we live in best of all possible worlds • This theory is called Philosophical Optimism • Another way of expressing it is the English Enlightenment poet Alexander Pope’s phrase “whatever is, is right” • An outgrowth of this thinking is the Principle of Sufficient Reason, which can be expressed in several ways, including: For every entity X, if X exists, then there is a sufficient explanation why X exists • In Chapter 1, when Cunegund observes Pangloss and “chambermaid” Pacquette having sex outdoors, she hopes that she (Cunegund) will constitute sufficient reason for Candide to want to make love to her • In Chapter 4, Pangloss claims there is a sufficient reason for the syphilis (or Great Pox) he contracted from Pacquette • The preceptor tells Candide that the cause of the chocolate and red dye (cochineal) that Europeans enjoy was Columbus’s discovery of the New World, which included Europeans’ being exposure to syphilis • Leibniz believed that everything exists for a reason—everything has a cause • There is an original cause, namely, God • Leibniz saw God as the original unit or monad: i.e. the supreme monad • Everything else is created or caused by the supreme monad; and everything else (whether a physical thing or a felt thing, like love) is made of monads • Monads = Leibniz’s version of atoms • Pangloss believes that we should understand the world through logic (aka reason or rationality), but Candide prefers observation; in fact, science requires both reason and observation • In Voltaire’s day, what is now country of Germany was collection of states and microstates (Kleinstaateri) • The fictional Thunder-ten-tronckh is self-important microstate (in Province of Westphalia) whose ruling family takes pride in descent from multiple noble families, a lineage displayed

1 by the numerous “quarterings” or image-units on family coat of arms • Really important, expanding German state during Enlightenment: Prussia, ruled by King Frederick II, nicknamed “Old Fritz” and “the Great” • Frederick sponsored Leibniz’s work; and Frederick and Voltaire wrote each other, but often argued • For a while, Voltaire resided in Frederick’s court in city of Potsdam, near city of Berlin • Frederick’s palace = Sans Souci (“without concerns”) • Johann Sebastian Bach’s son, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, worked at Sans Souci as court musician • The elder Bach met Frederick the Great in May 1747, later dedicating a collection of pieces, The Musical Offering, to him

Having witnessed England’s constitutional monarchy (power-sharing between crown and parliament), Voltaire disliked autocratic or despotic regimes of Frederick and King Louis XIV of France (the “Sun King”) • Voltaire critical of Frederick’s war-faring, particularly his involvement in Seven Years’ War (1756-1763), in which perhaps as many as 1,400,000 people died • Chapters in Candide about Bulgarians versus Abares = satire about Seven Years’ War • Sheer horror of combat: “ground...covered with the brains, arms, and legs of dead men” (Chapter 3) • Genocidal rape as weapon of war; ethno-genetic “cleansing”: “several young virgins...satisfied the natural necessities of the Bulgarian heroes” (Chapter 3) • During the Bosnian wars of the early 1990s, between 12,000 and 50,000 women and girls were raped—sometimes gang- raped, either in public or in military “rape camps”—with the intention of getting them pregnant • Most were Bosniaks (Bosnian-speaking Bosnian Muslims), raped by Serb-speaking, Orthodox Christian Bosnian- Serb soldiers • Around a half-million women were raped during Rwandan Genocide (1994) • Female President of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda declared, “From time immemorial, rape has been regarded as spoils of war. Now it will be considered a war crime. We want to send out a strong message that rape is no longer a trophy of war” • Question about whether ours is, in fact, the best of all possible worlds extends beyond man-made events like war to natural events: specifically, massive earthquake, triple tsunami, and fires that devastated Lisbon (capital of Portugal) on morning of of All Saints’ Day (1 Nov) 1755, when many were at Mass • Twentieth-century philosopher Theodore Adorno wrote, “The earthquake of Lisbon sufficed to cure Voltaire of the theodicy [belief in God’s goodness] of Leibniz” • Catholic Inquisition (religious court) believed catastrophe was God’s judgment against sinners and held auto-da-fé: public trials and punishments • In Chapter 6 of Candide, Pangloss is hanged and Candide flagellated (whipped) at auto-da-fé, although Old Woman rescues title character and reunites him with Cunegund, who has become a war-captive, shared sexually: merchant Jew Don Issachar on Mo, We, and Sa; Grand Inquisitor (head of Inquisition in Lisbon) on other days • Compare auto-da-fé in Lisbon to Rev. John Hagee of Texas-based CornerStone Church (2006): “All hurricanes are acts of God, because God controls the heavens....[T]here was to be a homosexual parade [in New Orleans] on the Monday that Katrina came. And the promise of that parade was that it would reach a level of sexuality never demonstrated before in...Gay Pride parades....I believe that Hurricane Katrina was, in fact, the judgment of God against the city of New Orleans” • Candide exposes hypocrisy of Roman Catholic priests vis-à-vis vow of celibacy: know identity of Old Woman’s father • Real-life Italian beauty Lucrezia Borgia (died 1519) = daughter of priest who became Pope Alexander VI •••

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