Candide by Voltaire, originally published in 1759
Spoiler Alert: Plot Summary
I took notes as I read for this one, in part because it takes place in these handy short-ish chapters, and in part because I was reading the French side-by-side with the English and I was getting very confused. I got tired of writing out Candide and Cunégonde, and I don't know if Cunégonde's brother ever gets a name, so I just kept calling him CuBro. Cacambo, who enters the story around chapter 13, is referred to as Cac. Feel free to read it if you like, it's mostly adventures, travel, occasional violence, and shenanigans.
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| My handwritten and messy summaries |
Spoiler Over: Continue Here
Well, blobbists, I've read another one! I suppose I would say I enjoyed reading this book in the sense that: (a) it was a pleasure to dust off my rather rusty French, but (b) it's rather nonsensical and intermittently deeply violent, in the same style as Gulliver's Travels, which seems to have come out about 30 years prior. So perhaps it was a 'referent' for Voltaire.
My eldest sister, Lexie, is doing a read-along, so at some point when she finishes, I will post her blob-along. No rush, sister Lexie!
I was impressed with my ability to stick to reading the French, but I lost steam about 3/4 of the way through, as I was starting to get dizzy reading each sentence in French on the left and in English on the right and I was losing the thread and the flow of the book. That said, I'm going to put the quotes that I liked in French so we can enjoy their original stylings.
Chapter Titles, aka Spoilers
I enjoyed the chapter titles, as they gave one a sense of what was to come. That said, sometimes they were downright spoiler-y, like "When Candide has to murder Cunégonde's brother". Well, gee, I wonder what will happen in THIS chapter, Voltaire?!
Candide, our hapless hero
Candide, tout stupéfait, ne démêlait pas encore trop bien comment il était un héros. [Candide, utterly astounded, could not yet make out too clearly how he was a hero.] I always a love a hero who doesn't think they're heroic.
Does everything happen as it should? Has life been constructed for good fortune? For evil?
These are just a few of the questions that Voltaire wrestles with in a 'joking-not-joking' sort of way. Here are some of my favorite snippets.
Pangloss, Candide's tutor: Tout ceci est ce qu'il y a de mieux. [All this is the best that can be.] Tout est bien. [All's well.] This is after a tempest, a shipwreck, and an earthquake. 😂 There is also a line that says "les convives arrosaient leur pain de leurs larmes" which translates to [the table companions moistened their bread with their tears]. lolololz
Candide, épouvanté, interdit, éperdu, tout sanglant, tout palpitant, se disait à lui-même: <<Si c'est ici le meilleur des mondes possibles, que sont donc les autres?>> [Candide, terrified, overwhelmed, distraught, bleeding all over, throbbing all over, said to himself, "If this is the best of all possible words, then what can the others be like?"] what indeed, Candide?
Si Pangloss n'avait pas été pendu, dit Candide, il nous donnerait un bon conseil dans cette extrémité, car c'était un grand philosophe. ['If Pangloss hadn't been hanged', said Candide, 'he'd give us good advice in this extremity, for he was a great philosopher.']
<<Quel est donc ce pays, disaient-ils l'un et l'autre, inconnu à tout le reste de la terre, et où toute la nature est d'une espèce si différente de la nôtre? C'est probablement le pays où tout va bien; car il fout absolument qu'il y en ait de cette espèce. Et quoi qu'en dît maître Pangloss, je me suis souvent aperçu que tout allait mal en Westphalie.>> ['What country is this, then' they said to one another, 'unknown to the rest of the world, and where all of nature is of a kind so different from our own? It's probably the country where all goes well; for there absolutely must be such a country somewhere. And whatever Master Pangloss said, I often perceived that everything went badly in Westphalia.'] hehehehehe.
-Eh bien, mon cher Pangloss, lui dit Candide, quand vous avez été pendu, disséqué, roué de coups, et que vous avez ramé aux galères, avez-vous toujours pensé que tout allait le mieux du monde? ['Well, my dear Pangloss,' Candide said to him, 'when you were hanged, dissected, beaten unmercifully and forced to row in the galleys, did you continue to think that everything was going for the very best?']
C'est Cri Cri! C'est Craque Plouf!
There's a line where someone helps Candide, (l'aide à remonter) and it reminded me of a children's rhyme that one of our French exchange students taught us. Perhaps Marine, who lived with AA?
The internet seems to agree that this was a children's song about a cricket named Cri Cri! Here's a darling 90 second video of French children doing it with their teacher. He falls in the water, but he knows how to swim, and climbs back on his branch to sing!
On seasickness
As I discovered on my cruise through the Adriatic that I have rather weak sea legs, I enjoyed this line.
La moitié des passager, affiablis, expirants de ces angoisses inconcevables que le roulis d'un vaisseau porte dans les nerfs et dans toutes les humeurs du corps agitées en sens contraires, n'avait pas même la force de s'inquiéter du danger. [Half of the passengers, weakened, expiring as a result of those inconceivable agonies that the rolling of a ship causes in the nerves and in all the humors of a body when they are shaken in opposing directions, did not even have the strength to worry about the danger.] Thankfully I did not expire, but I am also not living in Voltaire's satirical world ;)
On marks in books, not bookmarks
As you know if you read my blob, I write in my books, and this one has twice as many notes because I marked up both sides, lol. I think the marks I write tell you what kind of story I read, and in this one, my two most common marks were the exclamation point (!) and laughter (lol). And while I'm sure I missed some if not much of the nuance that Voltaire intended for his readers to experience in the roughly 250 years that have passed since, I think he would be pleased at my overall reading experience.
Oh he's a German? Well that's a horse of a different color!
There's a hilarious passage where a man in charge refuses to meet with Spaniards for more than a few minutes a day, but the situation changes when Candide's heritage is revealed. (BTW, Candide is supposed to be German, not French. I'm not sure why, and I'm sure the internet would tell me, but let's just let it be known that he's German, from a place called Westphalia.)
Le sergent alla sur-le-champ rendre copmte de ce discours au commandant. <<Dieu soit béni! dit ce seigneur; puisqu'il est Allemand, je peux lui parler; qu'on le mène dans ma feuillée.>> [The sergeant went at once to report this speech to the commandant. 'God be praised! said this lord; 'since he's a German, I can speak to him; have him brought to my bower.'] lololol.
The Optimist's Daughter
I have optimism on the brain after my last read, so I enjoyed this exchange:
Qu'est-ce qu'optimisme? disait Cacambo. -Hélas! dit Candide, c'est la rage de soutenir que tout est bien quand on est mal. ['What is optimism?' said Cacambo. 'Alas!' said Candide, 'it's the mania for affirming that all's well when you're in a bad way.']
The contagiousness of ennui
As I was reading and finishing this novel, I had a bad birding day (I KNOW, CAN YOU BELIEVE IT?) and was in a rather foul mood. I found it fitting that Candide found himself plunged into a 'black melancholy', and thought, yes, that's what I'm feeling!
Le sang-froid du juge et celui du patron don't il était volé, alluma sa bile, et le plongea dans une noire mélancolie. La méchanceté des hommes se présentait à son esprit dans toute sa laideur; il ne se nourrissait que d'idées tristes. [The cold-bloodedness of the magistrate and of the captain who had robbed him roused his anger and plunged him into a black melancholy. The wickedness of men presented itself to his mind in all its ugliness; he entertained nothing but gloomy thoughts.]
I only have eyes for Cunégonde.
As with many heros, satirical or not, Candide is SMITTEN with his love, Cunégonde. Here are some of my favorite fairly preposterously grand comments.
Pour moi, je n'ai nulle curiosité de voir la France, dit Candide; vous devinez aisément que, quand on a passé un mois dans Eldorado, on ne se soucie plus de rien voir sur la terre que Mlle Cunégonde. ['As for me, I have no curiosity to see France', said Candide; 'you'll easily understand that when one has spent a month in Eldorado one no longer cares to see anything on earth except Miss Cunégonde.'] lololol.
To his credit, he marries her even when she becomes very ugly and old well beyond her years. But he's in luck because she becomes a TOP NOTCH PASTRY CHEF. So #everybodywins #beautyisonlydonutdeep
The meaning of life, aka none of your beeswax.
I loved that at one point the philosophers and crew decide to consult with a dervish, and he totally just blows them off.
<<Maître, nous venons vous prier de nous dire pourquo un aussi étrange animal que l'homme a été formé.>> <<De quoi te mêles-tu? dit le derviche, est-ce là ton affaire?>> ['Master, we come to beg you to tell us why such a peculiar creature as man was created.' 'What are you meddling in?' said the dervish, 'is that any business of yours?']
We must cultivate our gardens
I very much enjoyed the ending, which seems to suggest that while there may be many crazy, violent, weird, wicked things happening in the world, we are meant to tend to our little corners of the world, aka cultivate our literal and metaphorical gardens.
Je sais aussi, dit Candide, qu'il faut cultiver notre jardin. ['I know also', said Candide, 'that we must cultivate our garden.']
Words that were new to me: (I think for some of these, the translator thought, c'est le même mot en Anglais! But it is not. Or it is not common enough for me to know it ;))
almoner - an official distributor of alms
auto-da-fé - the burning of a heretic by the Spanish Inquisition
caponized - castrated (a male chicken)
moidores - a Portuguese gold coin, current in England in the early 18th century and then worth about 27 shillings
Referents and Reverberations
- This exchange between Candide and Cacambo:<<Comment veux-tu, disait Candide, que je mange du jambon, quand j'ai tué le fils de M. le baron, et que je me vois condamné à ne revoir la belle Cunégonde de ma vie? à quoi me servira de prolonger mes misérables jours, puisque je dois les traîner loin d'elle, dans les remords et dans le désespoir?>> En parlant ainsi, il ne laissa pas de manger. ['How can you expect me to eat ham,' said Candide, 'when I've murdered the baron's son, and find myself doomed never to see the lovely Cunégonde again for the rest of my life? why should I prolong my wretched days, since I must drag them out far from her in remorse and despair? While speaking thus, he did not neglect to eat.] reminded me of one of my favorite scenes from the impeccable Importance of Being Earnest:
- In ElDorado, they discover a perfect world, but have found their way there very accidentally. When they are speaking to the monarch, he says: Partez quand vous voudrez, mais la sortie est bien difficile. [Leave when you wish, but the way out is very difficult.] This reminded me of Atlas Shrugged, when Dagny crashes into the Colorado settlement, and wasn't really supposed to be there yet.
- Proust - Lots of this book reminded of Proust, but especially the intensity of affection between Cunégonde and Candide, and how it was tender but also preposterous in its grandeur. This line, from a letter from Cunégonde: Le gouverneur de Buenos Aires a tout pris, mais il me reste votre coeur. Venez, votre présence me rendra la vie, ou me fera mourir de plaisir. [The Governor of Buenos Aires took everything, but I still have your heart. Come to me, your presence will either return me to life or cause me to die of pleasure.] reminded me of my favorite line in Swann's Way, from the early days of Swann and Odette's courtship: Swann had left his cigarette-case at her house. 'If only', she wrote, 'you had also forgotten your heart! I should never have let you have that back.'" I've said in other blobs that I have certain writers who I love for particular things, like Pasternak's weather, and Proust's descriptions of music. I think I would like Voltaire and Proust to handle the love department. ;)
Lines I Particularly Liked
- Remarquez bien que les nez ont été faits pour porter des lunettes, aussi avons-nous des lunettes. [Observe that noses were made to support spectacles, hence we have spectacles.] Obviously this is the order of things.
- Les homme ne sont fait que pour se secourir les un les autres. [Men were created only in order to help one another.]
- C'est un très grand plaisir de voir et de faire des choses nouvelles. [It's a very great pleasure to see and do new things.]
- Mais, Messieurs, vous ne voudriez pas manger vos amis. [But, gentlemen, you wouldn't want to eat your friends.]
(1) Nous allons dans un autre univers, disait Candide; c'est dans celui-là sans doute que tout est bien. ['We're going to another world', said Candide; 'undoubtedly it's there that all's well.]
(2) Nous somme au bout de nos peines et au commencement de notre félicité. [We're at the end of our troubles and the beginning of our happiness.] Doesn't that sound lovely?
(3) Tout est bien, tout va bien, tout va le mieux qu'il soit possible. [All's well, all's going well, all's going the best it possibly could.] obviously!
and this last one, a comment from a scholar they speak to for advice:
(4) Je ne lis que pour moi. [I read only for myself.] Off I go, blobbists, reading for no one but me; I hope you do the same! Keep safe, keep faith, good night.
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