Comments on: Candide, ou l'Optimisme

Candide, ou l'Optimisme

Kattullus — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 06:59:52 -0800

Few books written in the 18th Century are better known or more read today than Candide, Voltaire's great satire of optimism. The New York Public Library's Candide exhibition has many delights, including Rockwell Kent's famous illustrations. Many other artists have illustrated Candide, and many of those images can be seen in the University Library of Trier's Candide image database. If your eyes are tired, you can also download an audiobook of Candide for free from LibriVox, or you can listen to a lecture on Candide [iTunes] by Stanford professor Martin Evans. Adam Gopnik explains how Candide fits in Voltaire's life and what it can teach us today. And don't miss this old post about Leonard Bernstein's Candide operetta.

By: Kattullus

Kattullus — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 07:03:11 -0800

To view the database images full size you have to open the jpg in a new tab or window (or, if you're using IE, right-click on the image, select properties, and copy the URL and paste into a new tab or window).

By: The Whelk

The Whelk — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 07:09:46 -0800

Best of all possible posts!

By: shakespeherian

shakespeherian — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 07:36:02 -0800

Do they have Chris Ware's cover for the Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition?

By: BobbyDigital

BobbyDigital — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 08:15:17 -0800

Oh this post reminds me of how much I hate those smug Anabaptist jerks!

By: GenjiandProust

GenjiandProust — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 09:46:29 -0800

Oh this post reminds me of how much I hate those smug Anabaptist jerks! Now, BobbyDigital, don't go all Jan van Leiden on us... For my part, I liked Candide in 2 Minutes. Maybe I can't resist a "Severed Buttock!" or "War is Divine!" title card....

By: Lutoslawski

Lutoslawski — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 10:06:19 -0800

I was just thinking it was a great day for an auto de fe!

By: vito90

vito90 — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 10:56:44 -0800

I've always, always loved this book. Had to read it in high school and although I was a marginal, lazy student, I just GOT this book. I was scraping by with a C in the class (I don't even remember if it was history or literature) that assigned it and the teacher was always disappointed in everything I wrote cause my effort was so lax...but damn if I didn't write a great paper on Candide. I still remember his comment next to big red A: "You seem to have a solid understanding of the themes in this book".

By: empatterson

empatterson — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 16:13:04 -0800

Metafilter: The best of all possible webs.

By: mediareport

mediareport — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 16:49:53 -0800

The 2nd book I read in my year of reading nothing but classics a couple of years back was Candide. Page 2, with the professor "giving a lesson in experimental natural philosophy" to the maid in the bushes, made me realize I was going to have a lot more fun that year than I first thought. Thanks for this, from a huge Rockwell Kent fan, too.

By: batmonkey

batmonkey — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 21:36:19 -0800

! Terrific post. Loads to peruse. Thank you! My copy of Candide/Zadig is so tattered it's almost a shroud instead of a book, but it represents perfectly my grimly amused perceptions of a world gone wrong when I was 13. Ah, Voltaire. *happy sigh*