Candide, Voltaire, Jean Goldzink

What is Candide? The shortest, funniest, most famous tale of the Enlightenment. Condemned in several countries upon its publication for indecency and insolence, and forbidden by Diderot to his daughter, it now gallops at the top of classical literature bestsellers. It is adapted for the stage, set to music, attracts illustrators, and inspires filmmakers. What do we find in it? According to Voltaire himself, probably not entirely sincere, a "foolishness." In fact, this fable confronts the harsh question of evil. Candide, raised by his master Pangloss in the philosophy of optimism, encounters a deluge of bitter and comical calamities across Europe and America: expulsion, war, earthquake, auto-da-fé, slavery, diseases... He will eventually forge his own morality – to cultivate our garden – far from sterile metaphysics: Voltaire, an adversary of the Bible, had just invented one of the most famous parables in literature.