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[2]: 582 It also compares the adaptationist perspective to that of Dr. Pangloss, a character in Voltaire's Candide, who believed that the world he lived in was the best world possible. [9] This view is embodied in the statement by Pangloss that "Everything is made for the best purpose.
The claim that we live in the best of all possible worlds drew scorn most notably from Voltaire, who lampooned it in his comic novella Candide by having the character Dr. Pangloss (a parody of Leibniz and Maupertuis) repeat it like a mantra when great catastrophes keep happening to him and the titular protagonist.
Candide, ou l'Optimisme (/ k ɒ n ˈ d iː d / kon-DEED, [5] French: ⓘ) is a French satire written by Voltaire, a philosopher of the Age of Enlightenment, [6] first published in 1759. . The novella has been widely translated, with English versions titled Candide: or, All for the Best (1759); Candide: or, The Optimist (1762); and Candide: Optimism (1947)
Title page of Voltaire's Candide, 1759. Many of Voltaire's prose works and romances, usually composed as pamphlets, were written as polemics. Candide attacks the passivity inspired by Leibniz's philosophy of optimism through the character Pangloss's frequent refrain that, because God created it, this is of necessity the "best of all possible ...
The trouble with Candide is that you can either have a plot summary of a sentence: "Candide, taught optimism by his professor Pangloss, embarks upon a voyage of discovery in which he learns the world is a horrible place, and you may as well just work hard and try not to think about it." - or you have something of this length.
Candide's improbable adventures take him into a concentration camp to rescue his tutor, Pangloss; then he is off to South America (where he endures a series of revolutions), Borneo (where he is imprisoned by a primitive tribe), Moscow (where he accidentally foments a missile crisis between the Soviet Union and the United States), and New York ...
Pangloss (from Greek, meaning all languages) may refer to: Pangloss, a fictional character in the 1759 novel Candide by Voltaire Dr. Peter Pangloss, a fictional character in the 1797 play The Heir at Law by George Colman the Younger
Cunégonde is a fictional character in Voltaire's 1759 novel Candide. She is the title character's aristocratic cousin and love interest. At the beginning of the story, the protagonist Candide is chased away from his uncle's home after he is caught kissing and fondling Cunégonde. Shortly afterwards, Cunégonde's family is attacked by a band of ...