Cándido

Voltaire

LD Books, 2006 - Fiction - 157 pages

This is about the life of Candide, the illegitimate nephew of a German baron. He grows up in the baron's castle under the tutelage of the scholar Pangloss, who teaches him that this world is "the best of all possible worlds." Candide falls in love with the baron's young daughter and the baron catches the two kissing and expels Candide from his home. On his own for the first time, this is the begining of the real Candide's life.

Contents

• Prólogo: 7
• De lo que sucedió a Cándido con los búlgaros: 14
• Tempestad naufragio terremoto desventuras: 25
• Una vieja caritativa cuida de Cándido: 31
• Lo que les sucedió a Cunegunda a Cándido: 39
• Historia de la vieja: 45
• Prosigue la vieja contando sus desgracias: 50
• Sepárase Cándido de la hermosa Cunegunda y de la vieja: 55
• Viaje de Cándido y su criado a los establecimientos jesuíticos del Paraguay: 59
• De lo que hizo Cándido en un momento de cólera: 64
• De lo que sucedió a los dos viajeros en la tierra de los orejones: 67
• Llegan los dos fugitivos a la provincia de El Dorado y ven maravillas: 71
• Prosigue el aturdimiento de los dos viajeros: 77
• Cándido y Cacambo llegan a Surinam y de lo que allí les sucedió: 85
• De lo que sucedió a Cándido y a Martín durante su navegación: 93
• Cándido y Martín se acercan a las costas de Francia y siguen hablando: 97
• De lo que les pasó en Francia a Cándido y a Martín: 100
• De lo que vieron Cándido y Martín al llegar a las costas de Inglaterra: 114
• Vicisitudes de la Paulita: 117
• Visita de Cándido y Martín al senador Pococurante: 124
• Trátase de una comida que tuvieron: 132
• Viaje de Cándido a Constantinopla: 138
• Trabajos del barón jesuita y del doctor Pangloss: 144
• Se acaba el cuento: 152

About the author

François-Marie Arouet known as Voltaire, was born in Paris in 1694. He was educated by the Jesuits at the Collège Louis-le-Grand (1704-1711), where he learned Latin and Greek; later in life he became fluent in Italian, Spanish, and English. By the time he left school, Voltaire had decided he wanted to be a writer. His father then obtained a job for him as a secretary to the French ambassador in the Netherlands. Most of Voltaire's early life revolved around Paris. From early on, Voltaire had trouble with the authorities for critiques of the government and religious intolerance. These activities were to result in two imprisonments and a temporary exile to England. The name "Voltaire", which the author adopted in 1718, is an anagram of "AROVET LI," the Latinized spelling of his surname, Arouet, and the initial letters of "le jeune" ("the young"). The name also echoes in reverse order the syllables of the name of a family château in the Poitou region: "Airvault". The adoption of the name "Voltaire" following his incarceration at the Bastille is seen by many to mark Voltaire's formal separation from his family and his past. Voltaire continued to write plays, such as Mérope (or La Mérope française) and began his long research into science and history. From 1762, he began to champion unjustly persecuted people, the case of Jean Calas being the most celebrated. This Huguenot merchant had been tortured to death in 1763, supposedly because he had murdered his son for wanting to convert to Catholicism. His possessions were confiscated and his remaining children were taken from his widow and were forced to become members of a monastery. Voltaire, seeing this as a clear case of religious persecution, managed to overturn the conviction in 1765. n February 1778, Voltaire returned for the first time in 20 years to Paris. He soon became ill again and died on 30 May 1778. Emilio Carballido is known primarily as a playwright and one of the leaders of a movement that revitalized Mexican theater during the 1950s and 1960s. Previously, Mexican theater had been derivative of European models. Carballido is responsible for breaking from the traditional realistic drama and introducing a surrealistic, fantastic world (one to which the Mexican novel had already turned) into the theater. At the same time, Carballido probes the nature of reality and of human responsibility. The play Theseus in the volume The Golden Thread (1957), is a twentieth-century version of the Greek myth, in which Theseus takes full responsibility for his actions. Theseus willfully neglects to put up the white sail of victory on his return from killing the Minotaur so that his father will hurl himself from the Parthenon and he will become king. The Clockmaker from Cordoba is a wryly comic vision of the fallibility of justice and the weakness of humankind. Like all Carballido's work, ultimately The Clockmaker from Cordoba expresses an abiding faith in a weak but essentially striving humanity.

Bibliographic information

• Title: Cándido; Biblioteca juvenil
• Author: Voltaire
• Contributor: Emilio Carballido
• Publisher: LD Books, 2006
• ISBN: 9707321806, 9789707321809
• Length: 157 pages
• Subjects: Fiction / Classics; Fiction / General; Fiction / Humorous / General; Fiction / Psychological; Fiction / Satire