A Note from the Translator:

I’ve been working on this project as a hobby for quite a while, but the thought to publish it had not occurred to me until very recently. This translation is intended for readers who are already at least somewhat familiar with the circumstances surrounding Candide’s conception. Therefore, footnotes have been omitted. It is assumed that the reader has read this text before, but viewed it in a too stiffly analytical way. Voltaire did not write this to be an academic text. He intended it to be a caustic, sarcasm-filled satire attacking the popular philosophies of his time. 

In his original French manuscript, Candide’s adventures were not recounted in the bland, unspiced fashion many English translations offer. Instead, nearly every sentence was full of heavy irony. I have endeavored to mimic Voltaire’s blunt, aggressive style of satire in my own translation, in an effort to counteract the dry academic verse which has so often scarred English editions of the text. 

This is not a book that needs to be read between the lines. It is meant to be straightforward in its exaggeration and criticism of society. Enjoy it as such.

Happy reading,

Alexis Carlson

Chapter 1: How Candide was elevated in a great household, and how privilege was then taken from him.

There once was in Westphalia, in the glorious home of M. Baron de Thunder-ten-tronckh, a young man to whom nature had given the gentlest temperament. His physiognomy was like his soul. He was of good judgement, with a simple spirit; it is, I think, for this reason that he was named Candide. The aged servants of the house supposed that he was the son of the Baron’s sister, and a gentleman of familial connection. However, a true lady couldn’t marry Candide due to his unproven ancestry, the family tree lost to time.

The Baron was one of the most powerful men in Westphalia, whose palatial home possessed windows, and even contained a door. Candide knew nothing could compare to a place with both such things. The great room of the house was so exquisite as to be embellished with an actual tapestry. 

All the dogs of the household and farmyards were mute before the man, and the village vicar Thunder-ten-tronckh’s own chaplain. He was referred to by all as, “Monseigneur,” and it was simply an obligation to laugh at his anecdotes and fawn over his exploits.

Madame Baroness, who weighed around three hundred and fifty pounds, cared for matters of the house with a respectable dignity. Her daughter, Cunegonde, at the young age of seventeen, was high-spirited, fresh, and a feast for the eyes. The Baron’s son reflected all the honorability of his father. The tutor Pangloss, a sort of house oracle, was attended by Candide with a fascination befitting his character.

Pangloss taught metaphysico-theologo-cosmolo-nigologie. He had admirably proven that there is no such thing as an effect without a preceding cause, and that, in the best of all possible worlds, the Baron’s house was the best of all chateaux, and Monseigneur’s wife the best of all possible baronesses. Candide found such wisdom enthralling.

“It is demonstrated,” he said, “that things cannot be otherwise, that all is made for an end, that all is necessary for the best ending. Noses were made for wearing glasses, and we therefore have glasses. Legs are clearly meant for covering, so we have stockings. Rocks were collected to form this palace (a very beautiful place, Monseigneur), for the greatest baron of this province to lodge within, pigs raised for slaughter, so that we may eat pork. Consequently, those who say that all is simply well have said a foolish thing, for all things are, in fact, at their very best.”

Candide listened attentively, and believed innocently. He found Cunegonde quite beautiful, though he lacked the boldness to say so. He concluded that the first degree of happiness was borne by the Baron Thunder-ten-tronckh, the second embodied in Cunegonde, the third, that which he saw every day, and the fourth learning from Master Pangloss. That man was the greatest philosopher in all the province, possibly even all the earth.

One day, Cunegonde, during a walk outside the Baron’s house and in the nearby woods which were referred to as a park, encountered the bushes where Pangloss was teaching an experimentally physical lesson to her mother’s docile little maid. Cunegonde, who had quite a head for sciences, observed breathlessly the truth that no effect was without its cause. It was so clearly demonstrated through such simple teaching. She returned to the household thoughtful, yet nonetheless rather distracted, full of a desire to grow in her knowledge of the world, and thinking such a motivation might be a good reason to become Candide’s own.

She blushed when, during her return home, she encountered Candide. He blushed just as thoroughly. She greeted him in a pinched voice; Candide responded without realizing what he was saying. The following day, after dinner, as they left the table, Cunegonde and Candide found themselves behind a secluded screen. Cunegonde dropped her handkerchief, but dear Candide retrieved it for her. Innocently, she took his hand; the young man kissed Cunegonde’s own hand with a sort of hesitant vivacity, a sensibility, a particular grace. Their lips met each other’s, eyes inflamed and knees shaking, hands straying from their usual resting places.

In those moments, Baron Thunder-ten-tronckh passed by the screen and, discerning the cause which had led to such an effect, expelled Candide from the castle with a great kick to the young man’s posterior. Cunegonde fainted: she was slapped by the Baroness to regain consciousness. Indeed, Thunder-ten-tronckh’s home was without question the greatest of all possible worlds.

Translator’s Note: The paragraph about the physical features of the house (windows, tapestry, etc.) and the baron’s influence over his surroundings had to be rather heavily rewritten by changing and even adding certain descriptive terms. The original French did not translate quite as well as the rest of the chapter, and going word-for-word would sound choppy, so I elected to slightly reconfigure it in order to preserve the intended tone. Otherwise, it risked an English version which appeared to be stating the house’s features as a normal description, instead of highlighting absurdity by using ordinary architectural features as examples of grandeur. If any French-speakers want to compare my work, the original speech reads as such: “Monsieur le baron était un des plus puissants seigneurs de la Westphalie, car son château avait une porte et des fenêtres. Sa grande salle même était ornée d’une tapisserie. Tous les chiens de ses basses-cours composaient une meute dans le besoin; ses palefreniers étaient ses piqueurs; le vicaire du village était son grand-aumônier. Ils l’appelaient tous monseigneur, et ils riaient quand il fesait des contes.” Furthermore, the dropping of the handkerchief, and, indeed, the entire sequence leading up to Candide’s expulsion from Thunder-ten-tronckh, is a parody of courtly romance. Voltaire is critiquing the rituals and strange traditions of romance in novels and high society. Though certain lines in the original French give a slightly more explicit tone, I chose to use more mild wording to preserve the intended message while keeping it suitable for any reader.