Every week, you will be asked to answer a question that stems from our class discussion or even something we didn’t talk about in class. Here’s is where you’ll find it!
Week 1-2: In your opinion, has Candide changed at all during his journey?
Week 3-4: Who or perhaps what idea does Meursault represent in the 21st century?
I think that Candide has gone from a complete and total optimist, believing everything that Pangloss taught him about life being “the best” and everything always working out to result in the best possible world, to finally questioning whether or not this idea could be true. He does not distinctly deny its possibility in the end of the book, but he does not comply to the optimistic system of beliefs quite as easily as before. He has spent his life chasing after one woman, who ends up being old and ugly and not at all what he wants. This makes him rethink his idealistic approach to the world and question whether everything truly does have a purpose and whether that purpose is love, which he had truly believed in the beginning, or the purpose is to work for what you believe in and what you need to survive, as he comes to learn in the end of the story. While all of the characters find their way back to him, which hints at a truly optimistic way of life, the process was not easy. Candide learns from the trials and tribulations of his fellow travelers that while things do not always go the way they are expected to, that does not give cause for hopelessness, but rather hopefulness.
In my opinion I think that Candide has grown as a person while going on his journey. He no longer just believes what people tell him and adapts their ways, he actually starts to question what people force feed on to him to decide whether he agrees or not. Hes been through a lot on this voyage and has finally learned to think for himself.
In order to analyze the question of whether Candide has changed one must review Candide’s Character from the beginning to the end of the story. In the beginning Candide is this highly unchallenged lover of life who does not have a sense of reality. Once he lives outside of the castle he has a taste of real life but still does not change his opinion on optimism entirely. It is not until the very end that Candide denounces Pangloss’s philosophy and takes up the old farmer’s philosophy instead. Thus Candide changes philosophies but does not change his character completely because he is still a follower. I think the bigger message from Voltaire to the
reader is that even catastrophic events do not always change a personespecially those who are weak-minded to begin with, and Voltaire argues that one should change.
I believe that Candide does change through the story. At the beginning of the story he is naive and has the belief that everything is for the best and he is living in the best possible world. Throughout his adventures his trials begin to show him that things are not always for the best and he begins to use the belief that being reunited with his love would make everything good. By the end of the story he doubts the ideals he began with and adopts new beliefs. He sees that things are not always good and that just by having something to go to does not mean it will make him happy.
Candide has not really changed, except for doubting the finality of Pangloss’s theory. Throughout the novel we see time and again how Candide maintains the ridiculousness of believing that all is for the best without having a logical basis for doing so. Towards the end of his adventures, Candide does begin to question the validity of Pangloss’s teachings. However, Candide still remains unable to make decisions for himself, nor does he strive to use what he has to better his situation. The last line of the novel “Let us cultivate our garden” may lead one to the assumption that Candide has realized to work with what he has, but this is not true. In that line Candide simply adopts from a farmer whom he overheard. Thus Candide once again takes another’s philosophy as a governing way of life, further showing his incapacity for sound logical judgment.
It’s clear that while Candide’s character has matured by the end of his journey, he has not fully evolved into a completely changed man. When we meet Candide, he is naive and unworldly. He has seen little in his life to undermine his optimism until he is thrown out of the Baron’s house. His journey teaches him that no one philosophy about the way of life is sound; that is, each character in turn has his view of the world tested, especially Candide and Pangloss who believe that this is “the best of all possible worlds.” By the end of the novel, Candide seems to understand that this world is flawed and messy, not simple and logical. He finds that the best way to deal with the brutality of life is to cultivate his garden and stay immersed in physical labor, detached from the outside world. He no longer has blind faith in Pangloss’s philosophy; he is much less likely to adapt any given event to fit neatly within the walls of his optimism.
I believe that candide has become realistic about his life, and not living by the philosophy of livng in “the best of all possible worlds”. The extremity of the events that he has witnessed from his journey have given reasons to doubt his optimism. With the absence of Pangloss in his life candide loses faith in the teachings he learned, and starts to question whether his belief of optimism is the correct ideology. Relying on optimism and destiny has caused candid to kill two men and at that point we see optimism has failed him and survival instincts have surfaced and becomes the turning point of the novel when realism overcame optimism.
From viewing responses, it seems that whether Candide changed hinges on the fact of how you interpreted the ending of the novel. In my case I did not view the ending as favorable for Candide and thus do not believe that he has fundamentally changed. Yet if you view the ending of the novel as a positive step in the right direction for Candide than your sure to believe that he has changed more dramatically.
I think it’s very interesting to see how the rest of the class views Candide’s journey. As with any other story, readers tend to interpret and understand based on their own life experiences. What would Candide have thought about his life if he had read about it versus having lived through it? (or perhaps even more interesting would be to consider what he would have thought about this story of his life AFTER having lived through it.)
I believe Candide did in fact change throughout the novel. At the beginning of the story, Candid followed Dr. Pangloss’s teachings in everything he did. By the end of the novel, though, and after all the misfortune Candide had came across he openly states numerous times the failings of Pangloss’s teachings. However, often times he comes back to believe in Pangloss’s philosophy, seemingly whenever something makes him return to the “best of all possible worlds” belief. By the end of the novel, however, I believe Candide has realized that philosophy is not a math and cannot be proved to hold true in all circumstances. By choosing to work the earth, Candide is choosing to not be in touch with the world, so he won’t be in touch with evil. He no longer relies on philosophy to solve his problems and has discovered that the entire world is not his to worry about. The farmer with his twenty acres was doing what everyone should do, what is pleasing and fulfilling to oneself. Working in the garden allowed Candide to eventually achieve happiness with his friends in their simple lives and has helped him overcome his tragedies, enabling him to live peacefully and content.
Everyone has their own thoughts as to whether or not Candide has changed throughout his journey. Everyone’s reasoning makes sense and I enjoyed reading everyones responses.
In the 21st century most people want to find concrete answers to the motives of people and how they can be helped. Mersualt never cried at his mothers funeral and then killed an Arab by shooting him four times. I would argue that if he did these acts in today’s society people would ostracize him as a mental patient and keep him locked away becuase he is a danger to society. Today people hope that they can rehabiliatate the insane and help them with drugs and medical attention to erradicate their harmful behaviors.
The other idea that may have been proposed if he had done these acts in the 21st century is labeling his killing as a hate crime. Today’s society is highly aware of who people kill and why. If you are caught killing someone maliciously and they are a different race then you it is often labeled a hate crime. Thus if Mercualt had lived in the 21st century these are two possiblilities that might occuer to him based on his actions and the modern public’s reactions to similar situations today.
I think that Mersault, in reference to the 21st century, represents the idea that people don’t really care about things like they used to. Children today are brainwashed by television, school shootings are more and more frequent, and the general quality of life has declined for many, as cost of living has been rising steadily in particular since the time The Stranger was written. Today, people grow up to be disconnected from the world they live in, and by this process become more and more like the character Mersault.
In the 21st century, Mersault could be seen as a sociopath. A person who exhibits anti-social behavior and lacks emotional connection with other people. Mersault was never close to anyone and that didn’t bother him, even taking a life didn’t seem phase him. Most Sociopaths are seen as selfish and unable to have empathy for other people or feel guilt. He knew he didn’t fit in his own society, and lacked the moral compass that most people have. In this age, people would see him as a sociopath or a person with a chemical imbalance that is need of medication or therapy or put into confinement for the safety of the general public.
I think that in this 21st century, Mersault would be labeled as a cold blooded psycho. He has or shows no emotion towards anybody significant in his life. He didn’t cry when his mother died or doesn’t care about the only other female who has feelings for him, Marie. He only socializes with people when it is convenient for him to do so. This behavior is very unorthodox and is why he is a stranger to society. He is the kind of person that if I knew, I would do everything in my power to stay on their good side in fear of what they would do if they didn’t like me.
I think it is interesting to note that the technology that most Americans enjoy today affects how connected we are to our lives. The media has such an immense impact on what people buy and value. The control that this exerts on people is mostly overlooked but I agree that we are most likely to be detached emotionally to our own lives because we are bombarded with outside influences.
Mersualt in the 21 st century represents the individuals who society deem as “abnormal.” They are deemed so because they do not fit into the usual constructs set up by the varying opinons and general concensus. While it is true that Meursault shows no emotion, nor attachement to his genreal surroundings, his behaovir is not so destructive that he is a danger to society. Meursault’s indifference is one that allows him to accept what would seem to be irrational. In comparing this to the general population, his state of being is not so different. Consider that many people get up day in and day out to go to a job which they absolutely hate. Some may do it becuase they have to, but what about the individual who goes just for the sake of going. People have varying degrees of what they are willing to sacrifice. One willing to sacrifice their life for woth of not living is not statistically usual, but it is importnat to assess why one would do so. Although he did not have ambition, Meursault did not express the will to explicitly take his own life. In this sense he reflects the mentality of some to move to the pace of their enviornment around them, without setting their own beat.