Voltaire’s Candide celebrates 250th anniversary
16 Sep 09
Experts from around the world will be gathering at Oxford this week to celebrate the 250th anniversary of Candide, Voltaire’s most famous satirical novel, which was published in 1759.
Candide remains as popular with readers today, for its satirical humour and for its shocking and absurdist portrayal of human folly.
Oxford is the leading centre for research into Voltaire and the French Enlightenment so the anniversary is a key date on its calendar. Therefore, Oxford’s Besterman Centre for the Enlightenment (Voltaire Foundation) is collaborating with the Maison Française d’Oxford to organise an international conference 'Les 250 ans de Candide: lectures et relectures' on 16–18 September.
Director of the Voltaire Foundation Professor Nicholas Cronk said: 'Voltaire wrote enthusiastically about England, so I think he would have approved of this major international celebration of his work taking place on English soil.’
Professor Nicholas CronkVoltaire wrote enthusiastically about England, so I think he would have approved of this major international celebration of his work taking place on English soil.
The conference is organised with the patronage of the French Ambassador to the UK, M. Maurice Gourdault-Montagne, who will be attending some of the events.
Academics will be discussing everything from the text itself, to illustrations and cinema and from its reception around the world to its meaning today.
As part of this celebration the University will have two library exhibits. Candide was an instant success on publication, and quickly became an international best seller. Scholars have long been fascinated by the proliferation of early French editions, and the Taylor Institution Library is the only library in Europe (and one of only two in the world) to have all seventeen of the French editions published in 1759. It will be displaying these precious early editions.
Secondly, Candide was immediately translated and no fewer than three different English translations appeared in the course of 1759. A selection of these early English versions of Candide is on display in the Proscholium of the Bodleian Library.
Despite being published in France, Candide caused a sensation in the UK too. Even Laurence Sterne, who published the first book of Tristram Shandy in the same year, 1759, worried that his own novel was being put in the shade. At the end of chapter nine, he petitions the moon: ‘Bright Goddess, if thou art not too busy with Candide, and Miss Cunégonde’s affairs, take Tristram Shandy’s under thy protection also.’