Aggravating People

Some regard (American whistleblower) Edward Snowden as a hero, others as a traitor.  In either case, we all must admit that he comes from a long line of people in the past who have infuriated the powers of the time.  I’m reminded of this insofar as it’s the birthday of Voltaire, one of my favorite characters in history; I hope readers will read through this colorful summary of his achievements when it came to irritating the living bejesus out of the great forces of 18th Century France, which I reprint from today’s edition of the Writer’s Almanac:

It’s the birthday of French satirist, philosopher, and social revolutionary François-Marie Arouet, better known as Voltaire (books by this author), born in Paris (1694). The son of an influential lawyer, Voltaire showed little interest in towing the line or respecting authority from an early age. His father’s attempts to remove him from the bad influence of freethinkers and libertines — periodically sending him abroad and promising that the next trip would be to prison — had little effect.

In fact, his father hadn’t needed to threaten jail time; others followed through on the idea soon enough. Voltaire was just 21 when he was expelled from Paris for writing a satirical poem about the decadence at Versailles; within months of his return he offended another member of the royal family, which landed Voltaire in the Bastille. He was reportedly delighted, having visited a friend there many times, and hoped he would not be set free before completing some work. His wish was granted, and he wrote his first play, Oedipe, behind bars.

The tragedy was a great success, and helped establish his career in the theater. It was there, several years later, where his biting wit got Voltaire into trouble yet again with a nobleman. This time his cleverness was repaid with a beating and a direct order from the king to be thrown back in the Bastille. Voltaire secured his release by promising to leave the country altogether. He fled to England, where his involvement with the country’s leading intellectuals helped shape his future philosophy. Upon his return to France in 1733, Voltaire wrote Letters Concerning the English Nation, an ironic criticism of the French religious and political establishment. This time the book’s publisher was sent to the Bastille, and Voltaire hightailed it to Lorraine, where he lived and wrote for the next 15 years, until the death of his mistress, when he began yet another cycle of relocating, offending someone in power, and fleeing. He returned to his hometown of Paris only months before he died, in 1778, a hero among the common people.

Voltaire was not as logical or systematic a philosopher as most in the Age of Reason, which is in part what made his writing the most influential. His were not the standard philosophical treatise, but instead relied heavily on satire and humor to make his case, and used forms like fiction, poetry, and plays to reach a broad audience, despite being widely censored and banned. Voltaire’s views on religion, for example — that Judaism and Christianity were essentially corrupt and superstitious, and that any cosmic Designer or Creator was very possibly amoral — were radically polarizing, but he expressed them with such wit and irony that his writing was immensely popular. (Some consider Voltaire the founder of modern anti-Semitism because of his arguments against Judaism, which were cited to prevent Jews from becoming citizens during the French Revolution.)

The novel Candide, Voltaire’s most famous work, argues against the prevailing philosophy of the time: that this is the best of all possible worlds, and that everything that happens is ultimately for the best. The book’s laughably naïve protagonist, Candide, trusts his corrupt and insufferable teacher despite every imaginable evil, believing that it must all be for the best despite all appearances, until at last he retreats to spend the rest of his life tending his garden. Looking on the bright side was simply an excuse for those in power to remain in power, Voltaire argued, a way to ignore injustice and shirk responsibility.

He has been called the conscience of Europe for his call for social reform, and the Genius of Mockery for his blistering ridicule of anyone who opposed him.

Voltaire said, “If God did not exist, man would have to invent him.”

And he said, “As long as people believe in absurdities, they will continue to commit atrocities.”