Literature I / Six Set Books: Candide to A Doll’s House
Practice question · Select all that apply

Which are true of Candide?

Hints
  1. Three of these describe a philosophical tale; one describes a different genre entirely.
  2. Pangloss is a doctrine with legs, not a character with an interior.
Show the answer
  • A. It ends by recommending work over speculation
  • C. It targets the claim that this is the best of all possible worlds
  • D. Its characters function as positions rather than psychologies
Why

Candide is a conte philosophique: characters are positions, catastrophes arrive at absurd speed, and Pangloss’s imperviousness to evidence is the joke. Psychological development would defeat the form. Pangloss has to be unchangeable for the satire to work.

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