Voltaire Enlightenment

François-Marie Arouet, known by his pen name Voltaire (1694-1778), was the most influential writer of the French Enlightenment — prolific (over 20,000 letters, dozens of books), witty, sharp, and courageous in attacking religious intolerance, judicial torture, and arbitrary power. His Candide (1759, a satirical novella ridiculing Leibniz's philosophical optimism through a character experiencing every possible catastrophe) is one of the most widely read French literary works. His Dictionnaire Philosophique (1764) was burned in Geneva and banned in multiple countries. Voltaire spent his life challenging religious orthodoxy and defending victims of judicial religious persecution — his campaigns on behalf of Jean Calas (falsely convicted of murdering his son for converting to Catholicism, broken on the wheel) and Chevalier de la Barre (tortured and executed for failing to remove his hat during a religious procession) made him a hero of civil liberties. He lived near Geneva to be outside French jurisdiction while maintaining easy access to France. His return to Paris at 83 (just before his death) produced a triumphal reception.