Ep. 25. Voltaire: The Rascal Philosopher

Few enlightenment thinkers are as famous as the French writer Voltaire. Born into a modest though socially ambitious family, he found his talent for writing early and by his late teens was punching way above his weight as a playwright and poet earning accolades and raising eyebrows for his witty use of satire to make not-so-subtle criticisms of church and state. Indeed he would spend his entire adult life dodging the authorities, often writing under multiple pseudonyms and denying authorship of most of his scandalous books, for which there was no shortage of interest among the literate class of Paris, while the government burned his prolific output on a continuous basis in the public square. In his long and productive life he would write more than 2000 books and articles- including several massive encyclopaedic volumes. He would correspond with both monarchs and nobodies, on subjects as diverse as geology and free-speech; history and biology; mathematics and religious tolerance. His fortunes would take him from the Bastille and exile to the court of Frederick the Great, back to the Bastille and exile again. His very name became synonymous with both scandal and genius, and yet despite his herculean output, he nevertheless found time to advocate for the downtrodden and oppressed classes – often at substantial personal expense. He would ferociously denounce laws and customs he believed were unjust and savage his enemies in brutal polemical arguments, yet was incredibly generous to the point of being a sucker. He had an iron wit yet was an interminable hypochondriac. He was a Frenchman who loved the English way of life, always tearing at the fabric of his corrupt society. Perhaps more than any other individual of the time, his works challenged people to think deeply about the need to evolve our institutions and culture to be more humane, rational and accountable. If you want to know a bit more about this genius who stood at the crossroads between the old Europe and the New, then join us, as we dive into life and times of Voltaire, the Rascal philosopher.#voltaire #history #france #enlightenment #philosophy Support the show