Candide; or Optimism

'Always Look on the Bright Side of Life' - that's the essence of Voltaire's 'Candide'. For, like the ever-upbeat character in 'Monty Python's Life of Brian', the eponymous Candide is taught that everything is for the best. The young Frenchman must not grumble, grimace or lose heart.

However, when he is cast out for falling for the daughter of a Baron, his sunny disposition is sorely tested by global disasters including earthquakes, the Inquisition and syphilis.

'Candide' was initially banned because of blasphemy and political sedition. But the satire has since become one of the great novels in European history. Voltaire is the pen name of the French writer Francois-Marie Arouet (1694-1778). He was a writer and philosopher whose radical anti-Catholic and pro-freedom work helped inspire the French Revolution a decade after his death. He wrote 20,000-plus letters and 2,000 books and pamphlets and famously spent two years in exile in England for his seditious views. Among his many works, Voltaire was known for 'Lettres Philosophique' and 'Candide'.