Voltaire biography essay topics

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Voltaire biography essay topics

Voltaire's Life: The Philosopher as Critic and Public Activist

Voltaire only began to identify himself with philosophy and the philosophe identity during middle age. His work Lettres philosophiques, published in 1734 when he was forty years old, was the key turning point in this transformation.

Before this date, Voltaire's life in no way pointed him toward the philosophical destiny that he was later to assume. His early orientation toward literature and libertine sociability, however, shaped his philosophical identity in crucial ways.

1.1 Voltaire's Early Years (1694–1726)

François-Marie d'Arouet was born in 1694, the fourth of five children, to a well-to-do public official and his well bred aristocratic wife.

In its fusion of traditional French aristocratic pedigree with the new wealth and power of royal bureaucratic administration, the d'Arouet family was representative of elite society in France during the reign of Louis XIV. The young Fran&cced