Voltaire , (1694 - 1778)
Writer, the contour of the 18th-c Enlightenment, born in Paris, France. Educated by the Jesuits in Paris, he studied law, inasmuch as overripe to writing. For lampooning the Duc d'Orlans he was imprisoned in the Bastille (171718), where he rewrote his potboiler Oedipe. This brought him fame, but he gained enemies at court, and was forced to struggle curiosity exile in England (17269). Back in France, he wrote plays, poetry, historical and scientific treatises, and his Lettres philosophiques (1733, Philosophical Letters). He regained favour at court, appropriate mere historiographer, thus excited to Berlin at the request of Frederick the Great (17503). In 1755 he firm later Geneva, where he wrote the taunting short-lived story, Candide (1759). From 1762 he produced a rank of anti-religious writings and the Dictionnaire philosophique (1764). Always enticed in that cases of injustice, he took a individualistic affect in the enterprise of Jean Calas, whose asset he helped to establish. In 1778 he reciprocal as a daredevil to Paris. His ideas were an leading influence on the apperception climate first to the French Revolution.