Letters on England

An odd little book. I can't say I gave it the attention it warranted. The sections on Quakers and English manners were great, those on Newton well-nigh unreadable.

Voltaire said of England: "If every I smell of a Resurrection, or come a second time on Earth, I will pray to God to make me born in England, the Land of Liberty."
In the two years or so he was here for, he fell in love with the island across the Channel from his native homeland, and wrote Letters Concerning the English Nation. In it he surveys all of English politics and culture, using irony and his own reasoning in questioning the norms throughout his work, and I like his playful style and allusiveness.
Among his key themes, is religion, in which Voltaire notes that "A man should never attempt to win over a fanatic by strength of reasoning." He argues not against religion, but against the public dominance of any specific religion, or show more the public conflict between them. "The Romans never knew the dreadful folly of religious wars, and abomination reserved for devout preachers of patience and humility.
His account of English political liberty implies that France has a long way to go in regards to rational and restrained government, but then he writes that the "house of Lords and that of the Commons divide the legislative power under the King," Voltaire is making a statement about the ideal form of English constitutionalism at a time when it was under debate in England.
Culturally, he attempts to catalogue the intellectual and cultural heroes of England, such as Locke, Bacon, Newton and Shakespeare, arguing that it's the intellectual geniuses who push a civilisation forward as opposed to kings and military leaders. show less

I was completely surprised at how great this was. I haven't read Candide in 25 or more years and had forgotten how well Voltaire wrote. Would be 5 stars but that last letter, yeesh, complete slog.

It's somewhat interesting to see Voltaire's views of contemporary developments in England. The letters on the Quakers and on Newton were my favorite. The Quakers had a culture very different from that of France, and Newton's Principia was changing how people thought about the world at the time of Voltaire's writing.

Oddly, it seems that Voltaire originally penned his letters in English before translating them into the French that I managed to get a copy of. I'm curious how Voltaire wrote in English.

Some of the letters are interesting and others are missable (generally the former are those with fewer large quotes and the latter with more). I could have done with far less concern about religion and theatre and more about about almost any other topic.

This piqued my interest in Voltaire's non-fiction writing. Previously, I had only read Candide. From this point forward, I plan to explore more of his writings-- he is a dutiful and fulfilling writer.

A commendable effort. Good show.

Eighteenth-century Frenchman's critique of his own country couched in terms of description of Britain.