Candide: The start

As we start reading The book Candide, we see that the main character (Candide) is a very special character. He seems to be very uptight and decent but in a sort of way he is like a wannabe rich. Candide is the illegitimate son of the baron’s sister. His mother refused to marry his father because his father’s family tree could only be traced through “seventy-one quarterings.” Still Candide is thrown away from the castle because Pangloss finds him and Miss Cunegonde, the barons daughter kissing. This is a very drastic manner but still they do it. "Baron Thunder-ten-tronckh, happening to pass the screen at that moment, noticed both cause and effect, and drove Candide from the house with powerful kicks on the backside" (pg. 21). He starts wandering everywere to find some shelter when two man in blue noticed him. He starts to dine with them. One important event is that they convince Candide to serve in the army of the king of the Bulgars, but that was a problem for him later on. He is destroyed in the army because everyone sees him as a deserter and hates him. they make him run the gauntlet that is to hit him with their weapons for 36 times. "The regiment being two thousand strong, he received four thousand strokes, which exposed every nerve and muscle from the nape of his neck to his backside" (pg. 24). He still fights for the king of the bulgars but he doesn`t feel good and at the first chance he escapes to Holland were he starts working with Jacques, in his rug factory. We see something very interesting as he works here because he sees again Pangloss but as a bum. The bulgars attacked the barons palace and killed everybody in the family. Jacques helps Pangloss and he now is Candide´s new friend.