The SFFaudio Podcast #854 – Candide by Voltaire, (3 hours 49 minutes) read by Ted Delorme for LibriVox, followed by a discussion of both. Participants in the discussion include Jesse, Will Emmons, and Tom Pace

Talked about on today’s show:
done in French, as a person, very European, very funny, a few digs on France, complaining about Canada, fighting over a few acres of snow, super-dense, an interesting introduction, a good argument, Michel Houellebecq, Lovecraft, Against The World Against Life, the only book most people ever read by him, notable works, The Maid Of Orleans, on the list since a teenager, apocryphal meeting, Benjamin Lay, Catherine The Great of Russia, very popular, a rock star to your inauguration, birthday dinners, I am the king of Poland, I am also the king of Poland, a lot of the jokes, you should read this book, really funny, nice and short, new jokes this time, slaves, hit with a bull’s pizzle, a whip, a pizzle is a penis, penne, pen and pencil, dog treats, cattle’s pizzles, not a valued menu item (except with dogs), the sex throughout, the rape jokes, the rude jokes, hit with a bull’s penis, makes so much sense, the names are all funny, candid, telling you the secrets, an offshoot from the story, in a library, 501 Must Read Books, classics, Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, writings about his wife, Surprised By Joy, drawn from the name of the character, the etymology wrong, cunnagonde, good pussy, a naive narrator, horrible looking, gotten stubborn, a dig in on some Jesuits, throwin digs, really good at making pastry, all based on a real guy’s philosophy, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, all is for the best, the best of all, Spinoza, “the best of all possible worlds”, high end reading at the time, addressing the problem of evil in the world, how is that compatible with a loving god, it couldn’t be any better, the minimum number of horrible things happen, he could have made the world worse, people suffering, god did his best, a number of postulates, an important conclusion to have, a defense of god, god did his best, taking the piss on this idea, suffering is bad, a consolation, a baby run over by a truck, birth defects?, who are they good for?, god gave me this burden because I’m strong enough to carry it, a Robert Frippism, suffered in interesting ways, a grateful comearound, an opportunity to develop, especially addressive of the world, earthquake, a more beautiful or safer city, balcony collapse, kid got squished, so did a cat, just throw a cat or a racoon in there, operate on the assumption this is a silly idea, the universe is as best it could be, human beings being meat eaters, eating cows is mean to cows, you can’t have jesse without him being a carnivore, be like the Maasai turn their dicks into pizzles for whipping people, a dog nuzzling a duck, Leibniz is right, the corollary to this, the worst of all possible worlds, how so, there isn’t another world, we imagine another planet, if the laws of the universe are consistent across, implies alternatives, counterfactual, just as truthfully, the point of this philosophy is to give you consolation, balconies fall because of gravity, become better engineers, make earthquakes survivable, we didn’t make the world, god did his best, a convoluted way of making yourself feel better, re-meetings, misfortune, still beautiful, stomach cut open, ravished by work, he’s been hung, everything is okay in the end, it was for the best, cultivate your garden, a compatible and also good philosophy, worried about Jesse’s mental health with regard to the politics, Canadian flag bullshit, talking to boomers, people stuck in tv mode, upset about what’s happening that you can’t control, bitter and wrong, make some PDFs, to read some more books, the resources to watch the murder that’s happening in Gaza, reasons for sharing, a compatible philosophy, all the philosophies, very funny and fun book, ten thousand thoughts an hour, a bookshelf rooted, notes and biblography of Jordan Peterson’s Maps Of Meaning, Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 And The Final Solution In Poland, that book is 70 hours long, The Rape Of Nanking, committed suicide after wrioting it, Unit 731, more brutal, go cold, realistically a good framing, a blunt tool, having birthday cake, about as simple and effective, can’t they just have your cake it and eat too, it’s awesome, not a natural disaster, a human folly story, pride and empire, we are better people, huge human mistakes, as best He could, full of sin, choice, a dumb guy who thinks that a guy who’s a philosopher is much wiser than he, disabused, audited the others, the number 3 version on LibriVox, spot on, very solid [John Van Stan, narrator], more Voltaire, Zadig, interested in the origins of the detective story, Sherlock Holmes was ripping off Poe, Voltaire did a comedic detective before, in the same style of Sherlock Holmes, C. August Dupin, a series of misfortunes happen to him, he observes things correctly, the colour of the horse, missing a horseshoe, a bit of fur caught on a treebranch, dog ran away, Micromégas, Scott Miller’s podcast, busy making new stuff, hallucinating, he was really good, contacted, a breakdown, they went nuts, will you forgive me type message, their gut torn open, kicked out of the castle in Germany, Portugal, at the house of a woman, the person that you loved, let’s talk, two or three thousand words of response, a weird thing, the plot as it is, each chapter tells you what happens as the title, trunks, fartcastle, mooning over Cunégonde, maid, mistress to the Don in portugal, I can tell a story better than you, I only have one buttcheek, she’s not just the daughter of a king, she’s the daughter of a pope, Roman Catholics, that’s part of the joke, illegitimate children, everybody knows, the world in this book is very fallen, everything is full of sin, the enhancement, the story of misery, Brazil?, Argentina?, line up a whole bunch of dudes to tell their horror stories, horror stories of life, their horror story is they got bad service at a restaurant one time, never done something to a friend and regretted it for decades, that kind of punishment of yourself, out of duty, that’s hilarious, it points in every direction, the pain is in every direction, we’re all fools is the takeaway, people who’s trauma is so minimal, the worst thing we’ve ever experienced is the worst thing we’ve ever experienced, terrible things happen to them, live to tell the story, Pangloss still believes , it has to still be true, a very good mocking takedown, just tend to your garden, you can work on yourself a lot easier than other people, you should lift more, if lifiting is the thing you think is important, the manichaeism, Martin, in Suriname, El Dorado, Utopia by Thomas More, Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift, women chased by monkeys, the monkeys were biting their butts, sexual dimorphism, they breed with monkeys to a certain degree, quarterings back in your ancestry, one of the quarterings was missing 75 countings back, I am the rightful king of Brittany, a lot of people still believe in and operate, such a short amount of space, comparing it, a sleep after shooting, in the Bulgarian war, an ultramarksman, without rustling the leaves, whipped so hard, I was impressed by the British Navy’s recruiting methods, have some cash, nah man you’re good, how do you feel about the king of Bulgaria?, you’re in for life, you’re in the army now, boy, take the gauntlet, 9000 guys whip him, the honorable thing to do, please shoot me in the head, all the skin stripped from his back but he’s fine, it’d have to be a cartoon, too horrific otherwise, the cartoon version of this, hard cuts in comics, in French, it is cartoonish, there’s no talking animals, unbelievably fun and funny, he’s taking the piss, there’s nothing he doesn’t make fun of, tied down, he killed the Jesuit and proves that, a juncture, ridiculous, The Mission (1986), Black Robe (1991), continuous rape scenes, not being able to ride on horses very well, the juxtaposition, sold into slavery, stabbed open, that Monty Python sketch [the Four Yorkshiremen sketch], Deep Space 9, Bajor needs the energy, tamed earth, fingernails to plow, humour is the best solution to almost all problems, share that horror story, it makes you feel better, God did his best, when kittens get crushed, no help at all, I loved that kitten, the kitten’s mom, isn’t it hilarious, enough of a consolation, tell each other our horror stories and laugh about it, on a list of books to read, an internet friend, school is about reverence, an irreverent book, some fancy king, you’re not allowed to make fun of that guy, a particular heresy, the devil has creative powers in the world, in contrast, the Devil’s at work, the theory that Solomon Kane is insane, he commits genocide against vampires, The Moon Of Skulls, Red Shadows, demonic things, or vampires, crazed black people, their unholy idol, King Solomon, famous as a judge, and Cain is the killer, his own brother, condemned to walk the earth, the right hand of God, the normal reading, the subversive reading, deluded, a more fun reading, how interested Howard was in Cain, an alliance with a JuJu man, a Puritan in fact, by the devil’s active work in the world, that’s actually good actually, earthquakes are good actually, there’s an earthquake in this story, Lisbon gets earthquaked, make a meal, really good at burning people, without a philosopher to give him guidance, he picks up Martin, Jesse doesn’t describe to ideologies, are you sure about that?, is that an ideology?, more obligation to go along, basic team human behavior, tie yourself to the mast of a sinking ship, a huge mistake, the comparison is almost perfect, both abstractions and connectable, an up and down, trying to appease an idea of god by burning somebody at the state, punished by an earthquake, a good thing to do, the exact opposite happens, either god making a joke of it, the god of this book is Voltaire, a planet spanning book, Europe and South America, a cross section of travel, we gotta talk about El Dorado, jewels on the ground, have a meal, pay with pebbles, buildings made out of gold, they leave with sheep full of diamonds, spends that money continously, 10,000 peasters, 20,000 peasters!, nothing bad seems to happen there, how come the whole earth isn’t like that, engaging with Utopia, no accounting for taste, philosophy of optimism, what Thomas More is grappling with, internal themes, conversations, needs to join the court of a king, should we bow, should we scrape, should we lick the dust, go hug him, this is an anti-king, the live action version get Jeff Bridges wearing the bathrobe, couldn’t we all get along better?, making fun of Utopia, wouldn’t it better if we could be richer than other people, no need unmet, his quest, his slave, Cacombo, the native, why people buy expensive stuff, lord it over other people, I paid full price, the badge of the product, overpriced handbag, she wants to be upper-class, not wanting to be inferior, lording it over that girl at school, funny funny stuff, not a funny book, stuff written in the 20th century, time creates a barrier between us and our ancestors, the world we live in, the people are the same, same kinds of foibles and personality defects, the systems are different, shownoting The Aeneid, the story of the founding of Rome to fit within the mythology of the founding of Rome, a piece of propaganda for the Romans, figuring out the audience, see what these symbols mean, their religion is more leagalistic, a person 2000 years ago reading this book, hone in on it, glimmers, this book feels pretty modern, lots of kings, no electricity, more like Plato, more like Play-Doh?, not a novel exactly, a modern novel (except it is much shorter), more of that please, not Thomas More please, concise, to the point, the chapters are short, things happen immediately, cut some of the adventures out, the stories are pretty short, a series of unfortunate events, the beginning of the intro by Littel, 1759, in ridicule of the notion, the world has been a gayer place, written in 3 days, like the number 40, a magic number, not the right date, he’s right but not in the details, Lovecraft is channeling a certain mode in certain stories, every real person is a richer character than any fictional character, one named wonders, volt is electricity, he’s shocking, he’s playing a game, jokeism?, horrible tweet, Max Blumenthal from the Grayzone, they learned it from these guys, a horrible truth, put that star of David, they learned it from, Nakba, Holocaust, burnt sacrifice, the catastrophe, this ideal world, you can see why the argument make sense walking out of the Holocaust, built to help support the creation of Israel, settler colonialism, you can laugh, you’re crying, are you Joker?, the Joker, feels everything, wants to lash out violently, recent Joker movies, people who humiliated him, he’s laughing, in the second Nakba, Taxi Driver (1976), this baggage, DC Comics universe, salience, a morbid symptom, laugh or cry, not prescriptive, take this Candide and call me in the morning, that’s why we share it, busy lifting, doing more than cultivating your own garden, gardening tips, lifting videos on instagram, lifting bins of potatoes, sculpting, I got books to read, challenging yourself, interject, into the depths, avoid the analysis, J.R.R. Tolkien, the emotional effect of the story, have a garden, he does get a little farm, they’re all coming together, a bunch of diamonds hidden in somebody’s pocket, I think I still want to marry her, sell him back into slavery, and they’re bored, burn the garden down just to get his way, Candide is punished, he doesn’t like her personality, he doesn’t like her looks, good at baking desserts, Colony by Philip K. Dick, so bad at writing military stuff, goes into the bathroom for a shower, the towel tries to kill him, comparing notes, “I trusted the rug completely”, rugs all the way down, stable in the new meta, that’s true for us too, we learn to wiggle our legs and arms, runaround and grab cookies, why am I using this walker?, who I am again?, nobody gets out of this alive, the way to approach it, slavery is bad, let’s sell him into slavery, seems objectively more dangerous than ours, even with its problems Europe is more stable, we have other problems, he was right, laughter is the solution, not trusting anything, have a good laugh over it, is that an ism?, probably, you have an ideology, I like this, it’s not manicheanism, what is it?, lying is bad, first strategy, what is my ideology if I haven’t spelled it out, cosmicism, a follower of Jesseism, “there is no recognizable divine presence, such as a god, in the universe, and that humans are particularly insignificant in the larger scheme of intergalactic existence”, that’s fun, don’t worry about it, you’re nothing but a mote of dust in the beam of a sun with a short lifespan, does it require, ideology: define, “a system of ideas and ideals, especially one which forms the basis of economic or political theory and policy”, against copyright, it’s used as a censoring tool, a free speech absolutist, give em 10 years if they want, why not?, making it infinite, reasonablism?, eclectic, between Jesse and Jesse, do dogs have ideologies, they like bones, a set of behaviors, bring animals into a conversation, we are talking weird chimps, dogs don’t have policy, a special and rare and precious person, a very strange lady, a nice person too, strong will, not good when you are a little kid and have no defenses, tricks and techniques, an anti-ideology, ideologies make you week by outsourcing, not wanting to be weak, I like being effete, do you have the power to be as weak as a baby, putting on diapers, a weak colon, if you have a fetish, you wanna be a weak baby seems insane, weak like an infant, we all start off as infants who are weak, a newborn child, protected from insects, it’s mind is innocent, weakness and strength together, being obsessed with not being weak, lifting seems kinda silly, the only what is happiness, for a bear, rubbin against trees, what is happiness for a human?, ships or airplanes or tacos, doing intellectual works, writing poems, the real place where strength is needed, in the intellectual realm vs. lifting crates, quit the gym, new popular fads, all sailor related, pulling ropes and flipping big tires, get stuff off the ship, these are not sailors, sit for 8 hours, just observing, what kinda car they’re driving, they wanna be buff, skin salons and teeth whitening and nail salons, not a lot of personality improvement stores, a philosopher who gives you good argument, that’s why you got to Socrates, you don’t want to be mentally weak, that would hurt you, Paul in the New Testament, being spiritually strong vs. being physically strong, criticizing the use of physical strength, the psychological and intellectual training, the name Plato, broad or wide, short, he looks like a plate, he’s wider than he is tall, he’s a wrestler, wide in his variety of thought, a soldier wrestler, that was his nickname, I’ll wrestle you actually, bro, what is Plato’s real name, Aristocles, slave, time to work on your body and your mind, wrestle at symposia, where everything happened, some CBC guy on BlueSky, obscure social media network, Stephen Quinn of CBC, those Convoy types, we’re not the 51st state, getting ready for Flag Day, the day they switched the flag, the Suez Crisis, “peacekeeping”, if you call soldiers peacekeepers, Lester B. Pearson, why does Australia have the same flag, and New Zealand, why do they all have the Union Jack, pretend they’re not part of the British empire, a distinct society, we’re just these friendly dudes, Canada’s third way is to be the bully’s best friend, take nukes on or Bomarc missiles, laugh at Canada, because the TV told you to, don’t listen to the TV or radio guy, everyday is Flag Day in the USA, Jesse is mentally strong, Candide can help you mentally strong, if they’re not a mental baby, re-readable for one, the chapters are really short, a few jokes per chapter, like an episode of Friends, the cast of Friends in the adaptation of Candide, Buenos Aires, Abraham and his wife Sarah, just my sister, their relationship as brother and sister, a Wikipedia, a pun referring to the female genitalia, they’re brought up in a castle together, Candide is the son of the sister of the baron, not fully quartered, missing one of his provenances, at the very least they’re cousins, the reason he was disabused he was hanging out with her, they were half-siblings, son of the baron from another mother, that would make him the heir, the bastard heir, avoid more incest, underreporting, some of the scenes are elided, they don’t say they ate her buttock (but that’s what happened to it), chased away from his uncle’s home, marauding soliders, a lot of what could be seen as anti-jew, did you finish your podcasting?, soon!, not offended by this Jew talk, more Jews to sell more diamonds, everybody is equally stupid and lame, a comedy of humanity, are they half-brother and sister legit?, quite reasonable, keep it in the family, keep the money, fucked up stuff, the philosopher is fine with it, the best of all possible incest, the worst of all possible incest?, the final question: who is the idiot?, who is the fool philosopher, Pangloss, we all murdered each other, it’s fine, he has to say he believes in it, clarified right at the end, is this truly the best of all possible worlds?, from Suriname to Bordeaux, the philosophical conversations, so much analysis and stories, the funniness, tend to your own garden, clean your room isn’t the end of the story, god you stink you really need a shower, smell yourself first, I wanna shave more, that beard looking real raggy, bro, in terms of nations too, what Canada should be saying to the United States, trying to fix what’s going on in Suriname, we’re not states, we’re individuals, clean your room, check your messages, email is a scam, the dollar, a podcast on The Declaration Of Independence, the Federalist Papers, it makes no sense, 51st through 63rd, does PEI get it’s own state?, potato wars, Greenland’s not getting a statehood, Panama wouldn’t get a statehood either, the Canal Zone, why we getting worked out about, covered in comic books and printer cartridges and toilet paper, thank you guys, a good story to read, makes you laugh and think.

Posted by Jesse Willis