A Tale of Three Candides: Sfar, Meyran and Delcourt Recount Voltaire

Screech, Matthew ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2100-7362 (2013) A Tale of Three Candides: Sfar, Meyran and Delcourt Recount Voltaire. European Comic Art, 6 (1). pp. 14-44. ISSN 1754-3797

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Abstract

Since the millennium, bande dessinee artists have retold Voltaire’s Candide three times. The first Candide is by Joann Sfar, the second by Philippe Meyran, and the third, by Gorian Delpature, Michel Dufranne and Vujadin Radovanovic, is being published by Delcourt. This article begins with a brief presentation of the work. Taking our three Candides in chronological order, I then examine how Sfar, Meyran and the Delcourt version retell the story. Specific excerpts are studied, with emphasis on how far they convey Voltaire’s irony. We shall see how Sfar finds new ways to infuse Candide with irony. Analogies with medieval illuminations intimate that the great iconoclast is being sanctified. Moreover, Sfar’s grotesque artwork contrasts with Voltaire’s elegant prose. Thus, Sfar adds a visual dimension to Voltaire’s incongruities between what is said and what is meant. Sfar also jokes about ideas raised by Voltaire including philosophical optimism, anti-Semitism and Utopianism. Meyran depicts the hero’s sequence of misfortunes with faux naif caricature. Thus, he makes visible an incongruity between narrative developments and the manner of their recounting. Yet Meyran usually weakens (or eliminates) irony, while playing down philosophical and polemical issues. The Delcourt version employs elegant, technically accomplished artwork. The narrative is not without irony although engagement is intermittent. This work places emphasis on recounting a fast-moving adventure rather than elaborating upon the story’s philosophical underpinnings.