Candide Candide. Born François-Marie Arouet, Voltaire (1694–1778), by the time of the Lisbon earthquake, was already a well-established author, known for his satirical wit. He had been made a member of the Académie Française in 1746. He was a deist, a strong proponent of religious freedom, and a critic of tyrannical governments. "Candide" became part of his large, diverse body of philosophical, political and artistic works expressing these views. More specifically, it was a model for the eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century novels called the "contes philosophiques". This genre, of which Voltaire was one of the founders, included previous works of his
Marie-Angélique de Bombelles Marie-Angélique de Bombelles Marie-Angélique Charlotte de Bombelles née "de Mackau" (1762-1800), was a French court office holder and letter writer. She was maid of honour and a personal friend and confidante of Élisabeth of France (1764–1794), and known in history for her correspondence with her, which is preserved. She was the daughter of baron Louis Eléonor Dirkheim de Mackau (1727-1767) and Marie-Angélique de Mackau, and the sister of Renée Suzanne de Soucy (1758-1841) and Armand Louis de Mackau (1759-1827). She married her cousin, the diplomat baron Marc Marie, Marquis de Bombelles in 1778, and became the mother of Louis Philippe