Voltaire and his works came after Molière and his works. Like Molière, Voltaire criticized the church, but rather through hidden messages in plays and books, he explicitly attacked the church and the government of France in his books, and is one of the people who is credited for kicking off the French Revolution. Voltaire’s most famous work is his satire Candide, which like Molière’s Tartuffe, was widely banned because it made fun of religion and the government. While both Molière and Voltaire agree on these things, when the subject of women is brought up, they have polar opposite views. Unlike Molière, Voltaire does not see women as capable of anything more than traditional roles. A reoccurring idea and theme in Candide is the idea of rape.
