Voltaire
Patriarch of the French enlightenment
De Largillière, Nicolas. Portrait De Voltaire. 1724, Institut et Musée Voltaire.
The Life of Voltaire
- 1694 - Born in Paris as Francois-Marie Arouet
- 1704 - Enrolled at a Jesuit secondary school in Paris, began showing his promise as a writer
- 1713 - Sent to Holland as secretary to the French ambassador
- 1716 - Briefly exiled from Paris for composing poems mocking the French regent’s family
- 1717 - Imprisoned in the Bastille for 11 months
- 1718 - Adopts the name Voltaire; First theatrical success with his play Oedipus
- 1722 - Began as a "secret diplomat" to Dubois
- 1723 - Published Henriade
- 1726 - Sent to the Bastille due to a quarrel with Chevalier de Rohan
- 1729 - Becomes allowed to return to Paris
- 1732 - Produced his most famous play, Zaire
- 1733 - Published Letters on the English Nation, receives heavy criticism. Flees to Lorraine, France.
- 1745 - Appointed the Royal Historiographer of France
- 1748 - Published the philosophical tale, Zadig
- 1751 - Goes to Berlin to become a philosopher-poet for Frederick the Great
- 1752 - Published the Age of Louis XIV and Micromegas
- 1753 - Left Berlin after a quarrel with Frederick
- 1754 - Met Rousseau in Geneva
- 1759 - Published Candide
- 1763 - Published Treatise on Tolerance
- 1764 - Published Dictionnaire Philosophique
- 1778 - Returned to Paris, welcomed as a hero. Died in his sleep.