The Curious Enlightenment of Professor Caritat: A Comedy of IdeasProfessor Nicholas Caritat is a scholar of the Enlightenment and therefore, he reasons, a man with no role in the political struggle in Militaria, the autocratic state in which he lives. He is wrong. In the space of twenty-four hours, Caritat is arrested by the police, then liberated by the guerrillas of the Visible Hand. They give him the codename Pangloss and send him on a mission which only a philosopher could undertake: to find the best of all possible worlds. The Curious Enlightenment of Professor Caritat is a whirlwind journey through a series of vividly imagined political landscapes where eighteenth-century ideas confront twentieth-century concerns. Caritat, a middle-aged Candide, walks naively through worlds of ideological extremes, equipped only with a small travelling bag and a knowledge of such thinkers as Voltaire, Rousseau, Kant and Hume. |
Contents
Arrest | 1 |
The Eye Test | 16 |
Resistance | 24 |
Travelling Light | 40 |
Calcula | 52 |
The Collection | 100 |
15 Arrival | 117 |
Celebration | 128 |
Malvolians and Stalactites | 139 |
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Act party Aristotle asked Nicholas Bees Benjamin best possible world Bigotarians Body of Gender Bullet Head calculate Charmian Communicans Communitaria communities corridor course Cypselus decided door dressed Eliza Enlightenment ethnic explained eyes freedom friends future futurologists glass Glaube Globulus Goddington Graham Gregory grey hand happy hope hospital human idea identity documents Jonny Justin Karl and Fred lecture Leon letter Libertaria live looked lunch Malvolians Marcus Maximand Mellifluans Micklethrust Militaria morning Nicholas asked Nicholas felt Nicholas followed Nicholas noticed Nicholas took Nicholas's no-one once optician Pangloss passport patients Perhaps persons Philomena Pilgrim's Rest porters priest Prime Minister prison problem Professor Caritat Professor Grenzen psychiatrists question reason Rector replied satire seat seemed Seneca smile social Stalactites Stuffington sure Syndrome tell thing thought Tipster Unidiversity Utilitarian voice Voltaire walked ward woman young