Comparing War Is Kind And Voltaire's Candide

In the poem, “War is Kind,” by Stephen Crane, war is satirized to convey social commentary. Throughout the poem, war is shown both to be happy and kind, and then the reality of it is shown, talking about how violent and gruesome it is. This is similar to the satire Candide, by Voltaire, as well as the short story “The War Prayer,” by Mark Twain. In Candide, the main character experiences many terrible things, one of which is war, and sees the horrible tragedies that no one mentions when talking about war. In “The War Prayer,” an old man gives his views on war and tells the sad reality of how war only hurts people. Although the authors use different genres of satire, they all have the same overall message; war is gruesome, violent and hurts

In Candide, the main character, Candide is forced into the Bulgarian army, and at his first battle, “There was never anything so gallant, so spruce, so brilliant, and so well disposed as the two armies...Here, old men covered with wounds, beheld their wives, hugging their children to their bloody breasts” (Voltaire 5). Burlesque is used to talk about war in a fancy, exciting, happy matter, but then the grim reality of it comes in. Voltaire juxtaposes how people describe war, verse the severe actuality of war. By using juxtaposition and burlesque, readers get a better understanding of the message the author is trying to convey. War causes great destruction and immense pain to everyone. Similarly, in “War is Kind,” Crane also uses juxtaposition and burlesque to convey the overall message, when he states, “Make plain to them the excellence of killing / And a field where a thousand corpses lie” (Crane). Burlesque is shown when describing “the excellence of killing” and glorifying what killing really is. Just like in Candide, the author juxtaposes the description of war, verse the gruesome reality of it. When Crane mentions a “thousand corpses,” war is shown as extremely violent and murders tons of people. In both texts, burlesque and juxtaposition are an effective way to show the message of war and what the author wants readers to take away. The combination of both types of satire, allow the reader to have a better understanding of the horrid violence of