The most significant events in the history of books on the 21st of November
1694: Voltaire is born François-Marie Arouet in Paris. This towering figure of the French Enlightenment wrote satirical novels (Candide), philosophical works (Dictionnaire philosophique), and even an early example of the detective novel (Zadig). This last work takes the figure of Zadig (an ancient Babylonian philosopher) as its central character, and incorporates the classic fairy tale ‘The Three Princes of Serendip‘.