Cyrano de Bergerac [antikvár]

INTRODUCTION Noses have a long and distinguished literary pedigree, from Pinoc-chio's prototype lie-detector to the nose in Gogol's story which breaks away from its owner and decides to lead a life of its own. Cyrano de Bergerac (1619-55) is, however, unusual among authors in being remembered almost uniquely for his nose. Thanks to Edmond Rostand (1868-1918), this seventeenth-century writer has become an emblem of la vieille France. Cyrano, as every Frenchman knows, had a great nose, he was a great lover (heterosexual, of course), and he was a great patriot. These three interestingly interconnected facts are all that are generally known about Cyrano, and they constitute such a powerfully held myth that it hardly matters that they are all entirely erroneous. The 'real' Cyrano—perhaps one should say the 'other' Cyrano— was a writer of such dazzling unorthodoxy that he remains, even after three centuries, difficult to assess; indeed, his writings are still poorly known even in France. He was born and educated in Paris, but his life thereafter remains shrouded in mystery, and even in suspicion—an ideal foundation for the later growth of the legend. Cyrano embarked on a military career but it came to an abrupt end when he was badly wounded in the siege of Arras in 1640, and thereafter he seems to have devoted his life to writing. He was particularly associated with other burlesque writers like Scarron and Dassoucy, and he was, in both senses of the word—sexual and intellectual—a libertine. His reputation for debauchery was early established (he wrote a painfully graphic poem about his syphilis) and the tempestuous breakup of his homosexual affair with Dassoucy was much publicized. No less scandalous, however, and not entirely unconnected, was his attachment to the clandestine circle of atheistic free-thinkers then active in Paris; he was certainly influenced by the thought of the materialist philosopher Gassendi, whose pupil he may have been. [vü]