I think it will not come as a surprise to Gentle Readers that Cyrano de Bergerac is one of my favorite plays. There’s a role for Your Humble Blogger. Well, I can dream.
During a recent scramble for Something to Read, I found my mother-in-law’s volume of Noble’s Comparative Classics, containing Romeo and Juliet alongside the Howard Thayer Kingsbury translation of Cyrano. That’s the original 1897 or so translation. I had never read it before. The one I know best is the Brian Hooker version, although I must say I adored the Anthony Burgess translation in the RSC film of Derek Jacobi’s wonderful performance (with, it turns out, Pete Postlethwaite as Ragueneau and Sinéad Cusack as Roxanne—seriously, why is this not Netflixable?). Anyway, Mr. Kingsbury’s translation is distinctly inferior to Mr. Hooker’s, but it certainly doesn’t ruin the thing. Which is remarkable, since a good deal of what is marvelous about the play is the language, I would have thought, and if language isn’t the right language, can it still be good? Evidently, yes.
The most heartbreaking bit, for me, is not Christian’s untimely death (which is, actually, rather sad, which I forget) nor the moment when convent-bound Roxane discovers both Cyrano’s deception and his fatal wound. No, there’s a bit just before the end, when the audience knows that Cyrano is dying but Roxane does not, and Sister Martha (a wonderful, if brief, part) spots the wound. They carry on two conversations, one in asides:
Cyrano: Sister, come here! Ha, ha! You carry still your bright eyes always lowered!Sister Martha: But- oh!
Cyrano: Hush! ’tis nothing. Yesterday [Friday] I made a feast!
Martha: I understand. That’s why he is so pale. Come to the dining hall and you shall take a fine great bowl of broth. You will come, now?
Cyrano: Yes, yes; of course.
Martha: Now, I am glad to see that for this once you can be reasonable.
Roxane: She’s trying to convert you?
Martha: No, not I!
Cyrano: Yes, that is true! And yet the pious words fall from your lips in such a plenteous flow I am amazed you do not preach to me. Thunder and Mars! I shall amaze you, too. For I shall suffer you this very night— ...to pray for me at chapel!
Roxane: Oh, oh, oh!
Cyrano: The Sister’s stricken dumb.
Martha: I waited not for your permission. [Exits]
Cyrano: When shall I see the end of this interminable needlework?
I know, I’m a sucker. But—I waited not for your permission. Oh, it’s a moment.
chazak, chazak, v’nitchazek,
-Vardibidian.
Passing over the sublime to comment on the mercantile: I’ve found that Netflix is pretty responsive about adding a movie to their collection — at least, they were a year or so ago. If it’s out on DVD somewhere, it’s worth putting in the request.