Edmund Rostand

Edmund Rostand Poems

Edmund Rostand Biography

Edmond Eugène Alexis Rostand (1 April 1868 – 2 December 1918) was a French poet and dramatist. He is associated with neo-romanticism, and is best known for his play Cyrano de Bergerac. Rostand's romantic plays provided an alternative to the naturalistic theatre popular during the late nineteenth century. Another of Rostand's works, Les Romanesques, was adapted to the musical comedy, The Fantasticks. His first play, a burlesque, Les romanesques was produced on 21 May 1894 at the Theatre Francais. He took the motive of his second piece, La Princesse lointaine (Theatre de la Renaissance, 5 April 1895), from the story of the troubadour Rudel and the Lady of Tripoli. The part of Melissande was created by Sarah Bernhardt, who also was the original Photine of La Samaritaine (Theatre de la Renaissance, 14 April 1897), a Biblical drama in three scenes taken from the gospel story of the woman of Samaria. The production of his heroic comedy of Cyrano de Bergerac (28 December 1897, Theatre de la Porte Saint-Martin), with Benoît-Constant Coquelin in the title-role, was a triumph. No such enthusiasm for a drama in verse had been known since the days of Hugo's Hernani. The play was quickly translated into English, German, Russian and other European languages. For his hero he had drawn on French 17th-century history. In L'Aiglon he chose a subject from Napoleonic legend, suggested probably by Henri Welschinger's Roi de Rome, 1811-32 (1897), which contained much new information about the unhappy life of the Duke of Reichstadt, son of Napoleon I, and Marie Louise, under the surveillance of Metternich at the Schönbrunn Palace. L'Aiglon in six acts and in verse, was produced (15 March 1900) by Sarah Bernhardt at her own theatre, she herself undertaking the part of the Duke of Reichstadt. In 1901, Rostand became the youngest writer to be elected to the Académie française. Chantecler, produced in February 1910, was awaited with an interest, enhanced by considerable delay in the production, hardly equaled by the enthusiasm of its reception. Lucien Guitry was in the title role and Mme. Simone played the part of the pheasant, the play being a fantasy of bird and animal life, and the characters denizens of the farmyard and the woods.)

The Best Poem Of Edmund Rostand

Le Petit Chat

C'est un petit chat noir effronté comme un page,
Je le laisse jouer sur ma table souvent.
Quelquefois il s'assied sans faire de tapage,
On dirait un joli presse-papier vivant.

Rien en lui, pas un poil de son velours ne bouge ;
Longtemps, il reste là, noir sur un feuillet blanc,
A ces minets tirant leur langue de drap rouge,
Qu'on fait pour essuyer les plumes, ressemblant.

Quand il s'amuse, il est extrêmement comique,
Pataud et gracieux, tel un ourson drôlet.
Souvent je m'accroupis pour suivre sa mimique
Quand on met devant lui la soucoupe de lait.

Tout d'abord de son nez délicat il le flaire,
La frôle, puis, à coups de langue très petits,
Il le happe ; et dès lors il est à son affaire
Et l'on entend, pendant qu'il boit, un clapotis.

Il boit, bougeant la queue et sans faire une pause,
Et ne relève enfin son joli museau plat
Que lorsqu'il a passé sa langue rêche et rose
Partout, bien proprement débarbouillé le plat.

Alors il se pourlèche un moment les moustaches,
Avec l'air étonné d'avoir déjà fini.
Et comme il s'aperçoit qu'il s'est fait quelques taches,
Il se lisse à nouveau, lustre son poil terni.

Ses yeux jaunes et bleus sont comme deux agates ;
Il les ferme à demi, parfois, en reniflant,
Se renverse, ayant pris son museau dans ses pattes,
Avec des airs de tigre étendu sur le flanc.

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