![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Revisiting Cyrano
Jul. 8th, 2000 08:33 pmWatching the 1950 version of Cyrano de Bergerac with José Ferrer after a hiatus of more years than I care to mention brought back a flood of memories. The flood would have, perhaps, been more vivid had I watched the original black-and-white version of this film (which won Franz Planer a 1951 Golden Globe for black and white cinematography), but I had to settle for what I could get. As it was, I watched a colorized version. An example of "less is more," perhaps, but this is not the time or place to quibble about colorization.
I first saw Cyrano in New York. Don't ask me when, for it was early in my childhood. I remember WOR-TV (channel 9) broadcast a show called "Million Dollar Movie," which featured the same movie every night for a week (and twice on Saturday, if memory serves). Times sure have changed, eh?
At any rate, I don't remember when or where, but I happened to see Cyrano by happenstance and I was so impressed that I sneaked into my grandmother's room for the rest of the week and begged her to let me watch it on her television. Later, I never missed a chance to catch the film whenever I could arrange to be in front of a television at the right time. I don't recall when Cyrano disappeared from the small screen; I stopped paying any kind of major attention to TV a long time ago.
At any rate, I was unaware then that the film was based on a play written by Edmond Rostand, nor did I know that Cyrano de Bergerac was a real person (born 1619, died 1655), and I was not aware that José Ferrer won a Golden Globe and an Oscar for this role. All I knew was that Cyrano was a hero. He was brave, self-sacrificing, adventurous, gallant, and witty; he was a skilled swordsman and a poet; he defended his friends. Above all, he strove to live up to a very simple code of honor: to be true to himself.
It's a very powerful theme. Shakespeare pounded on it when he had Polonius give advice to Laertes in Hamlet:
This above all: to thine own self be true,
And it must follow, as night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.
In modern times, Howard Roark follows in Cyrano's footsteps in Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead. Indeed, the strategem that Rostand used to lead into Cyrano's "No, thank you!" soliloquy - the offer of patronage in exchange for ceding control over the hero's work, which the hero utterly rejects - is repeated in The Fountainhead when Roark attends a meeting to sign papers for his biggest commission, only to find that the selection committee will award the job only if "a few changes" are incorporated into Roark's plan.
I wanted to be like Cyrano (I guess that's what heroes - and heroines - are for). Even at a young age, I understood the metaphor of his "white plume." Reading Ayn Rand in college only reinforced this perception. I was going to live life on my own terms, think for myself, be independent, make my own way in the world. Take your pick of clichés that all amount to basically the same idea.
So, how are things turning out?
Well, I'm no swordsman. And as far as ceding creative control over my work, I've not ever gotten to the point where a proposed change to my work was worth, or even raised the prospect of, a do-or-die stand.
Stop! I do not like what I see in the preceding paragraph. It sounds like wholesale evasion. It was a fairly simple question...why am I mumbling on about creative control? Is it, perhaps, because I wouldn't like the answer if I were faced with it?
Shall we try again?
Later, perhaps.
Cheers...
P.S. For the reader's benefit, here is the "No, thank you!" soliloquy, from the Guillemard translation, which differs from the translation used in the film (which explains why "No, thank you!" becomes "No, grammercy!").
I first saw Cyrano in New York. Don't ask me when, for it was early in my childhood. I remember WOR-TV (channel 9) broadcast a show called "Million Dollar Movie," which featured the same movie every night for a week (and twice on Saturday, if memory serves). Times sure have changed, eh?
At any rate, I don't remember when or where, but I happened to see Cyrano by happenstance and I was so impressed that I sneaked into my grandmother's room for the rest of the week and begged her to let me watch it on her television. Later, I never missed a chance to catch the film whenever I could arrange to be in front of a television at the right time. I don't recall when Cyrano disappeared from the small screen; I stopped paying any kind of major attention to TV a long time ago.
At any rate, I was unaware then that the film was based on a play written by Edmond Rostand, nor did I know that Cyrano de Bergerac was a real person (born 1619, died 1655), and I was not aware that José Ferrer won a Golden Globe and an Oscar for this role. All I knew was that Cyrano was a hero. He was brave, self-sacrificing, adventurous, gallant, and witty; he was a skilled swordsman and a poet; he defended his friends. Above all, he strove to live up to a very simple code of honor: to be true to himself.
It's a very powerful theme. Shakespeare pounded on it when he had Polonius give advice to Laertes in Hamlet:
This above all: to thine own self be true,
And it must follow, as night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.
In modern times, Howard Roark follows in Cyrano's footsteps in Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead. Indeed, the strategem that Rostand used to lead into Cyrano's "No, thank you!" soliloquy - the offer of patronage in exchange for ceding control over the hero's work, which the hero utterly rejects - is repeated in The Fountainhead when Roark attends a meeting to sign papers for his biggest commission, only to find that the selection committee will award the job only if "a few changes" are incorporated into Roark's plan.
I wanted to be like Cyrano (I guess that's what heroes - and heroines - are for). Even at a young age, I understood the metaphor of his "white plume." Reading Ayn Rand in college only reinforced this perception. I was going to live life on my own terms, think for myself, be independent, make my own way in the world. Take your pick of clichés that all amount to basically the same idea.
So, how are things turning out?
Well, I'm no swordsman. And as far as ceding creative control over my work, I've not ever gotten to the point where a proposed change to my work was worth, or even raised the prospect of, a do-or-die stand.
Stop! I do not like what I see in the preceding paragraph. It sounds like wholesale evasion. It was a fairly simple question...why am I mumbling on about creative control? Is it, perhaps, because I wouldn't like the answer if I were faced with it?
Shall we try again?
Later, perhaps.
Cheers...
P.S. For the reader's benefit, here is the "No, thank you!" soliloquy, from the Guillemard translation, which differs from the translation used in the film (which explains why "No, thank you!" becomes "No, grammercy!").
| Act II, Scene 2 VIII CYRANO Ay, and then?. . . Seek a protector, choose a patron out, And like the crawling ivy round a tree That licks the bark to gain the trunk's support, Climb high by creeping ruse instead of force? No, grammercy! What! I, like all the rest Dedicate verse to bankers?--play buffoon In cringing hope to see, at last, a smile Not disapproving, on a patron's lips? Grammercy, no! What! learn to swallow toads? --With frame aweary climbing stairs?--a skin Grown grimed and horny,--here, about the knees? And, acrobat-like, teach my back to bend?-- No, grammercy! Or,--double-faced and sly-- Run with the hare, while hunting with the hounds; And, oily-tongued, to win the oil of praise, Flatter the great man to his very nose? No, grammercy! Steal soft from lap to lap, --A little great man in a circle small, Or navigate, with madrigals for sails, Blown gently windward by old ladies' sighs? No, grammercy! Bribe kindly editors To spread abroad my verses? Grammercy! Or try to be elected as the pope Of tavern-councils held by imbeciles? No, grammercy! Toil to gain reputation By one small sonnet, 'stead of making many? No, grammercy! Or flatter sorry bunglers? Be terrorized by every prating paper? Say ceaselessly, 'Oh, had I but the chance Of a fair notice in the "Mercury"!' Grammercy, no! Grow pale, fear, calculate? Prefer to make a visit to a rhyme? Seek introductions, draw petitions up? No, grammercy! and no! and no again! But--sing? Dream, laugh, go lightly, solitary, free, With eyes that look straight forward--fearless voice! To cock your beaver just the way you choose,-- For 'yes' or 'no' show fight, or turn a rhyme! --To work without one thought of gain or fame, To realize that journey to the moon! Never to pen a line that has not sprung Straight from the heart within. Embracing then Modesty, say to oneself, 'Good my friend, Be thou content with flowers,--fruit,--nay, leaves, But pluck them from no garden but thine own!' And then, if glory come by chance your way, To pay no tribute unto Caesar, none, But keep the merit all your own! In short, Disdaining tendrils of the parasite, To be content, if neither oak nor elm-- Not to mount high, perchance, but mount alone! |
