Rhymes
answer each other as the sexes in flowers and in humanity answer each
other. Men do not speak so, it is true. Even when they are inspired or
in love they talk inanities. But the poetic comedy does not misrepresent
the speech one half so much as the speech misrepresents the soul.
Monsieur Rostand showed even more than his usual insight when he called
"Cyrano de Bergerac" a comedy, despite the fact that, strictly speaking,
it ends with disappointment and death. The essence of tragedy is a
spiritual breakdown or decline, and in the great French play the
spiritual sentiment mounts unceasingly until the last line. It is not
the facts themselves, but our feeling about them, that makes tragedy and
comedy, and death is more joyful in Rostand than life in Maeterlinck.
The same apparent contradiction holds good in the case of the drama of
"L'Aiglon," now being performed with so much success. Although the hero
is a weakling, the subject a fiasco, the end a premature death and a
personal disillusionment, yet, in spite of this theme, which might have
been chosen for its depressing qualities, the unconquerable paean of the
praise of things, the ungovernable gaiety of the poet's song swells so
high that at the end it seems to drown all the weak voices of the
characters in one crashing chorus of great things and great men. A
multitude of mottoes might be taken from the play to indicate and
illustrate, not only its own spirit, but much of the spirit of modern
life.
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