Cyrano de Bergerac (Plot Summary)

Plot Summary

Act I: a Performance At the Hotel de Bourgogne

Act I of Cyrano de Bergerac opens at the famous Hotel de Bourgogne in France, where a troop of actors are setting up for a matinee performance. Joining the actors and stagehands is a cross-section of seventeenth-century Parisian life: cavaliers, pages, pickpockets, peddlers, and even Marquises bustle about the stage. The audience is introduced to Christian de Neuvillette, a handsome young man who has come (with his friend, Ligniere) to catch a glimpse of Roxane, a beautiful woman who may be attending the performance. Christian complains of his inability to speak to her:“I have no wit,” he states, and he fears embarrassing himself if he is given the chance to confront her. A greater obstacle, however, is the fact that the Comte de Guiche, who is married to the niece of Cardinal Richelieu, also desires Roxane, and has been pressing her to marry his friend, Valvert, so that he can be near her whenever he wishes. Roxane is, naturally, averse to the idea.

The play truly begins when its title character, the soldier Cyrano, enters and chases Montfleury, an actor whose pomposity and unskilled bombast the swordsman despises, off of the stage. After giving the theatre’s manager a purse of gold (to compensate for his closing the play), Cyrano banters with some minor characters — until Valvert, goaded by de Guiche, attempts to mock Cyrano for his most striking feature: his gigantic nose. He taunts Cyrano with, “your nose is . . . rather large,” to which Cyrano replies with a fifty-four line oration in which he details all of the insults Valvert could have said, had he “some tinge of letters, or of wit.” As if this speech is not proof enough of Cyrano’s quick mind and sense of humor, he immediately duels Valvert while simultaneously composing a ballad that describes his actions. He states that when he completes his verse, he will strike with his sword, which he does, killing Valvert. Clearly, the “Performance at the Hotel de Bourgogne” is Cyrano’s own, which the crowd on stage (and in the audience) watch, spellbound. After the hall empties out, Cyrano reveals to his friend, Le Bret, that he is in love with (of course) a woman named Roxane. Like Christian, he is afraid of humiliation, although his problem is not his lack of wit but “the shadow of my profile on the wall.” Roxane’s lady-in-waiting asks Cyrano if she and Roxane might meet him tomorrow to discuss “certain things.” Cyrano agrees and continues his pursuit of making himself “in all things — admirable.” He ends the Act by dueling one hundred men to save Ligniere’s life, a brave and noble act, although it has already been revealed to the audience that Cyrano’s private self is lovelorn and insecure.

Act II: the Bakery of the Poets

The action shifts to Ragueneau’s pastry shop, where the baker (and aspiring poet) feeds a host of local artisans in exchange for their verse and conversation. Cyrano enters, for it is here that he will meet Roxane, and he is eager to hear what he hopes will be a pronouncement of her love. Roxane tells him that she is in love, with someone “who does not know,” who “loves me too,” and “never says one word.” However, when she describes this man as “beautiful,” Cyrano knows that she cannot be speaking of him. Roxane confesses that she loves Christian, and has come to ask Cyrano to watch over him, as he is to enter the Guards (of which Cyrano is a member). Cyrano reluctantly agrees, saying nothing to Roxane about his own feelings.

Cyrano tells Christian of Roxane’s love and that she expects a letter from him. Delighted yet distraught, Christian tells Cyrano that he cannot write, for doing so “would ruin all”: “I am a fool!/Stupid enough to hang myself.” The two men speak of their own deficiencies: Christian, placing his hand on his heart, cries, “Oh, if I had words/To say what I have here.” Cyrano wishes he was “a handsome little Musketeer.” Finally, Cyrano devises a plan to help Christian: the young soldier can “borrow” his wit by allowing Cyrano to write the letter to Roxane. After some prodding, Christian agrees, causing Cyrano to exclaim that, with their combined forces, “we two” will “make one her of romance!”

Act III: Roxane’s Kiss

Act III takes place in front of Roxane’s house. Cyrano enters and speaks to Roxane about “Christian’s” letters, which she describes as the work of “a master,” but which Cyrano is forced (by virtue of his secret role in their creation) to criticize. De Guiche enters, again asking Roxane to consider his offer; she responds with indifference. When he reveals that the Guards have been ordered to besiege Arras, Roxane’s concern for Christian motivates her to trick de Guiche into leaving Cyrano and Christian behind, while the rest of the regiment marches off to glory. He agrees, convinced that this is a sign of Roxane’s love. Christian and Cyrano enter and discuss their agreement, which Christian wants to end by speaking freely and openly to Roxane. “I am no such fool! You shall see,” the young Cadet promises, only to flounder when he does attempt to speak eloquently to Roxane. She runs into her house, shutting the door in his face and leaving Christian more heartbroken than before. However, Cyrano again devises a plan: he will stand under Roxane’s balcony and pretend that he is Christian; this way, the illusion that they have created will be sustained. Hidden by shadows, Cyrano “rhapsodizes” under her window until she begs him to climb the trellis and receive her kiss. Christian does, leaving Cyrano on the ground, comparing himself to Lazarus, the Biblical beggar who waited outside the gates of a rich man who dined on the finest foods.

A Capuchin monk enters with a letter for Roxane from de Guiche, explaining that he has secretly remained in Paris for a day while his regiment is preparing for war. Roxane, however, pretends to read a very different letter to the Capuchin, claiming that she and Christian are to be immediately married by order of Cardinal Richelieu. Roxane and Christian arrive for the ceremony, while Cyrano, again finding himself an outcast, waits outside. When de Guiche enters, Cyrano manages to stall him long enough for the ceremony to conclude; when it does, Roxane and Christian enter and announce their marriage. Furious, de Guiche commands Cyrano and Christian to report to the front. As they leave, Cyrano promises Roxane that “Christian” will write her every day.

Act Iv: the Cadets of Gascoyne

Act IV occurs at Arras, the front of France’s war against Spain. Cyrano has risked his life every day by crossing the battlefield to ensure that Roxane receives her daily letter. All are shocked when a carriage arrives at the camp containing Roxane and Ragueneau; she has come to see Christian, and he has come to supply the hungry men with food and wine. In a conversation with Christian, Roxane asks for his “forgiveness.” She feels that she has sinned, that she has fallen in love with him only because he was “beautiful.” She tells him that even if he were “less charming” or “ugly even,” she would still love him. Of course, this is terrible news to Christian, who tells Cyrano that he is “tired of being/[His] own rival.” Christian wants Roxane to know the truth: “I want her love/For the poor fool I am — or not at all!” He asks Cyrano to tell Roxane the entire story in the hope that she will choose the man whom she loves more dearly. Christian exits the stage, entering the battle that rages outside.

Cyrano now has the opportunity for which he has been hoping: a chance to reveal himself to Roxane, to show her that it is his soul and his words that she loves. Just as he is about to tell her, however, Christian is brought on stage, mortally wounded. Rather than deny happiness to a dying man, Cyrano tells Christian that Roxane chose him: “I have told her; she loves you.” As he watches Roxane weep over Christian’s body, Cyrano realizes that he will never be able to tell her the truth: “I am dead and my love mourns for me/And does not know.” Inspired to fight, Cyrano rushes to the front, announcing, “I have two deaths to avenge now — Christian’s/And my own!” The act ends as Cyrano enters the fray.

Act V: Cyrano’s Gazette

The scene shifts to fifteen years later. Roxane has entered a convent and is visited by Cyrano every Saturday. During these visits he informs her of the week’s events, giving her a dose of the town’s gossip. Le Bret tells the nuns that Cyrano is penniless and lonely due to his caustic attacks (“satires”) on hypocrites of all kinds: “He attacks the false nobles, the false saints,/The false heroes, the false artists — in short,/Everyone!” De Guiche, whose passion has been cooled by time, visits Roxane to tell her of a rumor he heard at Court concerning the possible murder of Cyrano for offending a “false noble.” Ragueneau runs on stage and informs everyone that Cyrano was hit on the head with a log that “accidentally” fell from a window. He and Le Bret run off to aid the dying swordsman.

Cyrano, however, appears after they leave to see Roxane before he dies. Although he tries to make jests and tell Roxane the “gazette” of news at Court, he is obviously in pain (yet too proud to admit it). Confessing that he is dying, he engages in his last swordfight, a battle with death itself. While his previous clashes with death allowed him escape, this one will not, and he stumbles in exhaustion. Nearing death, Cyrano’s last wish is to read the letter that “Christian” wrote to Roxane on the day of his death, which she keeps in a locket around her neck. As he reads it aloud, the irony of the situation — and Cyrano’s life — intensifies: “Farewell, Roxanne, because to-day I die . . . and my heart/Still so heavy with love I have not told,/And I die without telling you!” When he continues reading the letter after the sun sets, however, Roxane realizes that Cyrano knows the letter by heart; she realizes that it was he, not Christian, who composed the words with which she fell in love. Roxane is so moved by the many sacrifices and selfless acts performed by Cyrano that she professes her love for him. Cyrano thanks her for a life of “sweetness” and collapses while offering Roxane “One thing without stain,/Unspotted from the world, in spite of doom/[His] own!” As Roxane leans toward him, asking him what he is leaving her, he smiles and says,“My white plume”: a symbol of his honor in a world that seemed to have little regard for such a quality.