Edmond Rostand

Edmond Eugène Alexis Rostand (UK:, US:, French: [ɛdmɔ̃ ʁɔstɑ̃]; 1 April 1868 – 2 December 1918) was a French poet and dramatist. He is associated with neo-romanticism and is known best for his 1897 play Cyrano de Bergerac. Rostand's romantic plays contrasted with the naturalistic theatre popular during the late nineteenth century. Another of Rostand's works, Les Romanesques (1894), was adapted to the 1960 musical comedy The Fantasticks.

Early life

Rostand was born in Marseille, France, into a wealthy and cultured Provençal family. His father was an economist, a poet who translated and edited the works of Catullus, and a member of the Marseille Academy and the Institut de France. Rostand studied literature, history, and philosophy at the Collège Stanislas in Paris, France.

Career

When Rostand was twenty years old, his first play, a one-act comedy, Le Gant rouge, was performed at the Cluny Theatre, 24 August 1888, but it was almost unnoticed.

He and his fiancée Rosemonde Gérard became friends with Emmanuel Chabrier in 1889, and the composer quickly set three of his poems (and two of hers) to music; the following year the two collaborated on À la musique for the house-warming of a mutual friend. In 1890, Rostand published a volume of poems called Les Musardises. The same year he offered a one-act Pierrot play in verse to the director of the Théâtre François. This gave him the opportunity to write for the state theatre a three-act play, also in verse, as are all Rostand's plays. He considered himself a poet, whether writing plays or poetry.