My nose was 15 minutes ahead of me. -------- Sijano de Begerac
In the movie "The Big Nose Love Saint", Sihano de Bejerac is talented and swordsmanship, and can fight and write poems at the same time. But he had a particularly large nose and looked like a monster. He has a crush on his beautiful cousin Roxanne, but his cousin loves his comrade-in-arms Christian. So he volunteered to write a love letter for Christian, expressing his heart between the lines.
Movie version of "Big Nose Love Saint"
The cousin was impressed by the tender and sweet love letter and married Christian. A count who coveted Roxanne sent the two to the front in a fit of rage. Later, Christian understands Sihano's feelings for his cousin and persuades him to tell him the truth. But when Roxanne came to the battlefield, the news of Christian's death came. At this time, Sihano could not say anything to Roxanne, and could only watch her resolutely enter the monastery with a blood-stained love letter.
15 years have passed. Sihano was killed for distributing articles attacking social ills. On his deathbed, he spoke his mind to his cousin, but it was too late.
This is the main plot of the film Big Nose Love, based on the five-act play Sihano de Bergerac by the 19th-century French playwright Edmund Rothstein. In December 1897, the play was first held at the Teatro Saint-Martin in Paris, and was immediately hailed as the "Pride and Hope of the French", and has since been repeatedly performed worldwide in its model. In the 1990 film Big Nose Love Saint was released, Gérard Depardieu won the Oscar for Best Actor for the role of Sihano. In 2014, It was reinterpreted and interpreted by Japanese national treasure theater master Tadashi Suzuki and was once again put on the stage. Arguably, this play has become one of the most widely recognized French plays in history.
Theatrical version of Sijano de Bergerac
It is worth noting that Sihano is not a figure made up by Rothstein out of thin air, but has existed in history. Sihano is real, and his cousin Roxanne and comrade-in-arms Christian can find prototypes one by one. But is the real-life Sihano as deeply in love with his cousin as in the play? We don't know.
Most biographers believe that Cyrano de Bergerac was born into a small aristocratic family in Gascon, France. In 1638, at the age of 19, he joined the army, and in 1640 was wounded in the Siege of Arras (siege of Arras, a battle in the Thirty Years' War), before abandoning congwen and returning to Paris to become a playwright. Previously, he had worked with the famous mathematician and philosopher Pierre Gassandis (the proposer of the "Three Souls"), composing with Molière and dancing with David Dupron. The real-life Sihano is as talented as the Sihano in the play, and of course has a big nose.
Sihano de Bejerac
As a playwright, Sihano's representative works include La Mort d'Aggrippine, Voyage to the Moon, and Land of the Sun. The first part satirizes exploitation and corruption, while the last two are full of wonderful fantasies. His creations inspired the later Jules Verne and Jonathan Swift and laid the foundation for the development of science fiction.
Even his death was full of drama. When he was visiting his patron, a wooden beam in his home fell right down and slammed on the door of his head, and he died at the age of 36.
Fast forward to the 1830s, when revolutions and wars were frequent and turbulent. The darkness in politics, the inequality of society, makes one feel that the capitalist system established after the French Revolution is far less beautiful than the Enlightenment thinkers described. Deeply disappointed by the "kingdom of reason" envisioned by the Enlightenment thinkers, all strata of society struggled to find spiritual sustenance, and Romantic literature came into being. Hugo's death seems to have ended the glory of Romantic theater, when Rothstein's Sihano was like a spring thunder on the French theater stage.
Rossdan's Sihano de Bejerac
Sihano is brilliant, improvising a poem while fighting swords and hitting his opponent at the end of the poem.
Sihano: Wait, I'll start first! Good ~ yes! (With movements to match the verse) I calmly threw away my felt hat Take it off slowly Tight coat Then draw the sword out of its sheath I'm graceful though But the sword is like the wind Beware, little friend At the end of the verse, I will stab you (Start of confrontation) Nosy? bedbug Where do I start? The chest behind the medal Or under the ribs, cuffs My sword blade fluttered and flew The hilt of the sword is clanging I chose you to have a big belly I couldn't think about it for a while Look at your face like dirt Jump backwards to dodge It's as timid as a rat I let you pounce Sorry, please accept the offer Small ribs hold the sword firmly At the end of the verse, I will stab you (solemnly and solemnly declared) The time has come for Your Excellency's deathbed to repent I stood firm and attacked one after another Stab a sword, make a false move (sprint) look at the sword (stab) (Wallway was injured and crumbling) (Full of applause, praise)
Sihano loves Roxanne desperately, but when he learns that Roxanne and Christian have mutual love, he is willing to sacrifice his happiness to help Christian pursue Roxanne and complete the two. Sihano was also very clever and witty, and when his cousin got married, the Earl who coveted Roxanne wanted to sabotage, and Sihano acted as a guard, making up various excuses to delay time. The Count was coaxed around, and Roxanne's wedding to Christian was successfully completed.
The story of "One Hundred" tells the story of Sihano's friend Liniere who offends a big man by writing satirical poems, and he ambushes a hundred people on his way home. When the upright Sihano learned of this, he charged alone, bravely killing the enemy, beating a hundred ambushers to pieces and throwing away their armor. Once, the count also wanted to bribe Sihano to be his royal literati, but Sihano sternly refused.
What moved the audience the most was not his strength, but his "weakness". On the surface, he was imposing, "my nose is huge, and I regard this object as pride." In fact, he was very concerned about this big nose, as long as someone laughed at him and insulted him because of his nose, Sihano would fight back in anger and beat the other party to the ground. When his friend urged him to confess, he said, "You know how sad I am when you think of the ugliness you have..."
The ugly Sihano has a beautiful heart, which immediately reminds people of the bell ringer "Quasimodo" portrayed by Hugo in "Notre Dame de Paris". The "beauty" reflected under an "ugly" appearance is more "beautiful". In the context of the dreary pessimistic and unideal society of France at the end of the 19th century, Rothstein's creation of Sihano is synonymous with "beauty". In an age of cynicism and utilitarianism, Sihano remained a source of inspiration for all Romantics.
Over the years, there have been numerous reviews of the play "Sihano", and one of them speaks to the modern meaning of the big-nosed lover:
In a world of casual fabrication of truth, the fool who proposes that "truth is objective" will be as ridiculous as Sihano's nose; in an era when romance is reduced to a one-night stand, Sihano's pure and loyal love for Roxanne is so precious; in a moment when courage is corrupted by cowardice, Sihano's fighting spirit requires people to be full of joyful self-confidence; in the "egalitarian" tide where no one dares to stand out, Sihano raises his head to remind us that those whose noses are in the air may not be proud and complacent. Maybe they're just staring at the stars.