C.D. Warner, et al., comp.
The Library of the World’s Best Literature. An Anthology in Thirty Volumes. 1917.
Cyrano de Bergerac (1619–1655)
Bergerac, Cyrano de, Savinien (sēr-a-nō’ de berzh-räk’). A French writer of literary extravaganzas (1619–55); born at Paris. He was a famous duelist, and fought more than a thousand single combats, most of them provoked by comments on his enormously overgrown nose. Boileau noted his “daring burlesque.” He wrote: ‘Letters,’ amorous or satirical; a ‘Comic History of the States and Empire of the Moon,’ and another ‘Of the Sun,’ both full of metaphysical and satirical passages in the vein later made famous by Swift, to whom they are thought to have suggested ‘Gulliver.’ His one tragedy, ‘Agrippina,’ evinces great dramatic power; he wrote also a clever comedy, ‘The Pedant Laughing-Stock.’