Customer Reviews

Chantecler: A Play in Four Acts

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Chantecler is Edmond Rostand's hymn to traditional values and his cry against what he saw as the bankrupt decay of modernity. While his unthinking reverence to tradition is certainly misplaced, one can certainly sympathize with his horror at the worst aspects of the encroaching cultural bankruptcy of the anti-enlightment (in the play Rostand mentions Kant by name).

One can forgive Rostand for failing to identify this as a false alternative, due to the sheer artistry of his work. Told in the form of a fairy-tale, Chantecler is the story of a rooster on a farm struggling to cling to his deeply-held ideals of heroism and romantic love in the face of gossiping superficial society hens, frivolously fashionable yet brutal game cocks, a cynical blackbird, and other colorful antagonists. Full of drama, humor, and romance, not to mention Rostand's trademark intelligent wit, all dramatizing a serious intellectual theme, this play truly has it all.

Chantecler ranks among the greatest dramas in all of world literature, along with Rostand's other masterpiece, Cyrano de Bergerac, whose spirit Chantecler shares. It is a shame that Chantecler is not as well-known, nor as widely available to a mass market, at least not in the English-speaking world. Gertrude Hall's brilliant English translation fully captures its beauty and majesty.

I cannot recommend this play highly enough.