Argumentative Essay Imagine that you have an obscenely large nose; you would most likely be self conscious or embarrassed. This is in most cases true for Cyrano. The play Cyrano de Bergerac, written by Edmond Rostand, takes place in the 1600’s in Paris France. It displays the main character, Cyrano, who is in love with the woman Roxane but is disappointed after realizing that his love for her is not mutual. Although in some cases Cyrano’s huge nose brings him pride, the majority of the time it brings him pain. Cyrano’s nose causes him a lot of pain when interacting with other people. This is evident during his first real encounter with Roxane. Cyrano becomes extremely nervous and anxious when he learns that Roxane wants to meet with him. Roxane begins describing all the qualities of the man she loves to Cyrano during their meeting in Ragueneau’s pastry shop. At this point Cyrano is extremely excited because all of them are fitting his own description. This is true until she says, “His face shines with wit and intelligence. He’s proud, noble, young, fearless, handsome…”(Cyrano 2.6.77). Cyrano stands up quickly with a stricken expression and it is here that he realizes that it is not him that Roxane loves. This causes a lot of pain to Cyrano because he is rejected for his unattractive nose. Cyrano’s pain is enhanced when she tells him that he is her best friend. Cyrano is not anticipating this and realizes that he will not have a chance with Roxane. It is reasonable to say that if Cyrano were to have a more normal nose, Roxane’s description will fit Cyrano exactly. After this point in the story, Cyrano has a completely different attitude and becomes very depressed. When Le Bret tries to ask about his meeting with Roxane, he is very quick to deny him and not answer. This first interaction with Roxane is the worst thing Cyrano could imagine and it causes him a lot of pain. Cyrano goes through a lot of pain again when people criticize his nose. Christian does exactly this to prove his courage to the other Cadets. Cyrano tells his story to the Cadets of how he fought 100 men. During his story, Christian begins to interrupt him countless times to make jokes about his nose. After he is furious, he gets up and furiously goes towards Christian and asks who he is. Carbon says he is Christian and Cyrano replies “Oh!” his face takes an expression of shock, then anger and he makes a movement as though to attack Christian. “I…” he controls himself and speaks dully “Very well… as I was saying…” (Cyrano 2.9.96). The reason for Cyrano not attacking Christian is due to the promise that he made to Roxane to protect him. This is extremely hard for Cyrano to stay relaxed and not fight him because he is used to fighting anyone that even looks at his nose. He is facing a huge internal conflict whether or not to fight him or to keep his promise. He goes against his instinct to fight, and chooses to keep his promise. Cyrano feels a lot of pain while Christian was making nose jokes. Other people may believe that Cyrano’s large nose brings him pride rather than pain. This is evident when Cyrano gets in an argument with the meddler. Cyrano tells the meddler “I carry it with pride and that a big nose is a sign of affability, kindness, courtesy, wit, generosity and courage” (Cyrano 1.4.37). Cyrano feels a lot of pride due to his nose because he is the only one with a nose that big and he claims that it brings out those desirable traits. Another scenario where Cyrano’s nose makes him proud is when Cyrano makes up at least 20 jokes about his own nose. Valvert makes an attempt to make fun of Cyrano’s nose and Cyrano turns it around on him. He tells him that he does not have any wit and therefore cannot even make a good joke about him. Cyrano makes Valvert look a like a fool for even trying to make an insult and results in making Cyrano proud. However, there are far more instances where his nose is looked down upon causing him to feel pain rather than him being proud of it. A large nose alone cannot bring about the traits of wit, affability, kindness or courage. They must be achieved so this statement does not prove that his nose brings him pride. Many fights break out with him and others due to them giving his nose just a quick glance. It can reasonably be concluded that Cyrano’s nose evokes much more pain than pride. From the information given, it is obvious that Cyrano’s nose evokes much more pain than pride. The many scenarios that Cyrano goes through show that his nose is an encumbrance. From almost killing a man to sitting still accepting the criticism, there is always a strong negative result when regarding his nose. Having and enlarged nose will result in most cases with strong negative feedback.