Google has delivered another fascinating and beautifully designed Doodle, celebrating one particular French writer.
The Google Doodle first appeared after the company’s founders headed to the Burning Man festival in the company's early days and decided to set a unique ‘Out Of Office’.
Rather than the traditional email notification, they added a stick man standing over one of the Os in the word Google to let users know they were away - and the Google Doodle was born.
Now Google Doodles are regularly released, celebrating important people, places and events that often might sneak under the radars of many.
But who is today’s Google Doodle about, and why are they so important?
What is today’s Google Doodle?
Today’s Google Doodle (May 30, 2022) shows Edmond Rostand, a French poet and playwright.
The Doodle itself shows Rostand holding a pen and a notebook, casting a shadow of a man in a plumed hat holding what looks like a rapier, a type of thin sword.
Who is Edmund Rostand?
Edmond Rostand was a poet and playwright from France who is associated with the neo-romantic movement.
He is famous for a piece called Cyrano de Bergerac, a play written in 1897 about a talented military officer who has it all - he’s a good fencer and an excellent poet and musician - but his large nose damages his confidence and prevents him from telling his distant cousin that he loves her.
Born in the Mediterranean city of Marseille in 1868, Rostand was welcomed to the French academy in 1901.
He grew up with money and surrounded by culture - his own father was also a poet and economist.
As a young man, he studied literature, philosophy and history at the Collège Stanislas in Paris.
His first work, a comedy called Le Gant Rouge, was written before he reached the age of 21 although admittedly received little excitement at the time.
He first tasted success with Les Romanesques, a play parodying Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet.
Rather than star-crossed lovers, Rostand’s mockery saw the families pretend to have a feud in order to make their children fall in love.
The play became hugely successful, even beyond France’s borders, and was eventually adapted into what would become the world's longest-running musical - The Fantasticks.
Three years later, he produced Cyrano de Bergerac, which is one of the most popular plays in France.
Rostand himself was married to fellow poet and playwright Rosemonde-Étienette Gérard and had two sons together, Jean and Maurice.
Rostand suffered from pleurisy and moved out to the beautiful Basque Country in the hope of trying to cure it but died in the final year of the First World War, 1918, from the flu.
