The central theme that
Shakespeare depicts through “As You like It” is love. Events in the play evolve around love. From the death of Sir Rowland de Bois to the
Marriage of Rosalind and Orlando. Shakespeare uses this theme to enable the
existence of the play. From the play,
different types of love are represented to the readers. From the love of Orlando and his brother Oliver, the love of
Sir Roeland de Bois to his sons, the love between Cilia and Rosalind and the
love between Rosalind and Orlando. All these are some of the different types of
love that exist in this play. Love affects the behavior of the characters. We
can say that the characters are built by the way they relate with one another, the
sharing of love between lovers. The play is possessed with the love and desire.
Shakespeare depicts repetitively how love can make people crazy like Orlando
writes on the trees in the Forest of Arden long poems. The play spends time
Critiquing courtly love, through this we see the aspect of the Petrarchan
Lover. The Petrarchan love involves high dramatic sighing, sadness and
frustration over an unattainable woman. The Play being “As You like it” being a
Shakespearean comedy progressively works its approach towards marriage. The
Play is a little restless about the happenings that take place after a couple
gets hitched. Through the play,
Shakespeare bring out the possibility of heterosexual relationships being
cracked. The playwright also shows that all men despite of their differences
are all cheated by unfaithful wives, the case of Silvius and Phebe explains
this.. To add on this the play discovers the love
between people of the same sex; the love between Phoebe and Rosalind, Rosalind and
Celia and the desire between “Ganymede and Orlando.
Shakespeare uses a
variety of unlike presentations of love in the play. Different types of love are presented by Shakespeare these include;
Romantic and courtly love, Bawdy love,
fatherly love, sisterly and brotherly
love. Shakespeare uses Orlando to present
the aspect of Petrarchan love. Rosalind, on the
other hand, is used as the pivot
in which the love of other characters grows.
Romantic
Love.
The idea of Romantic
love in the play “As You like It” is presented
to the audience who are the readers of
Shakespeare through Rosalind and Orlando. Orlando
is the youngest son to Sir Rowland de Bois, Hi father passed but had left
Oliver Orlando’s elder brother to take care of his brother, however Oliver
neglected his brother and denied him gentleman’s education and training.
Despite this Orlando looks a strong
character a hero in other words. He participates in the wrestling battle and
beats his competitor who was Charles. During this day of victory, Rosalind was impressed by Orlando and
the two instantly falls in love. Shakespeare
presents Rosalind on the other hand as heroine she looks strong despite being banished by Duke Fredrick
Rosalind runs into the forest where she makes her destiny.
Rosalind and Orlando love each other hastily,
the love between the two is uttered in
love poems and carvings in the trees. Rosalind likes the courting side of love, and she is aware it could not be frank.
That could be the reason she subjects Orlando to a test. Orlando’s love for
Rosalind is honest love but is troubled with obstacles which need to be overcome. Touchstone undermines this love by
describing it as dishonest. Touchstone says that the “truest poetry love is the
most Feigning”.
Orlando behaves like a
gentleman and can overcome these obstacles
that face his love between Rosalind.
Rosalind is a genius and cunning she tests the love Orlando has for her by pretending
to be to Ganymede. As Ganymede Rosalind tells Orlando to woo her, Orlando woos her,
and the two pretend to be in a wedding.
Maybe this was symbolizing what was to come the two were to marry. Orlando can
prove that his love for Rosalind is genuine to Ganymede, who he was not aware
was Rosalind. Rosalind is impressed by this fact that Orlando genuinely
loved him. Rosalind and Orlando have met on
very few occasions with exception of the disguise of Ganymede. Therefore, it is
not easy know if the two knew each other well. Despite knowing or not knowing
each other the two fall for one another.
Orlando is mad of
Rosalind, in the Forest of Arden he writes poems in the trees and carvings
describing Rosalind. Orlando shares some similarities with the Petrarch lover.
His idea of love is full of sadness and thwarting over an unreachable miss who would slay a man with a
dirty look. Orlando carves trees in the
Forest of Arden with Sentimental poems about Rosalind. Touchstone and Jaques
try to despise him that he should stop ruining
trees with writing love songs on their barks. However, this does not stop
Orlando from continuing to show his love for Rosalind. All this is because of
the Romance that he feels for this beautiful girl. Romantic love makes Orlando become a poet.
Orlando in his poems he
says that no any jewel can compared to Rosalind, he goes head to say that the
world bears her, her worth is in the wind. (Shakespeare,
1599-1600 Act 3 scene two lines 88-95)
This lines from Orlando
were enough to win him a Prize in a poetry
competition. Rosalind recognizes that Orlando is sincere, but she is also keen to remind her lover that actual love is not what we find in the sappy poetry.
Rosalind tells Orlando that love is not a
hallmark e-card whenever the gentleman tries to be dramatic. Orlando proposes that his love for Rosalind might be the
end of him because her “Frown might kill” him. Rosalind does not agree
with this. Instead she points out that “Men
have passed since spell to spell, and they have
died but not due to love” (Shakespeare, 1599-1600) . Orlando
learns how to be a perfect future husband the moment he knowns that love is not
a hallmark e-card. The love between the two characters is growing with time
Rosalind tries to help Orlando to become a good husband in future.
Despite being a very
romantic girl, Rosalind is very careful about love matters. When Orlando tells her that he will love her forever, Rosalind replies to
him by saying tha men can are change like the months change as love grows. (Shakespeare, 1599-1600) . Through
these words, Rosalind means that Orlando
will lose interest in her after they get married. This is evidence that despite the
romantic side Rosalind is a character
who is careful of her love with Orlando.
Bawdy,
sexual love.
Shakespeare presents other
characters that are different from
Rosalind and Orlando. Touchstone and Audrey fall in love. The readers do not well understand the love between
the two. Touchstone loves Audrey just
because he takes advantage of her simplicity. Touchstone does not praise her
love as Orlando does instead he uses insults which Audrey does not
understand. Touchstone view of love is
different from other characters;
Touchstone says that true love poems are
just faking it. He also goes ahead to mock Orlando when he realizes that
Orlando has been writing love poems. He says that love does not exist in poems
but through idealized desires. The love of Touchstone cannot be classified as
delightful while Touchstone goes ahead to say he is too good for Audrey.
The relationship between
Touchstone and Audrey is moreof physical love
than romantic. Touchstone at one point says that “Sluttishness may come afterward.” Touchstone arranges to marry Audrey
in the forest with Sir Oliver Martext,
who is a vicar from the adjacent village officiating the wedding. At the first
the two are glad to be married in the forest, which shows primitive desires.
They have no barriers against them, Touchstone even says that getting married
under the tree will give him an opportunity to leave Audrey with an excuse that
they were not well married. Touchstone
does not compliment the Audrey’s looks. Instead
he says that he loves her because of her honest. Touchstone marries Audrey to
satisfy his sexual desires. Touchstone himself admits this while accounting for
his decision to marry Audrey to Jaques. He says to Jaques that just like
animals; ox, horse and falcon has desire for sex same to man. Through this, we see Touchstone equating hi sexual
desires to various restraining animals. To satisfy these desires, Touchstone solution is to get married
to the shepherd girl Audrey. We see that
love between Touchstone and Audrey is full of lust, there is no real love that exists between the two.
Shakespeare gives his
audience the opportunity to resolve which type of love is more honest. The Courtly
love is seen to lay basis on appearance
and to be superficial while the bawdy love is presented as cynical.
The love of Touchstone
totally differs from that of the Petrarchan lover. Touchstone’s love is cynical
but based on some reality.
Pastoral
love.
Silvius suffers
unrequited love towards Phoebe, a snobby shepherdess who thinks that she is too
good for Silvius. Phoebe mistreats Silvius in all ways she even sends him to Ganymede, who Phoebe has fallen for. Similarly to Orlando Silvius is a cliché and
also a parody of the typical Petrarchan lover. As the Petrarchan lover falls in
love I with a woman who he has no chance of hooking up with, Silvius falls in
love with Phoebe, who scorns him
severally. Scorns behaves like a love sick puppy by following Silvius, who scorns him, the more he is scorned, the more he falls in love with the
woman. Indeed a Petrarchan lover. The
pairing between Phoebe and Silvius turns as the most dissatisfying Phoebe
agrees to marry Silvius. The reason behind Phoebe marriage to Silvius is
because Ganymede, who Phoebe falls in
love with is a woman, and she cannot
marry her.
Silvius behavior is a
reflection of a courtly lover, who is capable of doing silly activities for the sake of his much-loved, and who hurts the pangs
of pastoral love and the sudden parting with his woman. Silvius is only
concerned with love although he could be naïve his language sounds poetic when
he speaks about Phoebe. The two speak in decorative verses in order to comply
with the courtly love agreements. While wooing Phebe, Silvius approves her
virtues and requests for the least symbol of love. Phebe instead mocks Silvius
and junks him all long. Phebe’s attitude
towards love is portrayed as pastoral
love. Thus, Silvius and Phoebe represents
typical characters in pastoral romance.
The love-struck Silvius
thinks that Phoebe is the most beautiful woman on the planet. Ganymede informs
her that she is not all that. Ganymede goes on to tell her that she has no
beauty. Nothing in her not even her hair, eyeballs or her cheeks that could
entice Ganymede into worshipping Phoebe. According to Ganymede Phoebe, is behaving like a Petrarchan mistress
she tries to be unattainable. Ganymede, however,
tells her that nobody is going to write poems about her beauty anytime soon.
Ganymede goes on by advising her that she marry Silvius since nobody else will
marry her. “……..sell when you can for you are not for all markets.” These are
words of the disguised Rosalind to Phoebe.
From this evidence, it is true to say that the love
Silvius has for Phoebe is unrequited love. It is one-way love, loving someone who does not return the love. Even the sexual love between Touchstone and Audrey
is better than this kind of love. Shakespeare uses these characters who try to
act as Petrarch’s lovers to complete the comedy part of the Play.
Fatherly
love.
The love between Duke Fredrick and his daughter Celia can be
said to be fatherly love. Duke Fredrick love for his daughter enables him to
allow Rosalind to stay in the court since the Celia and Rosalind were
inseparable. Duke Fredrick changes his heart and banishes Rosalind from the
court. Celia decides to follow Rosalind and the two ladies escapes to the
forest. Duke Fredrick’s love for his daughter is unrequited because of his wrongdoing of banishing Rosalind.
Another instance of
fatherly love is the love between Duke Senior and is daughter Rosalind. Duke
senior loves her daughter, but he fails
to recognize her when she disguises herself as Ganymede.
Sir Rowland de Bois also loved his sons he leaves all
possessions behind and he wishes that Oliver will take care of his younger
brother Orlando. However, Oliver breaks
his father’s will he does not take care of the boy he denies him gentleman’s
education and training.
Sisterly
and Brotherly love.
Another type of love
that is present in this play is the brotherly and sisterly love. Cecilia and
Rosalind clearly manifest this type of love. The two ladies are cousins and on
top that they are very close friends they
share their secrets, like Rosalind affairs,
and Orlando were only known to Celia.
When Rosalind is banished by Duke Fredrick, Celia decides to follow her to the
forest she does not mind of the risks that she will face in exile all she cares
about is her love for Rosalind.
Oliver and Orlando also
manifest brotherly love. Orlando escapes
from home because his brother Oliver is plotting to kill him. The two sons of Sir Rowland de Bois meet
again in the forest this time Orlando saves Oliver from lions. As it is said, Blood is thicker than water, Orlando
despite having been chased home by his
brother Oliver he saves him. This act makes Oliver change his mind about Orlando.
Conclusion.
Shakespeare through
this comedic play of “As you Like it” passes many aspects of love. The theme of love in this comedy is represented
in many types; the Romantic love, unrequited love, to the Sexual love and
family love.
Love makes characters
behave madly similarly to the contemporary society whereby people are driven by love in one way or the other. We see
Celia following Rosalind because of the love she has for her.
Characters behave like
the Petrarchan lover, loving madly the likes of Silvius and Orlando. They
love without having to worry if the persons
they fall for love them in return.
Characters are mistreated because of love, and they don’t lose hope at all. Silvius
is more persistence on his love for
Phoebe despite Phoebe having no love for the man.
characters
are driven by the need to fulfill their sexual desires in the name of love
Touchstone is a good example of this.
Shakespeare play can be
said to be an accurate representation of
the modern day society when
it comes to the matters of love.
References
Petrarch, F., & Bernardo, t. b. ( 2005). Letters
on Familiar Matters (Rerum familiarium libri). New York: Italica Press.
Shakespeare, W. (1599-1600). AS
YOU LIKE IT. London: Helmat Publishers.
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