The Forest of Arden

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The direct and immediate source of As You Like It is Thomas Lodge's Rosalynde, Euphues Golden Legacie, written 1586–87 and first published in 1590. [8] [9] Lodge's story is based upon " The Tale of Gamelyn". [10] Watercolor illustration: Orlando pins love poems on the trees of the forest of Arden. In 2018 Vancouver's Bard on the Beach introduced a musical adaptation of As You Like It, with songs by The Beatles performed by the cast. [45] The production "broke Bard box office records" and toured several other cities, returning to Vancouver in 2023. [46]

The play begins in a courtly setting, where fighting, usurpation, betrayal and general disharmony are exhibited.The name still occurs in the several place names in the region: Hampton-in-Arden and Henley-in-Arden. The elaborate gender reversals in the story are of particular interest to modern critics interested in gender studies. Through four acts of the play, Rosalind, who in Shakespeare's day would have been played by a boy, finds it necessary to disguise herself as a boy, whereupon the rustic Phebe, also played by a boy, becomes infatuated with this " Ganymede", a name with homoerotic overtones. In fact, the epilogue, spoken by Rosalind to the audience, states rather explicitly that she (or at least the actor playing her) is not a woman. In several scenes, "Ganymede" impersonates Rosalind so a boy actor would have been playing a girl disguised as a boy impersonating a girl. Act 1, scene 1 Orlando demands that his elder brother Oliver give him part of the money left by their father. Oliver decides to get rid of Orlando by encouraging him to take part in a wrestling match almost sure to be fatal. The City of Coventry: The legend of Lady Godiva | British History Online". www.british-history.ac.uk.

Austin, Sue (8 November 2023). "Shropshire's remarkable connections with Shakespeare are fascinating". www.shropshirestar.com . Retrieved 9 November 2023. In Arden, both Rosalind and Oliver have a chance to reinvent themselves. Rosalind, having fled the corrupt society of court, approaches the Forest of Arden as a place where she may be able to be free to be herself. In a move that suggests the particular oppression of women in Renaissance England, Rosalind re-imagines herself as the mythological male figure of Ganymede: a Trojan boy of great beauty and Zeus' cupbearer (II.1.123). In Rosalind's attempt to shed her identity in outside society as the daughter of Duke Senior, she chooses the identity of a strong male. Underneath her disguise, however, she clings fiercely to her femininity. Even in her man's apparel, Rosalind insists that she can "cry like a woman" (II.4.5). Donovan set "Under the Greenwood Tree" to music and recorded it for A Gift from a Flower to a Garden in 1968. Forest of Arden". 8 February 2012. Archived from the original on 8 February 2012 . Retrieved 8 July 2023.The Arden edition of Shakespeare makes the suggestion that the name "Arden" comes from a combination of the classical region of Arcadia and the biblical garden of Eden, as there is a strong interplay of classical and Christian belief systems and philosophies within the play. [15] Arden was also the maiden name of Shakespeare's mother and her family home is located within the Forest of Arden. Act 2, scene 1 In the Forest of Arden, the banished duke (Duke Senior) and the courtiers who share his exile discuss their life in the country and listen to a story about their fellow-courtier Jaques.

The River Avon marked the boundary between two distinct areas, the Feldon, cultivated land to the south, and Arden, forested land to the north, including the village of Wilmcote where Shakespeare’s mother came from. Where the forest had been cleared land was used for farming and the typical medieval ridge and furrow ploughing system can still be seen as close to Stratford as the fields surrounding Clopton House. In 2023 a company which cast Rose Ayling-Ellis, who has a hearing impairment, as Celia performed the play at @sohoplace. [37] This was the subject of a documentary on experiences of living with hearing impairment. [38] Act 2, scene 6 Orlando leaves Adam, near starvation, under a tree and goes off determined to find food.Publisher Felix Dennis planted substantial areas of woodland in the area, known as the Heart of England Forest, and on his death in 2014 left most of his fortune to be used for this purpose. [30] 3000 acres (12.1km 2) have been planted in Spernall, Dorsington and Honeybourne. [31] Arden Forest scheme [ edit ] Orlando and his servant Adam, meanwhile, find the Duke and his men and are soon living with them and posting simplistic love poems for Rosalind on the trees. It has been said that the role of Adam was played by Shakespeare, though this story is also said to be without foundation. [7] Rosalind, also in love with Orlando, meets him as Ganymede and pretends to counsel him to cure him of being in love. Ganymede says that "he" will take Rosalind's place and that "he" and Orlando can act out their relationship. The playwright Christopher Marlowe was also an exceptional pastoral poet, and his verse The Passionate Shepherd to His Love, published posthumously in 1599, infuses the pastoral mode with unmistakeable erotic allure as the speaker offers his beloved a series of material temptations to take up the shepherding life: It’s a place of confusion, where people lose their minds and even their identities. Certainties are turned on their heads. Hermia, abandoned by her lover Lysander voices this paradox: