Blackwell Reference Online

Extract

In the explosion of interest in Shakespeare's construction of gender and sexuality in his plays, As You Like It has received the most intense critical attention, so that to return to the subject yet again seems to risk a response comparable to Touchstone's acid comment on a rather labored joke from Rosalind: “You have said; but whether wisely or no, let the forest judge” (III.ii.117). I trust myself to the judgment of the Forest in the spirit of Erasmus's Stultitia in The Praise of Folly , recalling as I do so Touchstone's observation to Audrey and William, that “‘the fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool’” (V.i.30). Wise man. Yes. But what of the woman? Well, we don't need to mention her because women are always fools. And in any case there weren't any women on Shakespeare's stage. Ay, there's the rub. Were they there or not? Of course, physically they were not there. But to assert that is, in my view, to say nothing. Because none of the shadows on Shakespeare's stage are there. There are no kings, queens, murderers, monsters, fairies, politicians, wise counselors, or even fools. There are only actors. Why should it matter that they are not biologically female, any more than it should matter that they are not royal, Roman, Moors, Egyptian, or Italian? Why should the fact of the male body make it impossible to conceive of a woman on the stage, ... log in or subscribe to read full text