Roses, Huntington Library and Gardens, Pasadena, California, USA (photo (c) Ulrike Boehm; all rights reserved)
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Rosalind is the kind of female character who, I imagine, must have scared the hell out of many a male audience member in Shakespeare's times. Although she is emotionally vulnerable and eventually blows her own cover by fainting at the sight of blood, she is also witty, charming and independent – much like Beatrice in "Much Ado About Nothing" –, and quite obviously superior to any- and everybody else in the play, even to her beloved Orlando. Perhaps worst of all, unlike Beatrice she even cross-dresses and thus commits one of the very sins whose commission had convinced the representatives of the Holy Inquisition that Joan of Arc simply had to be a witch; and disguised as a young man, she teaches Orlando a lesson in love which he is unlikely to ever forget, yet which he would probably never have taken it from a woman. Well aware how Rosalind might be perceived, Shakespeare assigns her the role of the Epilogue and has her remind the audience that it's all just in good fun and that they should like "as much of this play as please[s] [them]" (this is a Comedy, after all!), thus creating one of the few instances where a story takes its title from its epilogue; but also, at least implicitly, highlighting Rosalind's role even further.
Let me see; what think you of falling in love?
Marry, I prithee, do, to make sport withal; but love no man
in good earnest, nor no further in sport neither than with safety
of a pure blush thou mayst in honour come off again.
What shall be our sport, then?
Let us sit and mock the good housewife Fortune from her
wheel, that her gifts may henceforth be bestowed equally.
I would we could do so; for her benefits are mightily
misplaced; and the bountiful blind woman doth most mistake in her
gifts to women.
'Tis true; for those that she makes fair she scarce makes
honest; and those that she makes honest she makes very
ill-favouredly.
Nay; now thou goest from Fortune's office to Nature's:
Fortune reigns in gifts of the world, not in the lineaments of
Nature.
No; when Nature hath made a fair creature, may she not by
Fortune fall into the fire? Though Nature hath given us wit to
flout at Fortune, hath not Fortune sent in this fool to cut off
the argument?
Indeed, there is Fortune too hard for Nature, when
Fortune makes Nature's natural the cutter-off of Nature's wit.
Peradventure this is not Fortune's work neither, but
Nature's, who perceiveth our natural wits too dull to reason of
such goddesses, and hath sent this natural for our whetstone; for
always the dullness of the fool is the whetstone of the wits. How
now, wit! Whither wander you?
Mistress, you must come away to your father.
Were you made the messenger?
No, by mine honour; but I was bid to come for you.
Where learned you that oath, fool?
Of a certain knight that swore by his honour they were
good pancakes, and swore by his honour the mustard was naught.
Now I'll stand to it, the pancakes were naught and the mustard
was good, and yet was not the knight forsworn.
How prove you that, in the great heap of your knowledge?
Ay, marry, now unmuzzle your wisdom.
Stand you both forth now: stroke your chins, and swear
by your beards that I am a knave.
By our beards, if we had them, thou art.
By my knavery, if I had it, then I were. But if you
swear by that that not, you are not forsworn; no more was this
knight, swearing by his honour, for he never had any; or if he
had, he had sworn it away before ever he saw those pancackes or
that mustard.
Prithee, who is't that thou mean'st?
One that old Frederick, your father, loves.
My father's love is enough to honour him. Enough, speak no
more of him; you'll be whipt for taxation one of these days.
The more pity that fools may not speak wisely what wise
men do foolishly.
By my troth, thou sayest true; for since the little wit that
fools have was silenced, the little foolery that wise men have
makes a great show. Here comes Monsieur Le Beau.
With his mouth full of news.
Which he will put on us as pigeons feed their young.
Then shall we be news-cramm'd.
All the better; we shall be the more marketable. Bon jour,
Monsieur Le Beau. What's the news?
Fair Princess, you have lost much good sport.
Sport! of what colour?
What colour, madam? How shall I answer you?
As wit and fortune will.
Or as the Destinies decrees.
Well said; that was laid on with a trowel.
Nay, if I keep not my rank –
Thou losest thy old smell.
You amaze me, ladies. I would have told you of good
wrestling, which you have lost the sight of.
Yet tell us the manner of the wrestling.
I will tell you the beginning, and, if it please your
ladyships, you may see the end; for the best is yet to do; and
here, where you are, they are coming to perform it.
Well, the beginning, that is dead and buried.
There comes an old man and his three sons –
I could match this beginning with an old tale.
Three proper young men, of excellent growth and presence.
With bills on their necks: 'Be it known unto all men by
these presents' –
The eldest of the three wrestled with Charles, the Duke's
wrestler; which Charles in a moment threw him, and broke three of
his ribs, that there is little hope of life in him. So he serv'd
the second, and so the third. Yonder they lie; the poor old man,
their father, making such pitiful dole over them that all the
beholders take his part with weeping.
Alas!
Didst thou hear these verses?
O, yes, I heard them all, and more too; for some of them
had in them more feet than the verses would bear.
That's no matter; the feet might bear the verses.
Ay, but the feet were lame, and could not bear themselves
without the verse, and therefore stood lamely in the verse.
But didst thou hear without wondering how thy name should be
hang'd and carved upon these trees?
I was seven of the nine days out of the wonder before you
came; for look here what I found on a palm-tree. I was never so
berhym'd since Pythagoras' time that I was an Irish rat, which I
can hardly remember.
Trow you who hath done this?
Is it a man?
And a chain, that you once wore, about his neck.
Change you colour?
I prithee, who?
O Lord, Lord! it is a hard matter for friends to meet; but
mountains may be remov'd with earthquakes, and so encounter.
Nay, but who is it?
Is it possible?
Nay, I prithee now, with most petitionary vehemence, tell
me who it is.
O wonderful, wonderful, most wonderful wonderful, and yet
again wonderful, and after that, out of all whooping!
Good my complexion! dost thou think, though I am
caparison'd like a man, I have a doublet and hose in my
disposition? One inch of delay more is a South Sea of discovery.
I prithee tell me who is it quickly, and speak apace. I would
thou could'st stammer, that thou mightst pour this conceal'd man
out of thy mouth, as wine comes out of narrow-mouth'd bottle –
either too much at once or none at all. I prithee take the cork
out of thy mouth that I may drink thy tidings.
So you may put a man in your belly.
Is he of God's making? What manner of man?
Is his head worth a hat or his chin worth a beard?
Nay, he hath but a little beard.
Why, God will send more if the man will be thankful. Let
me stay the growth of his beard, if thou delay me not the
knowledge of his chin.
It is young Orlando, that tripp'd up the wrestler's heels
and your heart both in an instant.
Nay, but the devil take mocking! Speak sad brow and true
maid.
I' faith, coz, 'tis he.
Orlando?
Orlando.
Alas the day! what shall I do with my doublet and hose?
What did he when thou saw'st him? What said he? How look'd he?
Wherein went he? What makes he here? Did he ask for me? Where
remains he? How parted he with thee? And when shalt thou see him
again? Answer me in one word.
You must borrow me Gargantua's mouth first; 'tis a word too
great for any mouth of this age's size. To say ay and no to these
particulars is more than to answer in a catechism.
But doth he know that I am in this forest, and in man's
apparel? Looks he as freshly as he did the day he wrestled?
It is as easy to count atomies as to resolve the
propositions of a lover; but take a taste of my finding him, and
relish it with good observance. I found him under a tree, like a
dropp'd acorn.
It may well be call'd Jove's tree, when it drops forth
such fruit.
Give me audience, good madam.
Proceed.
There lay he, stretch'd along like a wounded knight.
Though it be pity to see such a sight, it well becomes
the ground.
Cry 'Holla' to thy tongue, I prithee; it curvets
unseasonably. He was furnish'd like a hunter.
O, ominous! he comes to kill my heart.
I would sing my song without a burden; thou bring'st me out
of tune.
Do you not know I am a woman? When I think, I must speak.
Sweet, say on.
You bring me out. Soft! comes he not here?
[...]I will speak to him like a saucy lackey,
and under that habit play the knave with him. – Do you hear,
forester?
Very well; what would you?
I pray you, what is't o'clock?
You should ask me what time o' day; there's no clock in
the forest.
Then there is no true lover in the forest, else sighing
every minute and groaning every hour would detect the lazy foot
of Time as well as a clock.
And why not the swift foot of Time? Had not that been as
proper?
By no means, sir. Time travels in divers paces with
divers persons. I'll tell you who Time ambles withal, who Time
trots withal, who Time gallops withal, and who he stands still
withal.
I prithee, who doth he trot withal?
Marry, he trots hard with a young maid between the
contract of her marriage and the day it is solemniz'd; if the
interim be but a se'nnight, Time's pace is so hard that it seems
the length of seven year.
Who ambles Time withal?
With a priest that lacks Latin and a rich man that hath
not the gout; for the one sleeps easily because he cannot study,
and the other lives merrily because he feels no pain; the one
lacking the burden of lean and wasteful learning, the other
knowing no burden of heavy tedious penury. These Time ambles
withal.
Who doth he gallop withal?
With a thief to the gallows; for though he go as softly
as foot can fall, he thinks himself too soon there.
Who stays it still withal?
With lawyers in the vacation; for they sleep between term
and term, and then they perceive not how Time moves.
Where dwell you, pretty youth?
With this shepherdess, my sister; here in the skirts of
the forest, like fringe upon a petticoat.
Are you native of this place?
As the coney that you see dwell where she is kindled.
Your accent is something finer than you could purchase in
so removed a dwelling.
I have been told so of many; but indeed an old religious
uncle of mine taught me to speak, who was in his youth an inland
man; one that knew courtship too well, for there he fell in love.
I have heard him read many lectures against it; and I thank God I
am not a woman, to be touch'd with so many giddy offences as he
hath generally tax'd their whole sex withal.
Can you remember any of the principal evils that he laid
to the charge of women?
There were none principal; they were all like one another
as halfpence are; every one fault seeming monstrous till his
fellow-fault came to match it.
I prithee recount some of them.
No; I will not cast away my physic but on those that are
sick. There is a man haunts the forest that abuses our young
plants with carving 'Rosalind' on their barks; hangs odes upon
hawthorns and elegies on brambles; all, forsooth, deifying the
name of Rosalind. If I could meet that fancy-monger, I would give
him some good counsel, for he seems to have the quotidian of love
upon him.
I am he that is so love-shak'd; I pray you tell me your
remedy.
There is none of my uncle's marks upon you; he taught me
how to know a man in love; in which cage of rushes I am sure you
are not prisoner.
What were his marks?
A lean cheek, which you have not; a blue eye and sunken,
which you have not; an unquestionable spirit, which you have not;
a beard neglected, which you have not; but I pardon you for that,
for simply your having in beard is a younger brother's revenue.
Then your hose should be ungarter'd, your bonnet unbanded, your
sleeve unbutton'd, your shoe untied, and every thing about you
demonstrating a careless desolation. But you are no such man; you
are rather point-device in your accoutrements, as loving yourself
than seeming the lover of any other.
Fair youth, I would I could make thee believe I love.
Me believe it! You may as soon make her that you love
believe it; which, I warrant, she is apter to do than to confess
she does. That is one of the points in the which women still give
the lie to their consciences. But, in good sooth, are you he that
hangs the verses on the trees wherein Rosalind is so admired?
I swear to thee, youth, by the white hand of Rosalind, I
am that he, that unfortunate he.
But are you so much in love as your rhymes speak?
Neither rhyme nor reason can express how much.
Love is merely a madness; and, I tell you, deserves as
well a dark house and a whip as madmen do; and the reason why
they are not so punish'd and cured is that the lunacy is so
ordinary that the whippers are in love too. Yet I profess curing
it by counsel.
Did you ever cure any so?
Yes, one; and in this manner. He was to imagine me his
love, his mistress; and I set him every day to woo me; at which
time would I, being but a moonish youth, grieve, be effeminate,
changeable, longing and liking, proud, fantastical, apish,
shallow, inconstant, full of tears, full of smiles; for every
passion something and for no passion truly anything, as boys and
women are for the most part cattle of this colour; would now like
him, now loathe him; then entertain him, then forswear him; now
weep for him, then spit at him; that I drave my suitor from his
mad humour of love to a living humour of madness; which was, to
forswear the full stream of the world and to live in a nook
merely monastic. And thus I cur'd him; and this way will I take
upon me to wash your liver as clean as a sound sheep's heart,
that there shall not be one spot of love in 't.
I would not be cured, youth.
I would cure you, if you would but call me Rosalind, and
come every day to my cote and woo me.
Now, by the faith of my love, I will. Tell me where it is.
Go with me to it, and I'll show it you; and, by the way,
you shall tell me where in the forest you live. Will you go?
With all my heart, good youth.
Nay, you must call me Rosalind. Come, sister, will you
go?
Why, how now, Orlando! where
have you been all this while? You a lover! An you serve me such
another trick, never come in my sight more.
My fair Rosalind, I come within an hour of my promise.
Break an hour's promise in love! He that will divide a
minute into a thousand parts, and break but a part of the
thousand part of a minute in the affairs of love, it may be said
of him that Cupid hath clapp'd him o' th' shoulder, but I'll
warrant him heart-whole.
Pardon me, dear Rosalind.
Nay, an you be so tardy, come no more in my sight. I had
as lief be woo'd of a snail.
Of a snail!
Ay, of a snail; for though he comes slowly, he carries
his house on his head – a better jointure, I think, than you make
a woman; besides, he brings his destiny with him.
What's that?
Why, horns; which such as you are fain to be beholding to
your wives for; but he comes armed in his fortune, and prevents
the slander of his wife.
Virtue is no horn-maker; and my Rosalind is virtuous.
And I am your Rosalind.
It pleases him to call you so; but he hath a Rosalind of a
better leer than you.
Come, woo me, woo me; for now I am in a holiday humour,
and like enough to consent. What would you say to me now, an I
were your very very Rosalind?
I would kiss before I spoke.
Nay, you were better speak first; and when you were
gravell'd for lack of matter, you might take occasion to kiss.
Very good orators, when they are out, they will spit; and for
lovers lacking – God warn us! – matter, the cleanliest shift is to
kiss.
How if the kiss be denied?
Then she puts you to entreaty, and there begins new
matter.
Who could be out, being before his beloved mistress?
Marry, that should you, if I were your mistress; or I
should think my honesty ranker than my wit.
What, of my suit?
Not out of your apparel, and yet out of your suit.
Am not I your Rosalind?
I take some joy to say you are, because I would be talking
of her.
Well, in her person, I say I will not have you.
Then, in mine own person, I die.
No, faith, die by attorney. The poor world is almost six
thousand years old, and in all this time there was not any man
died in his own person, videlicet, in a love-cause. Troilus had
his brains dash'd out with a Grecian club; yet he did what he
could to die before, and he is one of the patterns of love.
Leander, he would have liv'd many a fair year, though Hero had
turn'd nun, if it had not been for a hot midsummer night; for,
good youth, he went but forth to wash him in the Hellespont, and,
being taken with the cramp, was drown'd; and the foolish
chroniclers of that age found it was – Hero of Sestos. But these
are all lies: men have died from time to time, and worms have
eaten them, but not for love.
I would not have my right Rosalind of this mind; for, I
protest, her frown might kill me.
By this hand, it will not kill a fly. But come, now I
will be your Rosalind in a more coming-on disposition; and ask me
what you will, I will grant it.
Then love me, Rosalind.
Yes, faith, will I, Fridays and Saturdays, and all.
And wilt thou have me?
Ay, and twenty such.
What sayest thou?
Are you not good?
I hope so.
Why then, can one desire too much of a good thing? Come,
sister, you shall be the priest, and marry us. Give me your hand,
Orlando. What do you say, sister?
Pray thee, marry us.
I cannot say the words.
You must begin 'Will you, Orlando' –
Go to. Will you, Orlando, have to wife this Rosalind?
I will.
Ay, but when?
Why, now; as fast as she can marry us.
Then you must say 'I take thee, Rosalind, for wife.'
I take thee, Rosalind, for wife.
I might ask you for your commission; but – I do take thee,
Orlando, for my husband. There's a girl goes before the priest;
and, certainly, a woman's thought runs before her actions.
So do all thoughts; they are wing'd.
Now tell me how long you would have her, after you have
possess'd her.
For ever and a day.
Say 'a day' without the 'ever.' No, no, Orlando; men are
April when they woo, December when they wed: maids are May when
they are maids, but the sky changes when they are wives. I will
be more jealous of thee than a Barbary cock-pigeon over his hen,
more clamorous than a parrot against rain, more new-fangled than
an ape, more giddy in my desires than a monkey. I will weep for
nothing, like Diana in the fountain, and I will do that when you
are dispos'd to be merry; I will laugh like a hyen, and that when
thou are inclin'd to sleep.
But will my Rosalind do so?
By my life, she will do as I do.
O, but she is wise.
Or else she could not have the wit to do this. The wiser,
the waywarder. Make the doors upon a woman's wit, and it will out
at the casement; shut that, and 'twill out at the key-hole; stop
that, 'twill fly with the smoke out at the chimney.
A man that had a wife with such a wit, he might say 'Wit,
whither wilt?'
Nay, you might keep that check for it, till you met your
wife's wit going to your neighbour's bed.
And what wit could wit have to excuse that?
Marry, to say she came to seek you there. You shall never
take her without her answer, unless you take her without her
tongue. O, that woman that cannot make her fault her husband's
occasion, let her never nurse her child herself, for she will
breed it like a fool!
For these two hours, Rosalind, I will leave thee.
Alas, dear love, I cannot lack thee two hours!
I must attend the Duke at dinner; by two o'clock I will be
with thee again.
Ay, go your ways, go your ways. I knew what you would
prove; my friends told me as much, and I thought no less. That
flattering tongue of yours won me. 'Tis but one cast away, and
so, come death! Two o'clock is your hour?
Ay, sweet Rosalind.
By my troth, and in good earnest, and so God mend me, and
by all pretty oaths that are not dangerous, if you break one jot
of your promise, or come one minute behind your hour, I will
think you the most pathetical break-promise, and the most hollow
lover, and the most unworthy of her you call Rosalind, that may
be chosen out of the gross band of the unfaithful. Therefore
beware my censure, and keep your promise.
With no less religion than if thou wert indeed my
Rosalind; so, adieu.
Well, Time is the old justice that examines all such
offenders, and let Time try. Adieu
You have simply misus'd our sex in your love-prate. We must
have your doublet and hose pluck'd over your head, and show the
world what the bird hath done to her own nest.
O coz, coz, coz, my pretty little coz, that thou didst
know how many fathom deep I am in love! But it cannot be sounded;
my affection hath an unknown bottom, like the Bay of Portugal.
Or rather, bottomless; that as fast as you pour affection
in, it runs out.
No; that same wicked bastard of Venus, that was begot of
thought, conceiv'd of spleen, and born of madness; that blind
rascally boy, that abuses every one's eyes, because his own are
out – let him be judge how deep I am in love. I'll tell thee,
Aliena, I cannot be out of the sight of Orlando. I'll go find a
shadow, and sigh till he come.
And I'll sleep.
It is not the fashion to see the lady the epilogue; but
it is no more unhandsome than to see the lord the prologue. If it
be true that good wine needs no bush, 'tis true that a good play
needs no epilogue. Yet to good wine they do use good bushes; and
good plays prove the better by the help of good epilogues. What a
case am I in then, that am neither a good epilogue, nor cannot
insinuate with you in the behalf of a good play! I am not
furnish'd like a beggar; therefore to beg will not become me. My
way is to conjure you; and I'll begin with the women. I charge
you, O women, for the love you bear to men, to like as much of
this play as please you; and I charge you, O men, for the love
you bear to women – as I perceive by your simp'ring none of you
hates them – that between you and the women the play may please.
If I were a woman, I would kiss as many of you as had beards that
pleas'd me, complexions that lik'd me, and breaths that I defied
not; and, I am sure, as many as have good beards, or good faces,
or sweet breaths, will, for my kind offer, when I make curtsy,
bid me farewell.
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Copyright 2002 – 2009: Ulrike Böhm, all rights reserved.