Accessibility Tools

  • Content scaling 100%
  • Font size 100%
  • Line height 100%
  • Letter spacing 100%

As You Like It

Radiant Shakespeare from the MTC
Melbourne Theatre Company
by
ABR Arts 22 November 2021

As You Like It

Radiant Shakespeare from the MTC
Melbourne Theatre Company
by
ABR Arts 22 November 2021
James Mackay as Orlando and Christie Whelan Browne as Rosalind in As You Like It (photograph by Jeff Busby)
James Mackay as Orlando and Christie Whelan Browne as Rosalind in As You Like It (photograph by Jeff Busby)

As is often the case with Shakespeare, theories and counter-theories about the provenance of As You Like It (probably 1599 or early 1600) have floated around for centuries. One such theory posits that the play is Love’s Labour’s Won, the ‘lost’ sequel – or more accurately second part of a literary diptych – to Love’s Labour’s Lost (1595–96) and that As You Like It is actually the play’s subtitle. This would align with Shakespeare’s finest comedy, Twelfth Night, which has the subtitle What You Will. Take that as you like it and make of it what you will.

Certainly, the two plays make fascinating companion pieces: one is about a coterie of smug young men who hide out in a royal park in order to avoid love, the other about a ragtag bunch of outcasts who head to the forest in order to sanctify love. One has four failed attempts at wooing and no happy ending; the other has, as Jonathan Bate puts it, ‘four weddings and no funeral’.

Comment (1)

  • What a beautiful review. I am, compelled to see the work. Such fluid writing.
    Posted by Fotis
    22 November 2021

Leave a comment

If you are an ABR subscriber, you will need to sign in to post a comment.

If you have forgotten your sign in details, or if you receive an error message when trying to submit your comment, please email your comment (and the name of the article to which it relates) to ABR Comments. We will review your comment and, subject to approval, we will post it under your name.

Please note that all comments must be approved by ABR and comply with our Terms & Conditions.