As You Like It, Acts I, II: Duke Senior: finds tongues in trees, books in running brooks...good in everything

sweetsilentsessions: Glenn Feole on Shakespeare

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     I am re-reading As You Like It, an inspiring play of love; the deep love of friendship between two cousins (Rosalind and Celia) and the romantic love of Rosalind and Orland.  I have listed excerpts from the play's first two Acts below. 

 

    I recently went to a pediatric conference in Seattle, Washington with nothing but a backpack, a pen and a journal; no computer or smart phone.  For nine days I was drenched in rain, the weather was in the 30's, sometimes snowing, and I was bundled up and hiking with many wonderful friends from around the world that I had met at the Green Tortoise Hostel.  I walked all over that beautiful city: to the expansive University of Washington with its Cherry Blossoms, to Japanese gardens, museums and many eclectic coffee shops.  My paperback As You Like It accompanied me everywhere and as I sat in one coffee shop drinkiing a hot Chai tea, I  serendipitously read this passage by the gentle, wise Duke Senior.  His kingdom had been usurped by his brother, Duke Frederick, who had then banished him to the Forest of Arden.  He was not bitter or despondent; he was happy...like I was.   This passage beautifully summarized my feelings of joy, my experiences  of nonmaterial beauty and friendship while at the hostel where I was staying in Seattle:

“And this is our life, exempt from public haunt, Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, Sermons in stones, and good in everything.” Duke Senior, II,i, 15-17


Also:

Hath not old custom made this life more sweet

Than that of painted pomp?  Are not these woods

More free from peril than the envious court?

Here feel we not the penalty of Adam;

The season’ difference, as the icy fang

And churlish chiding of the winter’s wind,

Which, when it bites and blows upon my body

Even till I shrink with cold, I smile and say

“This is no flattery; these are counselors

That feelingly persuade me what I am.”

Sweet are the uses of adversity…”  Duke Senior in the Forest of Arden, II,i.2-12

 

“There’s no news at the court, sir, but the old news.”  I.i.96

“I see thou lov’st me not with the full weight that I love thee,” Celia to Rosalind, I.i. 5-6

“My sweet Rose, my dear Rose,” Celia, I.i. 21

“what think you of falling in love?” Rosalind, I.i.24

“unmuzzle your wisdom” Rosalind, I.i. 68

“that was laid on with a trowel,” Celia, I.i. 100

“Cupid have mercy, not a word? …Not one to throw a dog… throw one at me” Roseland and Celia I.iii. 1

“these burrs are in my heart” Rosalind I.iii. 16

“We still have slept together, Rose at an instant, learned, played, eat together; and wheresoe’re we went, like Juno’s swans, Still we went coupled and inseparable.”  Celia about Rosalind I.iii.71

“I can not live out of her company.” Celia I.iii. 56

“thou and I am one.” Celia I.iii.95

 

 

Other excerpts from the first two Acts:

Did he not moralize this spectacle? Duke Senior   O,yes, in a thousand similes.  II,i.44,45

Be comfort to my age.  Adam.  II,i.45

Therefore my age is as a lusty winter,

Frosty, but kindly.  Adam II,I,53

 

These quotes below are exquisite, approaching those in Romeo and Juliet in their depiction of true love. a remembrance of our past youth: 

"Though in thy youth thou wast as true a lover

As ever sighed upon a midnight pillow

…How many actions most ridiculous

Hast thou been drawn to by thy fantasy?

O, thou didst then never love so heartily!

If thou rememb’rest not the slightest folly

That ever love did make thee run into,

Thou hast not loved. 

Or if thou hast not sat as I do now,

Wearing thy hearer in they mistress’ praise,

Thou hast not loved.

Or if thou hast not broke from company

Abruptly, as my passion now makes me,

Thou has not loved.”  Silvius (shepherd) II,iv, 31-39

 

We that are true lovers run into strange capers. Silvius II,iv, 51, 52

Live a little, comfort a little, cheer thyself a little. II,vi, 5

Again, the wise Duke Senior:

Your gentleness shall force More than your force move us to gentleness. Duke Senior II, vii, 101, 102

Sacred pity. Duke Senior  II, vii, 123

All the world’s a stage, And all the men and women merely players; They have their exits and their entrances, And one man in his time plays many  parts, His act being seven ages.  Jaques II, vii, 140

And then the lover, sighing like a furnace, with a woeful ballad Made to his mistress. II, vii, 147