Leader Hawkins as Hymen in the Shakespeare's Globe 1998 performance of As You Like It, directed by Lucy Bailey. Set design by Bunny Christie.
This blog post is a continued discussion of the course that I taught this past semester, "Clothing and Gender in Shakespeare's Plays."
There were three main topics that we addressed in our discussion of Act 5: 1) Rosalind as a fluid signifier of both gender and desire, 2) the textual history of the marriage scene, and 3) the fabulous Epilogue and how it brazenly points to the male body of the boy actor underneath the feminine clothes of Rosalind. We compared this Epilogue to 8 accounts of boy actors from writers who were contemporary to Shakespeare.
There were three main topics that we addressed in our discussion of Act 5: 1) Rosalind as a fluid signifier of both gender and desire, 2) the textual history of the marriage scene, and 3) the fabulous Epilogue and how it brazenly points to the male body of the boy actor underneath the feminine clothes of Rosalind. We compared this Epilogue to 8 accounts of boy actors from writers who were contemporary to Shakespeare.
Rosalind as a fluid signifier
In my blog post, "Teaching Acts 1-2 of As You Like It," I mentioned that Rosalind uses metonymy to associate men and women with the clothing that they wear. Men are "doublet and hose" and women are "petticoats" in her figurative language, which suggests that gender is something that can be put on and taken off like clothing. Elsewhere in the play this use of metonymy comes back.
Rosalind: I could find in my heart to disgrace my man's apparel, and to cry like a woman; but I must comfort the weaker vessel, as doublet and hose ought to show itself courageous to petticoat; therefore, courage, good Aliena. (2.4.3-6)
Rosalind (before finding out that the author of the poems is Orlando): Good my complexion! dost thou think, though I am caparison'd like a man, I have a doublet and hose in my disposition? (3.2.175-177)
Rosalind (after finding out Orlando has authored the poems): 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. (3.2.197-201)
Ask students to compare and contrast the way that Rosalind uses "doublet and hose" in each of these situations. How does the play develop the idea that gender is something that can be put on and taken off? The play doesn't maintain the thesis that gender is something that can be completely put on and taken off, but Rosalind passes pretty well for quite some time.
This comes back in terms of sexuality or desire as well. Through her code switching, Rosalind gets to occupy the full gamut of positions when it comes to being the gendered object of a person's desire:
Female object of a man's desire: Rosalind enjoys being the female/feminine object of Orlando’s desire in her role as “Rosalind” when she is educating Orlando, and she also enjoys being the object of his affection in real life.
Female object of a woman's desire: Arguably, Roz and Celia enjoy an intimacy that goes beyond friendship. Their closeness is remarked upon by everyone who discusses them, and Celia at times seems jealous of Rosalind's love for Orlando. The other characters (and even Celia) remark that her love of Rosalind exceeds Rosalind's love for her: "I see thou lov'st me not with the full weight that I / love thee" (1.2.6-7).
Male object of a man's desire: Rosalind deliberately chooses the name Ganymede because she also wants to be the male/masculine object of Orlando’s desire. She is thus an object of desire for Orlando in both the genders/sexes she performs.
Male object of a woman's desire: She seems to enjoy being the male object of Phoebe’s desire as well. Rosalind is very aware that Phoebe is falling in love with her. Let’s look at 3.5.43-44 and then also at 66-69. She knowingly toys with Phoebe to make her fall in love with Ganymede.
This comes back in terms of sexuality or desire as well. Through her code switching, Rosalind gets to occupy the full gamut of positions when it comes to being the gendered object of a person's desire:
Female object of a man's desire: Rosalind enjoys being the female/feminine object of Orlando’s desire in her role as “Rosalind” when she is educating Orlando, and she also enjoys being the object of his affection in real life.
Female object of a woman's desire: Arguably, Roz and Celia enjoy an intimacy that goes beyond friendship. Their closeness is remarked upon by everyone who discusses them, and Celia at times seems jealous of Rosalind's love for Orlando. The other characters (and even Celia) remark that her love of Rosalind exceeds Rosalind's love for her: "I see thou lov'st me not with the full weight that I / love thee" (1.2.6-7).
Male object of a man's desire: Rosalind deliberately chooses the name Ganymede because she also wants to be the male/masculine object of Orlando’s desire. She is thus an object of desire for Orlando in both the genders/sexes she performs.
Male object of a woman's desire: She seems to enjoy being the male object of Phoebe’s desire as well. Rosalind is very aware that Phoebe is falling in love with her. Let’s look at 3.5.43-44 and then also at 66-69. She knowingly toys with Phoebe to make her fall in love with Ganymede.
Why, what means this? Why do you look on me?
I see no more in you than in the ordinary
Of nature's sale-work. 'Od's my little life,
I think she means to tangle my eyes too!
[Aside] He's fall'n in love with your foulness, and she'll fall in love with my anger. If it be so, as fast as she answers thee with frowning looks, I'll sauce her with bitter words. Why look you so upon me?
The fun thing about Rosalind is that she seems to take pleasure in occupying all of these positions. Unlike Viola from Twelfth Night, she never calls her cross-dressing a "wickedness," even in jest. If anything, her ability to manage people because of their sexual attraction to her allows for the happy ending of the play, with its whopping four marriages. If you have students who are up to the challenge of the reading and presenting scholarly writing about Shakespeare, then I would recommend the following excerpt (which is quite short) for a homework presentation assignment: Valerie Traub, "The Homoerotics of As You Like It" in the Norton Critical Edition of As You Like It, pp. 380-387.
The Textual History of the Marriage Scene
I assigned Jeffrey Masten's “Ganymede’s Hand in As You Like It” (which is anthologized in the Norton Critical Edition of As You Like It, pp. 395-404) as a homework presentation assignment this year. It went over shockingly well, which surprised me because it is all about editing practices through history--a subject that many students find to be dull. The image above is from Shakepeare's First Folio, which Masten references. For those of you who have trouble reading the typeface of early printed books, please see the following transcription:
Good Duke receive thy daughter,
Hymen from heaven brought her
Yea brought her hether [i.e., hither],
That thou might joyne his hand with his,
Whose heart within his bosome is.
Editors have long changed the "his hand with his" to "her hand with his" since the marriage scene is between a daughter (Rosalind) and Orlando. Masten, a major scholar in both English and Sexuality Studies, has argued that this editorial practice has made assumptions about the text that are not really supportable, and he argues for a return to the Folio's printing of "his hand with his."
We opened the classroom up to debate, simply using the following questions: Which pronoun should editors use and why? How does the pronoun matter in this scene and in the play? How does it change our view of the play if we use one pronoun or the other? This debate ended up being a MAJOR success in the classroom. It got them to see the stakes of editing practices on reception history, and it tied the marriage scene to the ambiguity of Rosalind's sexual fluidity that we had been discussing throughout the play. I highly recommend such a debate if you have students who are mature enough to handle it.
We opened the classroom up to debate, simply using the following questions: Which pronoun should editors use and why? How does the pronoun matter in this scene and in the play? How does it change our view of the play if we use one pronoun or the other? This debate ended up being a MAJOR success in the classroom. It got them to see the stakes of editing practices on reception history, and it tied the marriage scene to the ambiguity of Rosalind's sexual fluidity that we had been discussing throughout the play. I highly recommend such a debate if you have students who are mature enough to handle it.
The Epilogue
The Epilogue is such a delightful and rich ending to the play, one that helps to maintain this gender indeterminacy and fluidity by calling to attention that the Rosalind who may or may not be "fixed" finally as a heterosexual woman within the fiction of the play is actually a boy underneath the clothes.
This is a great opportunity to bring in accounts of boy actors that are roughly contemporary with Shakespeare. You can find all of these passages in the selection “Eight Accounts of Boy Actors” in the Texts and Contexts Edition of Twelfth Night ed. Bruce Smith pp. 276-278. Generally speaking, these accounts tend to fall into three camps:
1) People who argue (as we have seen) that boy actors are too sexy and will provoke audiences to "unclean" lust:
This is a great opportunity to bring in accounts of boy actors that are roughly contemporary with Shakespeare. You can find all of these passages in the selection “Eight Accounts of Boy Actors” in the Texts and Contexts Edition of Twelfth Night ed. Bruce Smith pp. 276-278. Generally speaking, these accounts tend to fall into three camps:
1) People who argue (as we have seen) that boy actors are too sexy and will provoke audiences to "unclean" lust:
Philip Stubbes: Then these goodly pageants being done, every mate sorts to his mate, every one brings another homeward of their way very friendly, and in their secret conclaves (covertly) they play the sodomites, or worse.
John Rainolds: [Note] what sparkles of lust to that vice the putting of women’s attire on men may kindle in unclean affections.
2) People who consider the custom of boy actors on the stage in a larger context, either by staunchly denying that the female dress of boy actors is confusing for the audience (because English people understand the stage tradition) or debating whether boy actors are more "natural" at playing women than the female actors who were working on the European continent (especially in Italy):
Thomas Platter: “When the play was over, they danced very marvelously and gracefully together as is their wont, two dressed as men and two as women.”
Thomas Heywood: “Who cannot distinguish them by their names, assuredly knowing they are but to represent such a lady, at such a time appointed?”
Thomas Corayte: “I saw women act, a thing that I never saw before, though I have heard that is hath been sometimes used in London, and they performed it with as good a grace, action, gesture, and whatsoever convenient for a player, as ever I saw any masculine actor.”
George Sandys: “There [in Italy] have they their playhouses, where the parts of women are acted by women, and too naturally passionated.”
3) People who question what it means that the concept of "femininity" is constructed entirely by male writers and male actors. All of the following are passages from Lady Mary Wroth's Urania.
Part 1: he saw her with all passionate ardency seek and sue for the stranger’s love; yet he unmoveable, was no further wrought than if he had seen a delicate play-boy act a loving woman’s part, and knowing him a boy, liked only his action.
Part 2: If you did, madam, but see her speak, you would say you never saw so direct a mad woman. Such gestures and such brutish demeanor, fittinger for a man in woman’s clothes acting a Sybilla than a woman.
Part 3: [She was] the greatest libertine the world had of female flesh, and above any that fictions can set forth of truths manifest… being for her overacting fashion, more like a play-boy dressed gaudily up to show a fond loving woman’s part, than a great lady, so busy, so full of talk, and in such a set formality, with so many framed looks, feigned smiles, and nods, with a deceitful downcast look, instead of purest modesty and bashfulness…
I found that my students had a hard time keeping all of these ideas in their heads, so I just lectured (very briefly) on these accounts, fleshing out the three groups that I have outlined here, showing them how Wroth (for example) discusses the artificial femininity that men and women can perform as a result of seeing men perform "femininity" in the playhouses. After I have guided them through these passages, we simply close read Shakespeare's epilogue together.
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.
Questions:
This was an excellent way to end our discussion of the play. The students really like Rosalind because of how agential she is, and this play opens up discussion about postmodern and poststructuralist gender theory in a way that Twelfth Night does not. Reading the two of them together is a lot of fun, and it helps to clarifying some of the concepts that we will get to later when we talk about gender identity as opposed to gender performance.
- Who is speaking here? Shakespeare, the boy actor, or the character of Rosalind?
- What implicit claims does this epilogue make about boy actors?
- Is there a focus on desire (as we saw in Stubbes and Rainold)?
- Is this epilogue a way for the actor/character to wink at the audience, who is in on the joke or the convention of having a boy actor play a woman’s part (like Heywood)?
- Is this a shocking way to pull back the curtain and deconstruct the natural way that the boy actor has played Rosalind (like what Coryate would say)?
- Is this a means for talking about artificial ways that men construct femininity for women through the theater (Wroth)?
This was an excellent way to end our discussion of the play. The students really like Rosalind because of how agential she is, and this play opens up discussion about postmodern and poststructuralist gender theory in a way that Twelfth Night does not. Reading the two of them together is a lot of fun, and it helps to clarifying some of the concepts that we will get to later when we talk about gender identity as opposed to gender performance.
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