On a practical level, what's up with the cross-dressing?

"I would cure you, if you would but call me Rosalind and come every day to my cote and woo me" (As You Like It, III.ii.45).

Let's talk about dramatic suspense.

At first, suspense occurs as the audience worries about the fate of Orlando with a crazy Duke and Oliver coming after him, but I'm not going to talk about that. Once we get past that, we find suspense as Rosalind forms this weird plan in her mind to . . . I'm not really sure I understood her methods throughout the play. I mean, she got what she wanted in the end, but I feel like there must have been an easier way to do it than cross-dressing.

My point is that Rosalind knows how she's going to end up with Orlando and even how she's going to get three other couples to get married by the play's end. We, as the audience, don't know what exactly is going to happen because while we get a lot of information from Rosalind, we can't read her mind like we can in some literature. There's a discrepancy between what Rosalind knows about her plan and what the audience knows about her plan, and since the audience increasingly learns more and more details of Rosalind's scheme, suspense is created.

Let me point out one more suspenseful thing, here. "Let your wedding be tomorrow" (V.ii.69). "To-morrow meet me all together" (V.ii.71). "To-morrow is the joyful day, Audrey; to-morrow will we be married" (V.iii.72). With the repetition of the word "tomorrow" (with or without a hyphen), I got pretty excited about tomorrow. And I think that tomorrow lived up to all the hype -- the ending was very happy. A little too happy for me, maybe. The real question is . . . did Avatar live up to the hype? Man, I'm full of Parks and Rec references tonight.

Look for my new CD next month: Memories . . . of Now

"Now will I stir this gamester: I hope I shall see an end of him; for my soul, yet I know not why, hates nothing more than he" (As You Like It, I.i.5).

Sometimes in literature, we have a Harry and a Voldemort, a Luke Skywalker and an Emperor, or an Othello and an Iago. However, in As You Like It (in your pants), identifying a protagonist and antagonist is difficult and perhaps [dramatic pause] impossible. I'm going to try and see what happens.

Let's start with potential antagonists. We first have Oliver who says that quote up there about how he hates his brother Orlando for no good reason. Then, we have Duke Frederick, who unlawfully banished his brother Duke Senior and then later Duke Senior's daughter just because she is her "father's daughter" (I.iii.13). It seems to me that Duke Frederick is a tad more evil than Oliver -- he commands Oliver to bring Orlando to him "dead of living" and then threatens him with seizure of his "lands and all things" (III.i.34). The problem here is that Oliver has a quick change of heart and falls in love with Aliena/Celia, AND Duke Frederick was converted by some "old religious man" at the conclusion (V.iv.77). If I had to pinpoint an antagonist, I would say that it's Duke Frederick, although he's not a typical antagonist when he changes his ways in Act V.

I don't think I can identify a single protagonist because most of the characters are just so . . . nice and good. Forgive the four-year-old vocabulary, but it's true. Touchstone is kind of vulgar and perverted, I guess. The most central character in the play is Rosalind, perhaps, so if I have to pick someone, I guess I'll pick her. Sense my enthusiasm here.

If I, at any point, refer to Duke Senior as "Duke Silver," please forgive me. This is the fault of Parks and Rec.

My Predictions

"Since each of us was copied at some point from a normal person, there must be, for each of us, somewhere out there, a model getting on with his or her life" (139).

Way to throw in something else that I don't understand; my first prediction is that it's all going to be spelled out for me at the end of the novel, which would be nice. Sometimes it's kind of annoying, though -- Kathy's very withholding right now. Parks and Recreation quote opportunity!

Leslie: That fish over there kinda reminds me of my mom.
Justin: Why?
Leslie: It's just being very withholding.

I've read thirteen chapters so far, and I'm very confused about what's going to happen with the characters, so I'm going to make some predictions that will probably turn out to be embarrassing later on (organized from most likely to most far fetched):

1. All of the donor/carer/possible/deferral business will be explicitly explained to me by the end of the novel. I think it's just that kind of book.
2. Ruth and Tommy are going to continue their relationship way too long before anyone realizes that he should be with Kathy.
3. The trip that Kathy and Tommy will take to Norfolk later in the book will be the climax of the story.
4. The reason that Kathy is a carer for twelve years is that she managed to get a super-long deferral from donating.
5. Each person is actually two people. I'm not talking about emotional duality like the "two quite separate Ruths" (129) discussed in chapter eleven. I mean that there are two physically separate Kathys and Ruths and Tommys walking around England who share thoughts and memories.