As You Like It E-Book

William Shakespeare

• Herausgeber: Phoemixx Classics Ebooks
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Seitenzahl: 119

Beschreibung

As You Like It - William Shakespeare - As You Like It is a pastoral comedy by William Shakespeare based on the novel Rosalynde by Thomas Lodge, believed to have been written in 1599 or early 1600. It features one of Shakespeare's most famous and oft-quoted lines, "All the world's a stage", and has been adapted for radio, film, and musical theatre.

Leseprobe

William Shakespeare

As You Like It

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ACT 1

Scene 1

Orchard of Oliver's house.

Enter ORLANDO and ADAM

ORLANDO; As I remember, Adam, it was upon this fashionbequeathed me by will but poor a thousand crowns,and, as thou sayest, charged my brother, on hisblessing, to breed me well: and there begins mysadness. My brother Jaques he keeps at school, andreport speaks goldenly of his profit: for my part,he keeps me rustically at home, or, to speak moreproperly, stays me here at home unkept; for call youthat keeping for a gentleman of my birth, thatdiffers not from the stalling of an ox? His horsesare bred better; for, besides that they are fairwith their feeding, they are taught their manage,and to that end riders dearly hired: but I, hisbrother, gain nothing under him but growth; for thewhich his animals on his dunghills are as muchbound to him as I. Besides this nothing that he soplentifully gives me, the something that nature gaveme his countenance seems to take from me: he letsme feed with his hinds, bars me the place of abrother, and, as much as in him lies, mines mygentility with my education. This is it, Adam, thatgrieves me; and the spirit of my father, which Ithink is within me, begins to mutiny against thisservitude: I will no longer endure it, though yet Iknow no wise remedy how to avoid it.

ADAM; Yonder comes my master, your brother.

ORLANDO; Go apart, Adam, and thou shalt hear how he willshake me up.

Enter OLIVER

OLIVER; Now, sir! what make you here?

ORLANDO; Nothing: I am not taught to make any thing.

OLIVER; What mar you then, sir?

ORLANDO; Marry, sir, I am helping you to mar that which Godmade, a poor unworthy brother of yours, with idleness.

OLIVER; Marry, sir, be better employed, and be naught awhile.

ORLANDO; Shall I keep your hogs and eat husks with them?What prodigal portion have I spent, that I shouldcome to such penury?

OLIVER; Know you where your are, sir?

ORLANDO; O, sir, very well; here in your orchard.

OLIVER; Know you before whom, sir?

ORLANDO; Ay, better than him I am before knows me. I knowyou are my eldest brother; and, in the gentlecondition of blood, you should so know me. Thecourtesy of nations allows you my better, in thatyou are the first-born; but the same traditiontakes not away my blood, were there twenty brothersbetwixt us: I have as much of my father in me asyou; albeit, I confess, your coming before me isnearer to his reverence.

OLIVER; What, boy!

ORLANDO; Come, come, elder brother, you are too young in this.

OLIVER; Wilt thou lay hands on me, villain?

ORLANDO; I am no villain; I am the youngest son of SirRowland de Boys; he was my father, and he is thricea villain that says such a father begot villains.Wert thou not my brother, I would not take this handfrom thy throat till this other had pulled out thytongue for saying so: thou hast railed on thyself.

ADAM; Sweet masters, be patient: for your father'sremembrance, be at accord.

OLIVER; Let me go, I say.

ORLANDO; I will not, till I please: you shall hear me. Myfather charged you in his will to give me goodeducation: you have trained me like a peasant,obscuring and hiding from me all gentleman-likequalities. The spirit of my father grows strong inme, and I will no longer endure it: therefore allowme such exercises as may become a gentleman, orgive me the poor allottery my father left me bytestament; with that I will go buy my fortunes.

OLIVER; And what wilt thou do? beg, when that is spent?Well, sir, get you in: I will not long be troubledwith you; you shall have some part of your will: Ipray you, leave me.

ORLANDO; I will no further offend you than becomes me for my good.

OLIVER; Get you with him, you old dog.

ADAM; Is 'old dog' my reward? Most true, I have lost myteeth in your service. God be with my old master!he would not have spoke such a word.

Exeunt ORLANDO and ADAM

OLIVER; Is it even so? begin you to grow upon me? I willphysic your rankness, and yet give no thousandcrowns neither. Holla, Dennis!

Enter DENNIS

DENNIS; Calls your worship?

OLIVER; Was not Charles, the duke's wrestler, here to speak with me?

DENNIS; So please you, he is here at the door and importunesaccess to you.

OLIVER; Call him in.

Exit DENNIS

'Twill be a good way; and to-morrow the wrestling is.

Enter CHARLES

CHARLES; Good morrow to your worship.

OLIVER; Good Monsieur Charles, what's the new news at thenew court?

CHARLES; There's no news at the court, sir, but the old news:that is, the old duke is banished by his youngerbrother the new duke; and three or four loving lordshave put themselves into voluntary exile with him,whose lands and revenues enrich the new duke;therefore he gives them good leave to wander.

OLIVER; Can you tell if Rosalind, the duke's daughter, bebanished with her father?

CHARLES; O, no; for the duke's daughter, her cousin, so lovesher, being ever from their cradles bred together,that she would have followed her exile, or have diedto stay behind her. She is at the court, and noless beloved of her uncle than his own daughter; andnever two ladies loved as they do.

OLIVER; Where will the old duke live?

CHARLES; They say he is already in the forest of Arden, anda many merry men with him; and there they live likethe old Robin Hood of England: they say many younggentlemen flock to him every day, and fleet the timecarelessly, as they did in the golden world.

OLIVER; What, you wrestle to-morrow before the new duke?

CHARLES; Marry, do I, sir; and I came to acquaint you with amatter. I am given, sir, secretly to understandthat your younger brother Orlando hath a dispositionto come in disguised against me to try a fall.To-morrow, sir, I wrestle for my credit; and he thatescapes me without some broken limb shall acquit himwell. Your brother is but young and tender; and,for your love, I would be loath to foil him, as Imust, for my own honour, if he come in: therefore,out of my love to you, I came hither to acquaint youwithal, that either you might stay him from hisintendment or brook such disgrace well as he shallrun into, in that it is a thing of his own searchand altogether against my will.

OLIVER; Charles, I thank thee for thy love to me, whichthou shalt find I will most kindly requite. I hadmyself notice of my brother's purpose herein andhave by underhand means laboured to dissuade him fromit, but he is resolute. I'll tell thee, Charles:it is the stubbornest young fellow of France, fullof ambition, an envious emulator of every man'sgood parts, a secret and villanous contriver againstme his natural brother: therefore use thydiscretion; I had as lief thou didst break his neckas his finger. And thou wert best look to't; for ifthou dost him any slight disgrace or if he do notmightily grace himself on thee, he will practiseagainst thee by poison, entrap thee by sometreacherous device and never leave thee till hehath ta'en thy life by some indirect means or other;for, I assure thee, and almost with tears I speakit, there is not one so young and so villanous thisday living. I speak but brotherly of him; butshould I anatomize him to thee as he is, I mustblush and weep and thou must look pale and wonder.

CHARLES; I am heartily glad I came hither to you. If he cometo-morrow, I'll give him his payment: if ever he goalone again, I'll never wrestle for prize more: andso God keep your worship!

OLIVER; Farewell, good Charles.

Exit CHARLES

Now will I stir this gamester: I hope I shall seean end of him; for my soul, yet I know not why,hates nothing more than he. Yet he's gentle, neverschooled and yet learned, full of noble device, ofall sorts enchantingly beloved, and indeed so muchin the heart of the world, and especially of my ownpeople, who best know him, that I am altogethermisprised: but it shall not be so long; thiswrestler shall clear all: nothing remains but thatI kindle the boy thither; which now I'll go about.

Exit

Scene 2

Lawn before the Duke's palace.

Enter CELIA and ROSALIND

CELIA; I pray thee, Rosalind, sweet my coz, be merry.

ROSALIND; Dear Celia, I show more mirth than I am mistress of;and would you yet I were merrier? Unless you couldteach me to forget a banished father, you must notlearn me how to remember any extraordinary pleasure.

CELIA; Herein I see thou lovest me not with the full weightthat I love thee. If my uncle, thy banished father,had banished thy uncle, the duke my father, so thouhadst been still with me, I could have taught mylove to take thy father for mine: so wouldst thou,if the truth of thy love to me were so righteouslytempered as mine is to thee.

ROSALIND; Well, I will forget the condition of my estate, torejoice in yours.

CELIA; You know my father hath no child but I, nor none islike to have: and, truly, when he dies, thou shaltbe his heir, for what he hath taken away from thyfather perforce, I will render thee again inaffection; by mine honour, I will; and when I breakthat oath, let me turn monster: therefore, mysweet Rose, my dear Rose, be merry.

ROSALIND; From henceforth I will, coz, and devise sports. Letme see; what think you of falling in love?

CELIA; Marry, I prithee, do, to make sport withal: butlove no man in good earnest; nor no further in sportneither than with safety of a pure blush thou maystin honour come off again.

ROSALIND; What shall be our sport, then?

CELIA; Let us sit and mock the good housewife Fortune fromher wheel, that her gifts may henceforth be bestowed equally.

ROSALIND; I would we could do so, for her benefits aremightily misplaced, and the bountiful blind womandoth most mistake in her gifts to women.

CELIA; 'Tis true; for those that she makes fair she scarcemakes honest, and those that she makes honest shemakes very ill-favouredly.

ROSALIND; Nay, now thou goest from Fortune's office toNature's: Fortune reigns in gifts of the world,not in the lineaments of Nature.

Enter TOUCHSTONE

CELIA; No? when Nature hath made a fair creature, may shenot by Fortune fall into the fire? Though Naturehath given us wit to flout at Fortune, hath notFortune sent in this fool to cut off the argument?

ROSALIND; Indeed, there is Fortune too hard for Nature, whenFortune makes Nature's natural the cutter-off ofNature's wit.

CELIA; Peradventure this is not Fortune's work neither, butNature's; who perceiveth our natural wits too dullto reason of such goddesses and hath sent thisnatural for our whetstone; for always the dulness ofthe fool is the whetstone of the wits. How now,wit! whither wander you?

TOUCHSTONE; Mistress, you must come away to your father.

CELIA; Were you made the messenger?

TOUCHSTONE; No, by mine honour, but I was bid to come for you.

ROSALIND; Where learned you that oath, fool?

TOUCHSTONE; Of a certain knight that swore by his honour theywere good pancakes and swore by his honour themustard was naught: now I'll stand to it, thepancakes were naught and the mustard was good, andyet was not the knight forsworn.

CELIA; How prove you that, in the great heap of yourknowledge?

ROSALIND; Ay, marry, now unmuzzle your wisdom.

TOUCHSTONE; Stand you both forth now: stroke your chins, andswear by your beards that I am a knave.

CELIA; By our beards, if we had them, thou art.

TOUCHSTONE; By my knavery, if I had it, then I were; but if youswear by that that is not, you are not forsworn: nomore was this knight swearing by his honour, for henever had any; or if he had, he had sworn it awaybefore ever he saw those pancakes or that mustard.

CELIA; Prithee, who is't that thou meanest?

TOUCHSTONE; One that old Frederick, your father, loves.

CELIA; My father's love is enough to honour him: enough!speak no more of him; you'll be whipped for taxationone of these days.

TOUCHSTONE; The more pity, that fools may not speak wisely whatwise men do foolishly.

CELIA; By my troth, thou sayest true; for since the littlewit that fools have was silenced, the little foolerythat wise men have makes a great show. Here comesMonsieur Le Beau.

ROSALIND; With his mouth full of news.

CELIA; Which he will put on us, as pigeons feed their young.

ROSALIND; Then shall we be news-crammed.

CELIA; All the better; we shall be the more marketable.

Enter LE BEAU

Bon jour, Monsieur Le Beau: what's the news?

LE BEAU; Fair princess, you have lost much good sport.

CELIA; Sport! of what colour?

LE BEAU; What colour, madam! how shall I answer you?

ROSALIND; As wit and fortune will.

TOUCHSTONE; Or as the Destinies decree.

CELIA; Well said: that was laid on with a trowel.