Touchstone
As You Like It
Notes on Touchstone
Status of Women
Read the NoteCelia and Rosalind engage in an intellectual discourse on questions that might today be expressed as: “Is it better to be born talented or lucky?”, “Is it our genetic code or our environment that most shapes us?”, “Are women by nature or by misfortune disadvantaged in their status compared with men?” When Celia and Rosalind use the word natural, as in “Nature’s natural”
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Quotes spoken by the character Touchstone
How now, wit, whither wander you?
Read the QuoteCelia
How now, wit, whither wander you?
Touchstone
Mistress, you must come away to your father.
The more pity that fools may not speak
wisely what wise men do foolishly
Celia
Were you made the messenger?
Touchstone
No, by mine honor, but I was bid to come
for you.
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Bonjour, Monsieur Le Beau. What’s the news?
Read the QuoteCelia
Bonjour, Monsieur Le Beau. What’s the news?
La Beau
Fair princess, you have lost much good sport.
Celia
Sport? Of what color?
La Beau
What color, madam? How shall I answer you?
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Alas, poor shepherd, searching of thy wound
Read the QuoteRosalind
Alas, poor shepherd, searching of thy wound,
I have by hard adventure found mine own.
Touchstone
And I mine. I remember when I was in
love I broke my sword upon a stone and bid him
take that for coming a-night to Jane Smile; and I
remember the kissing of her batler, and the cow’s
dugs that her pretty chopped hands had milked;
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And how like you this shepherd’s life, Master Touchstone?
Read the QuoteCorin
And how like you this shepherd’s life, Master Touchstone?
Touchstone
Truly, shepherd, in respect of itself, it is a
good life; but in respect that it is a shepherd’s life, it
is naught. In respect that it is solitary, I like it very
well; but in respect that it is private, it is a very vile
life.
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Good ev’n, gentle friend. Cover thy head
Read the QuoteTouchstone
Good ev’n, gentle friend. Cover thy head,
cover thy head. Nay, prithee, be covered. How old
are you, friend?
William
Five-and-twenty, sir.
Touchstone
A ripe age. Is thy name William?
The fool doth think he is wise, but the
wise man knows himself to be a fool.
William
William,
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Tomorrow is the joyful day, Audrey
Read the QuoteTouchstone
Tomorrow is the joyful day, Audrey. Tomorrow
will we be married.
Audrey
I do desire it with all my heart, and I hope it is
no dishonest desire to desire to be a woman of the world.
It was a lover and his lass,
With a hey, and a ho, and a hey-nonny-no
Enter two Pages.
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There is sure another flood toward
Read the QuoteJaques
There is sure another flood toward, and these
couples are coming to the ark. Here comes a pair of
very strange beasts, which in all tongues are called fools.
Touchstone
Salutation and greeting to you all.
Jaques, to Duke
Good my lord, bid him welcome.
This is the motley-minded gentleman that I have so
often met in the forest.
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