As You Like It As You Like It As You Like It is a pastoral comedy by William Shakespeare believed to have been written in 1599 and first published in the First Folio in 1623. The play's first performance is uncertain, though a performance at Wilton House in 1603 has been suggested as a possibility. "As You Like It" follows its heroine Rosalind as she flees persecution in her uncle's court, accompanied by her cousin Celia to find safety and, eventually, love, in the Forest of Arden. In the forest, they encounter a variety of memorable characters, notably the melancholy traveller Jaques who speaks
Enchanted forest being written, expanding geographical knowledge, and the decrease of woodland for farmland, meant the decrease of forests that could be presumed magical. In "A Midsummer Night's Dream", William Shakespeare wrote of a forest that was enchanted specifically by the presence of Oberon and Titania, the fairy king and queen; like many forests in Shakespeare's works, it becomes a place of metamorphosis and resolution. Others of his plays, such as "As You Like It", take place in a forest, which contains no enchantments but acts much as the forest of folklore. Often there will be Dragons, Dwarfs, Elves, Fairies, Giants, Gnomes,