Jaques (As You Like It) wealth and comfort to please the stubborn Duke and live an uncomfortable life in the Forest of Arden. Jaques leaves the Duke, as soon as he is restored to his sovereignty, to seek his brother, Duke Frederick, who has stepped down and turned hermit. Jaques (As You Like It) Jaques () is one of the main characters in Shakespeare's "As You Like It". The 'Melancholy Jaques', as he is known, is one of Duke Senior's noblemen who lives with him in the Forest of Arden (or Ardennes). The role has long been a favourite for famous Shakespearean actors. Jaques' distinguishing
As You Like It a boy, whereupon the rustic Phebe, also played by a boy, becomes infatuated with this "Ganymede", a name with homoerotic overtones. In fact, the epilogue, spoken by Rosalind to the audience, states rather explicitly that she (or at least the actor playing her) is not a woman. In several scenes, "Ganymede" impersonates Rosalind' so a boy actor would have been playing a girl disguised as a boy impersonating a girl. Arden is the name of a forest located close to Shakespeare's home town of Stratford-upon-Avon, but Shakespeare probably had in mind the French Arden Wood, featured in Orlando Innamorato, especially