Finished: As You Like It (Shakespeare). Ahh, another fun Shakespeare play. :-) Another one I'd seen on the stage but not read yet. And, of course, another one where some of Shakespeare's most famous lines sneak up on  you and take you by surprise and make you smile as you read them! As You Like It is the pretty simple story of Orlando falling in love with Rosalind, and Rosalind with Orlando. Orlando, though, is despised by his own big brother, Oliver, and after defeating the Duke Usurper's royal wrestler and winning the heart of the Duke Usurper's niece, Rosalind, he is forced to run from his own estates or be killed by his brother. The Duke Usurper is himself a brother, and has banished his own older brother, the rightful Duke, to the forest and taken the crown for himself. He has a lovely daughter, Celia, who is like a sister to the banished Duke's daughter, Rosalind, so he has allowed Rosalind to stay. However, the Duke Usurper is growing impatient with the "people" loving Rosalind, and so he soon banishes Rosalind as well. Celia and Rosalind secretly plot that they will run away together into banishment with Rosalind disguised as a young man. Meanwhile...Orlando and his servant, Adam, are nearly starving to death in the forest when Orlando comes across the banished Duke. He begs for food, but mostly to take food back to Adam who he left near starvation in the forest while he hunted. Seeing his goodness and kindness, the Duke, who is himself in a hardship during his banishment, tells Orlando to of course take some food and then come back and join them. So, here's that conversation that sneaks up on you that the Duke then has with one of his attendants, Jaques:

Duke Senior:    Go find him out,
    And we will nothing waste till you return.
Orlando:    I thank ye, and be blest for your good comfort.           Exit.
Duke Senior:    Thou seest we are not all alone unhappy.
    This wide and universal theater
    Presents more woeful pageants than the scene
    Wherein we play in.
Jaques:     All the world's a stage,
    And all the men and women merely players.
    They have their exits and their entrances,
    And one man in his time plays many parts,
    His acts being seven ages. At first the infant,
    Mewling and puking in the nurse's arms.
    Then the whining schoolboy with his satchel
    And shining morning face, creeping like snail
    Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,
    Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad
    Made to his mistress' eyebrow. Then a soldier,
    Full of strange oaths and bearded like the pard,
    Jealous in honor, sudden and quick in quarrel,
    Seeking the bubble Reputation
    E'en in the cannon's mouth. And then the justice,
    In fair round belly with good capon lin'd,
    With eyes severe and beard of formal cut,
    Full of wise saws and modern instances;
    And so he plays his part. The sixt age shifts
    Into the lean and slipper'd pantaloon,
    With spectacles on nose and pouch on side;
    His youthful hose well sav'd, a world too wide
    For his shrunk shank, and his big manly voice,
    Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
    And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
    That ends this strange eventful history,
    Is second childishness and mere oblivion---
    Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.
    
Honestly, who can write like Shakespeare?? So, anyway...Rosalind dressed as a boy comes across the lovesick Orlando and sees how much he does, in fact, love her. A few other characters fall in love. The Duke Usurper sends Oliver out to find and kill his own brother because he thinks that Orlando was responsible for his daughter and niece disappearing. Orlando saves Oliver from a lion and the brothers make up. Oliver and Celia fall in love. A shepherd falls in love with a shepherdess who falls in love with "male" Rosalind. Finally, Rosalind reveals herself to her father and to Orlando, and the two lovers are married in a ceremony along with Oliver and Celia, the clown and his lady, and the shepherd and shepherdess. Of course, it's all far more witty with the comical disguising of Rosalind at play. Oh, and then conveniently at the end, a third brother to Oliver and Orlando comes to announce to the banished Duke that his own brother has spoken to a religious man and seen the light. He has given up the crown and is giving all his lands back to his brother while he goes on a religious sojourn. Jaques, the profound speaker of above, who spends the whole play being melancholy decides to go and serve that Duke. Finally, a story where everyone lives happily ever after and, amazingly, no one was poisoned, stabbed or killed themselves. :-)

Another line I liked was Rosalind's. She was listening to Celia tell her how much Orlando loved her, as she witnessed his declarations firsthand, but Rosalind kept interrupting Celia and asking her to tell her more quickly. Celia keep shushing Rosalind. Finally Rosalind said:

Do you not know I am a woman? When I think I must speak.

Hee hee, I like that! Well, we're off on our plane trip to New York tomorrow where I think I will start A Passage to India.