If You Go Down in the Woods Today is a British TV film comedy released in 1981, written, directed and starring Eric Sykes, also featuring Fulton Mackay and Roy Kinnear amongst a cast of dozens. The film, produced by Thames TV, was described by Sykes as 'a comedy thriller, an Agatha Christie gone mad!'.

Plot
A Boy Scout troop led by their scoutmaster (Sykes) is on a field trip to a seemingly-peaceful English woodland. However, the woods are actually teeming with strange characters, some of whom turn out to be disguised police officers and others criminals. The police are searching for £2,000,000 in stolen banknotes and hope that the criminals will lead them to them. The criminals, on the other hand, are aware that the police are looking for them and doing their best to avoid betraying the location of their stash. It later transpires that the money is just a smokescreen for a top-secret document that the gang's leader - actually a KGB officer - is trying to smuggle out of the country. Despite an escalation of security in which the police are eventually joined by the army, navy and air force, it is the scoutmaster's chaotic bungling that leads him to discover the money and flush out the ringleader. At the end it is revealed that the scoutmaster was in fact an undercover police officer and that his bungling was a ruse.

External links

1981 television films
1981 films
1981 comedy films
Films directed by Eric Sykes
1980s English-language films
1980s British films
British comedy television films

If You Go Down in the Woods Today


Nahant Beach Boulevard, also Nahant Causeway and Nahant Road, is a historic road on the isthmus connecting Nahant, Massachusetts to the mainland at Lynn, Massachusetts, United States. The road runs from the Lynn Rotary, its junction with Lynn Shore Drive and the Lynnway, about  to Wilson Road in Nahant. It passes through Nahant Beach Reservation, a state park offering beach access on the isthmus. The road offers expansive views of the area coastlines and Boston Harbor. Both the park and the roadway are administered by the Massachusetts Department of Conservation and Recreation.

Nahant Beach Boulevard was first laid out in 1905, as part of the Metropolitan District Commission's program of developing oceanfront parkways, and provided the first paved road access to Nahant. It was designed by the firm of Olmsted, Olmsted, and Eliot, predecessor to the Olmsted Brothers landscape design firm. Around the same time, rail access and a bridle path were also added to the isthmus.

In 1936 that roadway alignment was converted into a parking area, and the present roadway was completed the following year on the alignment of the railroad bed. The Lynn Rotary was completed in 1935. This work, along with the conversion of the bridle path to a promenade, was paid for by Works Progress Administration grants. Since then modifications to the roadway have been modest. Seawalls have been built, a chain link fence was installed on the wall between the road and the parking lot, and the rotary was landscaped.

When the roadway was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2003, the designation included, in addition to the roadway itself, the Lynn Rotary and the Spanish–American War Memorial located in the rotary; a second memorial, the Aliferis Monument, postdates the period of significance for the listing.

See also
 National Register of Historic Places listings in Lynn, Massachusetts
 National Register of Historic Places listings in Essex County, Massachusetts

References

Roads on the National Register of Historic Places in Massachusetts
Parkways in Massachusetts
Transportation in Essex County, Massachusetts
National Register of Historic Places in Essex County, Massachusetts
Historic districts on the National Register of Historic Places in Massachusetts
Parks on the National Register of Historic Places in Massachusetts
National Register of Historic Places in Lynn, Massachusetts

Nahant Beach Boulevard


Captain 11 is an after-school children's program for over 41 years on KELO-TV, broadcast on channel 11 from Sioux Falls, South Dakota.  Station weatherman Dave Dedrick donned a yellow-trimmed blue pilot uniform with hat and daily (later weekly as cable TV began to cut into its ratings) became the jolly host of the show.  The show primarily played cartoons and other children's fare, and featured the Captain having all the kids (his "crew") introduce themselves on the air, guessing to win the toy chest, and children with birthdays working the Captain's control panel of lights and switches.  The show ended with the Captain playing the "freezeberg" game with the children, having them: Face the camera and wave one hand: then wave both hands: followed by wave both hands and one foot then wave both hands and both feet which usually resulted in most of the kids jumping up and down while facing the camera.  Finally, the Captain would tell them to "freeze", not moving a muscle as the camera panned over the crowd of kids attempting to remain still.

The Captain 11 charge
The show opened with an animated space scene, slowly zooming in to the Captain's space ship, with this charge voiced over:

"Captain 11! Today's man of the future!"

History
The show ran from March 7, 1955, to December 27, 1996, making it the longest continuously running children's television program in the United States.   Dedrick's autobiography reveals interesting background about the show, like why the character's trademark rubber headphones were eventually discarded after many seasons, and how the set designers could not agree on a single design and eventually had to work independently on their own sections.

Dave Dedrick retired from broadcasting on December 30, 1996.  He was inducted into the South Dakota Broadcasters Hall of Fame on April 18, 1997, and into the South Dakota Hall of Fame in 1999.  Dedrick died in Sioux Falls on January 22, 2010, at the age of 81.

The Captain 11 set and other memorabilia is displayed in the State Historical Museum in Pierre.

References

External links
Captain 11
Captain 11 Tribute at Keloland.com

Video Tribute to the Captain
The Unofficial Captain 11 Home Page

Local children's television programming in the United States
South Dakota television shows
1950s American children's television series
1960s American children's television series
1970s American children's television series
1980s American children's television series
1990s American children's television series
1955 American television series debuts
1996 American television series endings

Captain 11


The Plague of Justinian was a pandemic of the bubonic plague caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis. It happened during the years of 541 to 542 in the Byzantine Empire while under the rule of Justinian I. Historians estimate that this pandemic killed as many as 100 million people across the world, partly because it returned every twelve years until 770, when it stopped for about 500 years.

Between 541 and 700, the Plague of Justinian killed about half of the people in Europe. It also may have contributed to the success of the Muslim conquests. Its social and cultural impact is comparable to that of the Black Death.

Origin and impact
Through trade, the plague came from India to Ethiopia or Egypt. Eventually, trade ships brought the plague north to the large city of Constantinople. Ships bringing grain, which Constantinople imported, carried rats along with them. These rats carried the plague. By the end of the pandemic, the plague had killed 40% of Constantinople's population. At its worst, it killed 10,000 people in Constantinople every day.

Doctors at the time relied on religious and folk remedies which were not effective in treating the plague. This caused the plague to spread rapidly throughout Europe and the Mediterranean Basin. In total, about 25 million people died because of the Plague of Justinian. It is said to have contributed to the fall of the Byzantine Empire, because it killed farmers and caused famine. Also, the empire relied on tax money, and the plague killed many taxpayers.Overall, the Plague of Justinian was a sickness that happened around 1,500 years ago. It started in the city of Constantinople and spread to other parts of the world. Many people got sick and some even died. The disease was caused by bacteria and was spread by fleas on rats. It lasted for several years and caused a lot of damage to the Byzantine Empire by weakening its defenses, harming its economy, and killing large amounts of its population. Even though it was a long time ago, we can still learn from this event and take precautions to prevent the spread of diseases today.

References

Sources
 Edward Walford, translator, The Ecclesiastical History of Evagrius: A History of the Church from AD 431 to AD 594, 1846. Reprinted 2008. Evolution Publishing, .  —The author, Evagrius, was himself stricken by the plague as a child and lost several family members to it.
Procopius. History of the Wars, Books I and II (The Persian War). Trans. H. B. Dewing. Vol. 1. Cambridge: Loeb-Harvard UP, 1954.—Chapters XXII and XXIII of Book II (pages 451–473) are Procopius's famous description of the Plague of Justinian. This includes the famous 10,000 people dead a day in Constantinople statistic (page 465).
Little, Lester K., ed., Plague and the End of Antiquity: The Pandemic of 541–750, Cambridge, 2006. .
Rosen, William. Justinian's Flea: Plague, Empire, and the Birth of Europe, Viking Adult, 2007. .

Byzantine Empire
Ancient Rome
Plague pandemics
541
542
History of Europe

Plague of Justinian


Ratified on January 17, 1919 and went into effect a year later, the Eighteenth Amendment (Amendment XVIII) of the United States Constitution banned the making, transporting, and sale of alcoholic beverages in the United States. The Volstead Act was passed by Congress to enforce the Eighteenth Amendment. It did not prohibit the drinking of alcohol however. It started the period in American history called the Prohibition Era. This was a period of mass civil disobedience to the law. Those who could afford the higher prices of smuggled liquor went to illegal bars called speakeasies. Working class people tended to drink moonshine and so-called bathtub gin at home. The Eighteenth Amendment proved to be a major failure. Americans started drinking more than before and it caused crime to rise significantly. The Eighteenth Amendment was later repealed by the Twenty-first Amendment. It remains the only amendment to be repealed by another amendment to the Constitution.

Text

Clauses
The first clause, section one, says the law was to go into effect one year from its ratification. It was passed by Congress on December 18, 1917. The thirty-sixth state (required number for passage) to ratify the amendment did so 394 days later on January 16, 1919. The forty-seventh state to ratify the amendment was New Jersey on March 9, 1922. Rhode Island was the only state to reject ratification of the 18th Amendment.

The second clause gave the federal and state governments concurrent powers to enforce the amendment. Congress passed the national Prohibition Enforcement Act, also known as the Volstead Act. The act defined any beverage containing more than one-half of one percent an intoxicating beverage. It gave the Internal Revenue Service the power to enforce the law.

The third clause gave seven years as the time period for the states to ratify the amendment. This is the first amendment to have a limit on the time in which it was to be ratified. If it was not ratified by the required number of states in that time period, the amendment would not go into effect. Article Five of the United States Constitution requires an amendment be passed by three-quarters of the states. (36 out of the 48 states at that time.)

Background
During the 1820s intense religious and social movements spread across the country calling alcohol and drunkenness a "national curse." They were called temperance movements. The first state to have a temperance law was Massachusetts who in 1838 enacted a law prohibiting the sale of liquor in less than  quantities. In 1846, Maine passed the first state prohibition law. It was repealed two years later, still, other states also passed similar laws.

After the American Civil War, immigrants, mainly from Ireland, Germany, Italy and other parts of Europe, crowded major cities by the millions. Many of these men worked hard and drank just as hard. Beer became a favorite drink and many German-Americans who knew how to brew beer began producing it in large quantities. By the 1870s, many wives and mothers who were completely dependant on their men, began to protest having their lives ruined by alcohol. They were joined by a number of clergymen. They organized as the Woman's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) and became a powerful force for change. They were joined by women such as Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton. prominent in the suffrage movement (women's right to vote). The temperance movement was able to put political pressure on politicians that many were afraid of. The WCTU began calling for a nation-wide ban on alcoholic drink. At first, most Senators were against the idea. But they also did not want to be seen as voting against it. For this reason they imposed a deadline for ratification of seven years. Many hoped it would not be ratified. But the plan did not work since it was ratified just over a year after its passage.

Results of prohibition
Gustav Boess, Mayor of Berlin visited New York City in late 1929. He asked the Mayor of New York City, Jimmy Walker, when prohibition was supposed to go into effect. At that time, prohibition had already been the law of the land for over nine years. That the German mayor even had to ask shows how well the Eighteenth Amendment had been working. In fact, it was not working very well at all.

Economics
Those who supported prohibition expected the sales of household goods and clothing to go up dramatically. Many expected real estate and rents to rise as bars closed and neighborhoods were cleaned up. Many producers of soft drinks, juices and chewing gum expected sales to go up as Americans had to find new ways of entertaining themselves. None of this happened. Instead, the unintended consequences proved to be a decline in amusement and entertainment industries across the country. Restaurants failed, as they could no longer make a profit without legal liquor sales. Theater revenues declined rather than increase, and few of the other economic benefits that had been predicted came to pass. Prohibition proved to be largely negative for the economy. Jobs in breweries, distilleries and bars were lost by the thousands. Truckers, waiters, barrel makers and many other related workers had large numbers of jobs lost. Perhaps the largest unintended consequence was the loss to the government in tax revenues. The state of New York lost almost 75 percent of its revenue. The federal government lost over $11 million in tax revenues while the cost to enforce it was over $300 million.

Loopholes
The prohibition laws had many loopholes (ways to get around the law) that were quickly taken advantage of. The biggest loophole was that neither the Eighteenth Amendment nor the Volstead Act made it illegal to drink or be drunk in public. Farmers who grew fruit quickly learned to sell their harvests in dehydrated bricks. The warning label included instructions on how to easily turn the bricks into alcoholic drinks. Pharmacists were allowed to prescribe whiskey for any number of ailments from anxiety to the flu. As bootleggers learned of this, the number of pharmacies tripled in places like New York state. Tools and ingredients to make alcohol at home were sold in hardware and grocery stores. Books on how to make liquor were also legal.

Crime
Drinking under prohibition did not stop, it simply went underground. In New York City alone there were thousands of speakeasy clubs. The mob made millions in illegal sales of alcohol on the black market. Most Americans simply ignored the law. The agents who enforced prohibition laws were poorly paid and were easily bribed. Gangsters made money and became powerful under prohibition. They even cooperated with one another in setting prices. Organized crime gained a national foothold due to prohibition.  One of the better known gangsters was Al Capone. When Capone arrived in Chicago in 1920 he immediately saw the opportunities that prohibition offered. He organized illegal bootlegging on an international scale. He even controlled the distribution of his alcohol. He hired his own delivery trucks, salespeople, and his own heavily armed guards to protect his investments. Capone was making over $100 million a year. He had no trouble bribing all the politicians and law enforcement members in his district.

Notes

References

Other websites
 Effects of the 18th Amendment
 Significance of the 18th and 19th amendments

18

Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution


Bjørg Krane Bostad (born 1948) is a Norwegian feminist, civic leader, civil servant, businesswoman and humanitarian.

She served as president of the Norwegian Association for Women's Rights from 1992 to 1994. From 1990 to 1995 she served as a member of the Committee for Human Rights, a governmental committee appointed by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.  She was also a board member of Amnesty International in Norway from 1986 to 1990. From 1980 she worked as a civil servant at the Norwegian Consumer Ombudsman where she was responsible for discriminatory advertisement. She later became the parliamentary secretary of the Standing Committee on Family and Cultural Affairs in the Parliament of Norway. Bostad moved to South Africa in 2000, where she owns a company specializing in safari tours in Namibia, Botswana, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Tanzania, Kenya and South Africa. She is also involved in humanitarian work in Africa, and serves as a director of the Qokiso Orphans Project.

Bostad studied political science at the University of Oslo, and graduated with a cand.mag. degree.

References

Norwegian feminists
Norwegian civil servants
Norwegian women's rights activists
1948 births
Living people
University of Oslo alumni
Place of birth missing (living people)
Norwegian expatriates in South Africa

Bjørg Krane Bostad


Avenue Q is a musical comedy that has puppets and human actors with music and lyrics by Robert Lopez and Jeff Marx and book by Jeff Whitty. The show won Best Musical, Book, and Score at the 2004 Tony Awards. The show has themes of racism, homosexuality, and internet pornography.

The musical premiered Off-Broadway in 2003. In July of that same year the show moved to the John Golden Theatre on Broadway, where it ran until 2009, playing for over 2,500 performances.

References

Tony Award winning musicals

Avenue Q


Stuart Mudd (September 23, 1893, St. Louis, Missouri – March 6, 1975, Haverford, Pennsylvania) was an American physician and professor of microbiology. In 1945 he was the president of the American Society for Microbiology.

Biography
His father was the surgeon Harvey Gilmer Mudd (1857–1933). Stuart Mudd graduated in 1916 with a B.S. in biology from Princeton University and in 1918 with an A.M. from Washington University in St. Louis. At Harvard Medical School he graduated with an M.D. in  1920 and held a research fellowship in biophysics from 1920 to 1923. He was from 1923 to 1925 an associate at the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research. At the University of Pennsylvania (UPenn), he was from 1925 to 1931 an associate in pathology at UPenn's Henry Phipps Institute, as well as an associate and assistant professor of experimental pathology at the University of Pennsylvania Medical School (UPenn Medical School, now named the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania). In the microbiology department of the UPenn Medical School, he was an associate professor from 1931 to 1934 and a full professor from 1934 to 1959, when he retired as professor emeritus. From 1931 to 1959 he was the head of the department of microbiology. At the Veterans Administration Hospital in Philadelphia, he was from 1959 to 1975 the chief of the microbiological research program.

Mudd did research on a wide variety of topics, including phagocytosis, hemolytic streptococci, bacterial filtration, and electron microscopy of bacteria. During WW II, he worked on a method for freeze-drying of blood plasma, promoting an effective treatment for blood loss in wounded soldiers. He was the author or co-author of more than 275 scientific publications.

In 1952 he was the president of the Histochemical Society. From 1958 to 1962 he was the president of the International Association of Microbiological Societies. He was a founder and vice-president of the World Academy of Art and Science

In 1925 he was elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. In 1944 his name was engraved on the Guggenheim Honor Cup of the Penn Club of New York. From 1976 to 1995 the Eastern Pennsylvania Branch of the American Society of Microbiology sponsored an annual Stuart Mudd Memorial Lecture.

In 1922 he married Emily Borie Hartshorne, who became in 1956 the first woman appointed to a full professorship at the UPenn Medical School. Upon his death in 1975, he was survived by his widow, two sons, two daughters, and six grandchildren.

Stuart Mudd, M.D. (1893–1975) should not be confused with his son, Stuart Harvey Mudd, M.D. (1927–2014), who was called S. Harvey Mudd and was noteworthy for his research on metabolic disorders.

Selected publications

Articles

Books

References

1893 births
1975 deaths
20th-century American physicians
American microbiologists
Princeton University alumni
Washington University in St. Louis alumni
Harvard Medical School alumni
Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania faculty
Fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science

Stuart Mudd


The Union of Aragon (Castilian: Unión de Aragón) or "Union of the Nobles" was an anti-royalist movement among the nobility and the townsmen of the lands of the Crown of Aragon during the last quarter of the thirteenth century. Its efforts culminated in a series of articles confirming the privileges of the aristocracy and the cities and circumscribing the power of the monarchy known as the Magna Carta of Aragon.

The Union had its origin in the nature of the Crown of Aragon, incorporating various kingdoms at various times. The various lands vied for the attention of the monarch and struggled to protect their privileges and their influence against the rise of any other. At the same time, King Peter III was conquering Sicily and his Spanish dominions were neglected.

Eventually, Pope Martin IV called a crusade, the Aragonese Crusade, against Peter and his kingdom, dissolving his subjects of their oaths of fealty. Peter had to exact heavy taxes in order to finance resistance to the "crusade" against him. The nobles of the kingdom, believing they should have been consulted before any campaign to Sicily, formed the Union.

In 1283, the nobles and burghers of Aragon held a court (cortes) in Zaragoza at which they swore to uphold each other's rights. Within three months, the Courts of Catalonia swore a similar oath at Tarragona. At both, Peter III had to recognise the ancient customs and fueros of the people and vow to summon the cortes annually. This was known as the General Privilege (Privilegio general).

In December 1286, the Union met at Zaragoza and then in January 1287 at Teruel. After brief talks with Alfonso III in May 1287, the Union invaded Valencia and fought some battles with the king's supporters until a Dominican prior from Zaragoza, Valero, organised a meeting in Zaragoza for 20 December. The Union forced many royal concessions from the weak Alfonso, who granted them the Privilege of the Union (Privilegio de la unión). The Privilege named the Union as the "true guardian of Aragonese law" in the Crown's territories. The Privilege devolved many royal functions to the lesser nobility and the Crown of Aragon nearly fell into anarchy, especially during the reign of Peter IV. Dante Alighieri placed Alfonso in his Purgatorio, outside the gates, for his part in fostering the chaos of Europe at the time. Alfonso himself, however, was not pleased, saying "en Aragón había tantos reyes como ricoshombres."

The Privilege ordained that the king could not proceed against any nobleman without the prior permission of the Justicia acting on the approval of the cortes. This last was to be summoned annually (in November) to the city of Zaragoza. If the king ever broke his terms of the Privilege, he need not be obeyed and no act against him was to be considered treason. Thus, the king could be deposed by the nobles in extreme circumstances. By January 1288, the Union was appointing the king's councillors.

James II refused to recognise the Privileges and, by the Act of Union, made permanent the Crown of Aragon and the union of Aragon, Valencia, and Catalonia under one crown. The Aragonese union was imitated by a Union of Valencia.

Notes

Sources

13th century in Aragon
Medieval Catalonia

Union of Aragon


Dame Adelaide Mary Anderson, DBE (8 April 1863 – 28 August 1936) was a British civil servant and labour activist, particularly interested in child labour and conditions in China. She served as HM Principal Lady Inspector of Factories from 1897 to 1921.

Early life and education
Anderson was born in Melbourne, Australia to a Scottish family, but was raised in London. Her mother was Blanche Emily Anderson (née Campbell), her uncle was Francis Eastwood Campbell, and her grandfather was James Campbell. Both her uncle and grandfather were public servants in New Zealand. Her father was Alexander Gavin Anderson (died 1892). Her parents were married at St Michael's Church in Christchurch, New Zealand in 1861. She was educated at Queen's College in Harley Street and at Girton College, Cambridge, where she studied for the Moral Sciences Tripos and graduated in 1887.

Career
She was a lecturer for the Women's Co-operative Guild and was offering private tuition when, in 1892, she joined the staff of the Royal Commission on Labour as a clerk. This subsequently led to her appointment in 1894 as one of the first women factory inspectors in the Home Office. She was appointed Her Majesty's Principal Lady Inspector of Factories in 1897, dealing with issues of health and safety, working hours and conditions. On her retirement she was appointed Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE), having been appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in 1918.

China
After her retirement from the Home Office, she visited China three times. In 1923–1924 she became a member of the Commission on Child Labour under the auspices of the Municipal Council of the International Settlement of Shanghai. In 1926 she was a member of the Advisory Committee on the China Indemnity of the Foreign Office.

In 1931 she served on a mission for the International Labour Office to Nanking, regarding a factory inspectorate for China. She was also a member of the Universities China Committee in London from 1932 to 1936.

Other travels
In 1930 she also visited Egypt to enquire into conditions of child labour. In addition, she travelled to South Africa, Australia and New Zealand. Anderson wrote and lectured widely until her death in 1936, aged 73.

Publications
 Women in the Factory: An Administrative Adventure, 1893–1921 (1922)
 Humanity and Labour in China: An Industrial Visit and its Sequel, 1923–1926 (1928)

Archives
Anderson's papers are held by the Women's Library at the library of the London School of Economics, ref  7AMA

References

Sources
Biography, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography

External links

Biodata

1863 births
1936 deaths
Alumni of Girton College, Cambridge
English activists
English women activists
Civil servants in the Home Office
Dames Commander of the Order of the British Empire
Civil servants from London
Public servants from Melbourne
People educated at Queen's College, London
Australian emigrants to England
Australian people of Scottish descent
English people of Scottish descent
Co-operative Women's Guild
Colony of Victoria people

Adelaide Anderson


The Great Britain men's national under-18 ice hockey team is the men's national under-18 ice hockey team of Great Britain. The team is controlled by Ice Hockey UK, a member of the International Ice Hockey Federation. The team represents Great Britain at the IIHF World U18 Championships.

International competitions

IIHF World U18 Championships

External links
Great Britain at IIHF.com

I
National under-18 ice hockey teams


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 (the house having been a focus for literary activity under Mary Sidney for much of the later C16th) 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 many of Shakespeare's most famous speeches (such as "All the world's a stage", "too much of a good thing" and "A fool! A fool! I met a fool in the forest").

Jaques provides a sharp contrast to the other characters in the play, always observing and disputing the hardships of life in the country.

Historically, critical response has varied, with some critics finding the play a work of great merit and some finding it to be of lesser quality than other Shakespearean works.

The play has been adapted for radio, film, and musical theatre.

Characters

Main characters:

Court of Duke Frederick:
 Duke Frederick, Duke Senior's younger brother and his usurper, also Celia's father
 Rosalind, Duke Senior's daughter
 Celia, Duke Frederick's daughter and Rosalind's cousin
 Touchstone, a court fool or jester
 Le Beau, a courtier
 Charles, a wrestler
 Lords and ladies in Duke Frederick's court

Household of Sir Rowland de Boys:
 Sir Rowland de Boys (while recently deceased in the world of the play, this character is developed and frequently referred to; A possible 'real world' identity for this character, Sir Rowland Hill, has been conjectured)
 Oliver de Boys, the eldest son and heir
 Jacques de Boys, the second son, announces Frederick's change of heart
 Orlando de Boys, the youngest son
 Adam, a faithful old servant who follows Orlando into exile
 Dennis, the servant who announces Charles's arrival in Oliver's orchard

Exiled court of Duke Senior in the Forest of Arden:
 Duke Senior, Duke Frederick's older brother and Rosalind's father
 Jaques, a discontented, melancholic lord
 Amiens, an attending lord and musician
 Lords in Duke Senior's forest court

Country folk in the Forest of Arden:
 Phebe, a proud shepherdess
 Silvius, a shepherd
 Audrey, a country girl
 Corin, an elderly shepherd
 William, a country man
 Sir Oliver Martext, a curate

Other characters:
 Hymen, officiates over the weddings in the end; god of marriage, as appearing in a masque
 Pages and musicians

Locations
The play is set in a duchy in France, beginning in a courtly environment; but most of the action takes place in a location called the 'Forest of Arden'.

This location is conjuring more than one place and identity. Firstly, in an Early Modern English mind the Forest of Arden roughly corresponds to the West Midlands to modern ears. It represents an area including Warwickshire and parts of Shropshire, Staffordshire and Worcestershire.

The Arden area is effectively bounded by Roman roads as follows: in the West by the Icknield Street, in the South by the Salt Road (the modern Alcester to Stratford Road), in the East by the Fosse Way, and in the North by the Watling Street. It includes Arden, Warwickshire, near Shakespeare's home town, which was the ancestral origin of his mother's family—whose surname was Arden.  That area was once heavily wooded, giving rise to the name.

Secondly the name evokes the Ardennes, a forested region covering an area located in southeast Belgium, western Luxembourg and northeastern France.

Synopsis

Frederick has usurped the duchy and exiled his older brother, Duke Senior. Duke Senior's daughter, Rosalind, has been permitted to remain at court because she is the closest friend of Frederick's only child, Celia. Orlando, a young gentleman of the kingdom who at first sight has fallen in love with Rosalind, is forced to flee his home after being persecuted by his older brother, Oliver. Frederick becomes angry and banishes Rosalind from court. Celia and Rosalind decide to flee together accompanied by the court fool, Touchstone, with Rosalind disguised as a young man and Celia disguised as a poor lady.

Rosalind, now disguised as Ganymede ("Jove's own page"), and Celia, now disguised as Aliena (Latin for "stranger"), arrive in the Arcadian Forest of Arden, where the exiled Duke now lives with some supporters, including "the melancholy Jaques", a malcontent figure, who is introduced weeping over the slaughter of a deer. "Ganymede" and "Aliena" do not immediately encounter the Duke and his companions. Instead, they meet Corin, an impoverished tenant, and offer to buy his master's crude cottage.

Orlando and his servant Adam, meanwhile, find the Duke and his men and are soon living with them and posting simplistic love poems for Rosalind on the trees. It has been said that the role of Adam was played by Shakespeare, though this story is also said to be without foundation. Rosalind, also in love with Orlando, meets him as Ganymede and pretends to counsel him to cure him of being in love. Ganymede says that "he" will take Rosalind's place and that "he" and Orlando can act out their relationship.

The shepherdess, Phebe, with whom Silvius is in love, has fallen in love with Ganymede (Rosalind in disguise), though "Ganymede" continually shows that "he" is not interested in Phebe. Touchstone, meanwhile, has fallen in love with the dull-witted shepherdess Audrey, and tries to woo her, but eventually is forced to be married first. William, another shepherd, attempts to marry Audrey as well, but is stopped by Touchstone, who threatens to kill him "a hundred and fifty ways".

Finally, Silvius, Phebe, Ganymede, and Orlando are brought together in an argument with each other over who will get whom. Ganymede says he will solve the problem, having Orlando promise to marry Rosalind, and Phebe promise to marry Silvius if she cannot marry Ganymede.

Orlando sees Oliver in the forest and rescues him from a lioness, causing Oliver to repent for mistreating Orlando. Oliver meets Aliena (Celia's false identity) and falls in love with her, and they agree to marry. Orlando and Rosalind, Oliver and Celia, Silvius and Phebe, and Touchstone and Audrey are all married in the final scene, after which they discover that Frederick has also repented his faults, deciding to restore his legitimate brother to the dukedom and adopt a religious life. Jaques, ever melancholic, declines their invitation to return to the court, preferring to stay in the forest and to adopt a religious life as well. Finally Rosalind speaks an epilogue, commending the play to both men and women in the audience.

Date and text
The direct and immediate source of As You Like It is Thomas Lodge's Rosalynde, Euphues Golden Legacie, written 1586–87 and first published in 1590. Lodge's story is based upon "The Tale of Gamelyn".

As You Like It was first printed in the collected edition of Shakespeare's plays, known as the First Folio, during 1623. No copy of it in Quarto exists, for the play is mentioned by the printers of the First Folio among those which "are not formerly entered to other men". By means of evidences, external and internal, the date of composition of the play has been approximately fixed at a period between the end of 1598 and the middle of 1599.

A local tradition holds that the play may have been written in the Kenilworth area, at Rowington.

External evidence

As You Like It was entered into the Register of the Stationers' Company on 4 August 1600 as a work which was "to be stayed", i.e., not published till the Stationers' Company were satisfied that the publisher in whose name the work was entered was the undisputed owner of the copyright. Thomas Morley's First Book of Ayres, published in London in 1600 contains a musical setting for the song "It was a lover and his lass" from As You Like It. This evidence implies that the play was in existence in some shape or other before 1600.

It seems likely this play was written after 1598, since Francis Meres did not mention it in his Palladis Tamia. Although twelve plays are listed in Palladis Tamia, it was an incomplete inventory of Shakespeare's plays to that date (1598). The new Globe Theatre opened some time in the summer of 1599, and tradition has it that the new playhouse's motto was Totus mundus agit histrionem—"all the Globe's a stage"—an echo of Jaques' famous line "All the world's a stage" (II.7). This evidence posits September 1598 to September 1599 as the time frame within which the play was likely written.

Internal evidence
In act III, vi, Phebe refers to the famous line "Whoever loved that loved not at first sight" taken from Marlowe's Hero and Leander, which was published in 1598. This line, however, dates from 1593 when Marlowe was killed, and the poem was likely circulated in unfinished form before being completed by George Chapman. It is suggested in Michael Wood's In Search of Shakespeare that the words of Touchstone, "When a man's verses cannot be understood, nor a man's good wit seconded with the forward child understanding, it strikes a man more dead than a great reckoning in a little room", allude to Marlowe's assassination. According to the inquest into his death, Marlowe had been killed in a brawl following an argument over the "reckoning" of a bill in a room in a house in Deptford, owned by the widow Eleanor Bull in 1593. The 1598 posthumous publication of Hero and Leander would have revived interest in his work and the circumstances of his death. These words in act IV, i, in Rosalind's speech, "I will weep for nothing, like Diana in the fountain", may refer to an alabaster image of Diana which was set up in Cheapside in 1598. However, it should be remembered Diana is mentioned by Shakespeare in at least ten other plays, and is often depicted in myth and art as at her bath. Diana was a literary epithet for Queen Elizabeth I during her reign, along with Cynthia, Phoebe, Astraea, and the Virgin Mary. Certain anachronisms exist as well, such as the minor character Sir Oliver Martext's possible reference to the Marprelate Controversy which transpired between 1588 and 1589. On the basis of these references, it seems that As You Like It may have been composed in 1599–1600, but it remains impossible to say with any certainty.

Analysis and criticism

Though the play is consistently one of Shakespeare's most frequently performed comedies, scholars have long disputed over its merits. George Bernard Shaw complained that As You Like It is lacking in the high artistry of which Shakespeare was capable. Shaw liked to think that Shakespeare wrote the play as a mere crowdpleaser, and signalled his own middling opinion of the work by calling it As You Like It—as if the playwright did not agree. Tolstoy objected to the immorality of the characters and Touchstone's constant clowning. Other critics have found great literary value in the work. Harold Bloom has written that Rosalind is among Shakespeare's greatest and most fully realised female characters.

The elaborate gender reversals in the story are of particular interest to modern critics interested in gender studies. Through four acts of the play, Rosalind, who in Shakespeare's day would have been played by a boy, finds it necessary to disguise herself as 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.

Setting

Arden is the name of a large forest which conceptually incorporated Shakespeare's home town of Stratford-upon-Avon and a large area besides currently roughly corresponding to the modern West Midlands.

Shakespeare likely also had in mind the French Arden Wood, featured in Orlando Innamorato, especially since the two Orlando epics, Orlando Innamorato and Orlando Furioso, have other connections with the play.

In the Orlando mythos, Arden Wood is the location of Merlin's Fountain, a magic fountain causing anyone who drinks from it to fall out of love. Many editions keep Shakespeare's "Arden" spelling, partly because that the pastoral mode depicts a fantastical world in which geographical details are irrelevant, and also because Shakespeare wrote in a time of non-standardised spelling.

The Oxford Shakespeare edition proceeds on the basis that there is confusion between the two Ardens, and assums that "Arden" is an anglicisation of the forested Ardennes region of France, where Lodge set his tale, and alters the spelling to reflect this.

The Arden edition of Shakespeare makes the suggestion that the name "Arden" comes from a combination of the classical region of Arcadia and the biblical garden of Eden, as there is a strong interplay of classical and Christian belief systems and philosophies within the play. Arden was also the maiden name of Shakespeare's mother and her family home is located within the Forest of Arden.

Themes

Court life and country life

The play begins in a courtly setting, where fighting, usurpation, betrayal and general disharmony are exhibited.

Most of the play is then a celebration of life in the country, where after intensifying disorder, harmony is recovered.

The inhabitants of Duke Frederick's court suffer the perils of arbitrary injustice and even threats of death; the courtiers who followed the old duke into forced exile in the "desert city" of the forest are, by contrast, experiencing liberty but at the expense of some easily borne discomfort. (Act II, i). A passage between Touchstone, the court jester, and shepherd Corin establishes the contentment to be found in country life, compared with the perfumed, mannered life at court. (Act III, I). At the end of the play the usurping duke and the exiled courtier Jaques both elect to remain within the forest.

Usurpation and injustice are significant themes of this play. The new Duke Frederick usurps his older brother Duke Senior, while Oliver parallels this behavior by treating his younger brother Orlando so ungenerously as to compel him to seek his fortune elsewhere. Both Duke Senior and Orlando take refuge in the forest, where justice is restored "through nature".

The ultimate recovery of harmony is marked with four weddings and a dance of harmony for eight presided over by Hymen, before most of the exiled court are able to return to the court and their previous stations are recovered.

Love
Love is the central theme of As You Like It, like other romantic comedies of Shakespeare. Following the tradition of a romantic comedy, As You Like It is a tale of love manifested in its varied forms. In many of the love-stories, it is love at first sight. This principle of "love at first sight" is seen in the love-stories of Rosalind and Orlando, Celia and Oliver, as well as Phebe and Ganymede. The love-story of Audrey and Touchstone is a parody of romantic love. Another form of love is between women, as in Rosalind and Celia's deep bond.

Forgiveness
The play highlights the theme of usurpation and injustice on the property of others. However, it ends happily with reconciliation and forgiveness. Duke Frederick is converted by a hermit and he restores the dukedom to Duke Senior who, in his turn, restores the forest to the deer. Oliver also undergoes a change of heart and learns to love Orlando. Thus, the play ends on a note of rejoicing and merry-making.

Envy
In this play, the universal globe, inhabited by ordinary mortals, is shown at the end as the audience liked it: happy and reconciled by love. However, the text can be seen as a pretext. "This wide and universal theatre present more woeful pageants" (II, vii, 137–138). The comedy in fact establishes a respite from the so-called War Stage. "Are not these woods more free from peril than the envious court?" (II, i, 3–4).

From Oliver's description (IV, iii, 98–120), a golden green snake is instead seen by Orlando threateningly approaching the open mouth of "a wretched ragged man", tightening around his neck, "but suddenly seeing Orlando, it unlinked itself and with glides did slip away into a bush" (IV, iii, 106, 110–113). It can be deduced that with the appearance of the actor on stage, envy suddenly disappears. He who had fought like a Hercules, a hero not by chance invoked by Rosalind ("Now Hercules be thy speed", I, ii, 204–210), just before the challenge with "Charles, the wrestler", in allusion to the figure of the insign of Globe Theatre, which accompanied the presumed inscription: "Totus Mundus Agit Histrionem".

Gender
Gender poses as one of the play's integral themes. While disguised as Ganymede, Rosalind also presents a calculated perception of affection that is "disruptive of [the] social norms" and "independent of conventional gender signs" that dictate women's behavior as irrational. In her book As She Likes It: Shakespeare's Unruly Women, Penny Gay analyzes Rosalind's character in the framework of these gender conventions that ascribe femininity with qualities such as "graciousness, warmth ... [and] tenderness". However, Rosalind's demanding tone in her expression of emotions towards Orlando contradicts these conventions. Her disobedience to these features of femininity proves a "deconstruction of gender roles", since Rosalind believes that "the wiser [the woman is], the waywarder" she is. By claiming that women who are wild are smarter than those who are not, Rosalind refutes the perception of women as passive in their pursuit of men

Religious allegory

University of Wisconsin professor Richard Knowles, the editor of the 1977 New Variorum edition of this play, in his article "Myth and Type in As You Like It", pointed out that the play contains mythological references in particular to Eden and to Hercules.

Music and songs
As You Like It is known as a musical comedy because of the number of songs in the play. There are more songs in it than in any other play of Shakespeare. These songs and music are incorporated in the action that takes place in the forest of Arden, as shown below:
 "Under the Greenwood tree": It summarises the views of Duke Senior on the advantages of country life over the amenities of the court. Amiens sings this song.
 "Blow, blow, thou winter wind": This song is sung by Amiens. It states that physical suffering caused by frost and winter winds is preferable to the inner suffering caused by man's ingratitude.
 "What shall he have that killed the deer": It is another song which adds a lively spectacle and some forest-colouring to contrast with love-talk in the adjoining scenes. it highlights the pastoral atmosphere.
 "It was a lover and his lass": It serves as a prelude to the wedding ceremony. It praises spring time and is intended to announce the rebirth of nature and the theme of moral regeneration in human life. Thomas Morley is known to have set the lyrics of this song to music in the form of a lute song.

Language

Use of prose
Shakespeare uses prose for about 55% of the text, with the remainder in verse. Shaw affirms that as used here the prose, "brief [and] sure", drives the meaning and is part of the play's appeal, whereas some of its verse he regards only as ornament. The dramatic convention of the time required the courtly characters to use verse, and the country characters prose, but in As You Like It this convention is deliberately overturned. For example, Rosalind, although the daughter of a Duke and thinking and behaving in high poetic style, actually speaks in prose as this is the "natural and suitable" way of expressing the directness of her character, and the love scenes between Rosalind and Orlando are in prose (III, ii, 277). In a deliberate contrast, Silvius describes his love for Phebe in verse (II, iv, 20). As a mood of a character changes, he or she may change from one form of expression to the other in mid-scene. In a metafictional touch, Jaques cuts off a prose dialogue with Rosalind because Orlando enters, using verse: "Nay then, God be wi' you, an you talk in blank verse" (IV, i, 29). The defiance of convention is continued when the epilogue is given in prose.

All the world's a stage

Act II, Scene VII, Line 139, features one of Shakespeare's most famous monologues, spoken by Jaques, which begins:
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
The arresting imagery and figures of speech in the monologue develop the central metaphor: a person's lifespan is a play in seven acts. These acts, or "seven ages", begin with "the infant/Mewling and puking in the nurse's arms" and work through six further vivid verbal sketches, culminating in "second childishness and mere oblivion,/Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything".

Pastoral mode

The main theme of pastoral comedy is love in all its guises in a rustic setting, the genuine love embodied by Rosalind contrasted with the sentimentalised affectations of Orlando, and the improbable happenings that set the urban courtiers wandering to find exile, solace or freedom in a woodland setting are no more unrealistic than the string of chance encounters in the forest which provoke witty banter and which require no subtleties of plotting and character development. The main action of the first act is no more than a wrestling match, and the action throughout is often interrupted by a song. At the end, Hymen himself arrives to bless the wedding festivities.

William Shakespeare's play As You Like It clearly falls into the Pastoral Romance genre; but Shakespeare does not merely use the genre, he develops it. Shakespeare also used the Pastoral genre in As You Like It to 'cast a critical eye on social practices that produce injustice and unhappiness, and to make fun of anti-social, foolish and self-destructive behaviour', most obviously through the theme of love, culminating in a rejection of the notion of the traditional Petrarchan lovers.

The stock characters in conventional situations were familiar material for Shakespeare and his audience; it is the light repartee and the breadth of the subjects that provide opportunities for wit that put a fresh stamp on the proceedings. At the centre the optimism of Rosalind is contrasted with the misogynistic melancholy of Jaques. Shakespeare would take up some of the themes more seriously later: the usurper Duke and the Duke in exile provide themes for Measure for Measure and The Tempest.

The play, turning upon chance encounters in the forest and several entangled love affairs in a serene pastoral setting, has been found, by many directors, to be especially effective staged outdoors in a park or similar site.

Performance history

There is no certain record of any performance before the Restoration. Evidence suggests that the premiere may have taken place at Richmond Palace on 20 Feb 1599, enacted by the Lord Chamberlain's Men.

Another performance may possibly have taken place at Wilton House in Wiltshire, the country seat of the Earls of Pembroke, where Mary Sidney is understood to have been running a kind of literary salon, her son  William Herbert, 3rd Earl of Pembroke hosted James I and his Court at Wilton House from October to December 1603, while Jacobean London was suffering an epidemic of bubonic plague. The King's Men were paid £30 to come to Wilton House and perform for the King and Court on 2 December 1603. A Herbert family tradition holds that the play acted that night was As You Like It.

During the English Restoration, the King's Company was assigned the play by royal warrant in 1669. It is known to have been acted at Drury Lane in 1723, in an adapted form called Love in a Forest; Colley Cibber played Jaques. Another Drury Lane production seventeen years later returned to the Shakespearean text (1740).

Notable recent productions of As You Like It include the following examples:

 The 1936 Old Vic Theatre production starring Edith Evans and the 1961 Shakespeare Memorial Theatre production starring Vanessa Redgrave.
 The longest-running Broadway production starred Katharine Hepburn as Rosalind, Cloris Leachman as Celia, William Prince as Orlando, and Ernest Thesiger as Jaques, and was directed by Michael Benthall. It ran for 145 performances in 1950.
 Another notable production was at the 2005 Stratford Festival in Stratford, Ontario, which was set in the 1960s and featured Shakespeare's lyrics set to music written by Barenaked Ladies.
 In 2014, theatre critic Michael Billington said his favourite production of the play was Cheek by Jowl's 1991 production, directed by Declan Donnellan.
 In 2023 a company which cast Rose Ayling-Ellis, who has a hearing impairment, as Celia performed the play at @sohoplace.  This was the subject of a documentary on experiences of living with hearing impairment.
 Shakespeare's Globe staged the play in 2023, in an adaptionthat was noted for its LBGT/queer presentation of the play.

Adaptations

Music

Thomas Morley () composed music for "It was a lover and his lass"; he lived in the same parish as Shakespeare, and at times composed music for Shakespeare's plays.

Roger Quilter set "Blow, Blow, Thou Winter Wind" for voice and piano (1905) in his 3 Shakespeare songs Op. 6

Florence Wickham wrote the music and lyrics for her opera Rosalind, based on As You Like It, which premiered at the open air Rockridge Theater in Carmel, New York, in August 1938.

In 1942, Gerald Finzi included a setting of "It was a lover and his lass" (V, iii) in his song cycle on Shakespearean texts Let Us Garlands Bring.

Cleo Laine sang a jazz setting of "It was a lover and his lass" on her 1964 album "Shakespeare... and all that Jazz". The composer is credited as "Young".

Donovan set "Under the Greenwood Tree" to music and recorded it for A Gift from a Flower to a Garden in 1968.

Hans Werner Henze, in the first part of his sonata Royal Winter Music, which portraits Shakespearean characters, included "Touchstone, Audrey and William" as its 5th movement, in 1976.

John Rutter composed a setting of "Blow, Blow, Thou Winter Wind" for chorus in 1992.

In 2005, the Barenaked Ladies wrote and released a full album for the play. It was recorded for and exclusively released at the Stratford Shakespeare Festival.

Michael John Trotta composed a setting of "Blow, Blow, Thou Winter Wind" for choir in 2013.

Rush's drummer and composer Neil Peart incorporated the passage "All the world's indeed a stage / And we are merely players / Performers and portrayers / Each another's audience / Outside the gilded cage" into the lyrics for "Limelight" from their 1981 progressive rock album Moving Pictures.

In 2018 Vancouver's Bard on the Beach introduced a musical adaptation of As You Like It, with songs by The Beatles performed by the cast. The production "broke Bard box office records" and toured several other cities, returning to Vancouver in 2023.

Pakistani-American composer set "Blow, Blow thou Winter Wind" to music for voice, clarinet and piano as the middle song of his 'Three Songs of Longing". (1974/2020)

Radio
On 1 March 2015, BBC Radio 3 broadcast a new production directed by Sally Avens with music composed by actor and singer Johnny Flynn of the folk rock band Johnny Flynn and The Sussex Wit. The production included Pippa Nixon as Rosalind, Luke Norris as Orlando, Adrian Scarborough as Touchstone, William Houston as Jaques, Ellie Kendrick as Celia and Jude Akuwudike as Corin.

Film

As You Like It was Laurence Olivier's first Shakespeare film. Olivier, however, served only in an acting capacity (performing the role of Orlando), rather than producing or directing the film. J.M. Barrie, author of Peter Pan, wrote the treatment. Made in England and released in 1936, As You Like It also starred director Paul Czinner's wife Elisabeth Bergner, who played Rosalind with a thick German accent. Although it is much less "Hollywoody" than the versions of A Midsummer Night's Dream and Romeo and Juliet made at about the same time, and although its cast was made up entirely of Shakespearean actors, it was not considered a success by either Olivier or the critics. Still, it's a visual delight with eccentric characters in an enchanting forest rife with animals: sheep, goats, peacocks, storks, a huge snake and skulking lioness.

Helen Mirren starred as Rosalind in the 1978 BBC videotaped version of As You Like It, directed by Basil Coleman.

In 1992, Christine Edzard made another film adaptation of the play. It features James Fox, Cyril Cusack, Andrew Tiernan, Griff Rhys Jones, and Ewen Bremner. The action is transposed to a modern and bleak urban world.

A film version of As You Like It, set in 19th-century Japan, was released in 2006, directed by Kenneth Branagh. It stars Bryce Dallas Howard, David Oyelowo, Romola Garai, Alfred Molina, Kevin Kline, and Brian Blessed. Although it was actually made for cinemas, it was released to theatres only in Europe, and had its U.S. premiere on HBO in 2007. Although it was not a made-for-television film, Kevin Kline won a Screen Actors Guild award for Best Performance by a Male Actor in a Television Movie or Miniseries for his performance as Jaques.

In 2022 CBBC filmed a version of the play adapted for children.

Other musical work
The Seven Doors of Danny, by Ricky Horscraft and John McCullough is based on the "Seven Ages of Man" element of the "All the world's a stage" speech and was premiered in April 2016.

References

Sources

External links

 Modern translation

 MaximumEdge.com – scene-indexed, searchable version of the play
 As You Like It, edited by David Bevington, as well as original-spelling texts, facsimiles of the 1623 Folio text, and other resources, internetshakespeare.uvic.ca, University of Victoria

 List of As You Like It movies, IMDb
 Lesson plans for As You Like It, varsitytutors.com
 "Variations on a Theme of Love"  introduction to the play and pastoral comedy as a genre
 Costume and set designs by the Motley Theatre Design Group for the 1949 production at The Old Vic and the 1957 production at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre

1599 plays
Cross-dressing in theatre
English Renaissance plays
Love stories
British plays adapted into films
Shakespearean comedies
Plays set in France
Ardennes in fiction
Plays set in forests

LGBT-related plays

As You Like It


The 2006 American League Championship Series (ALCS), the second round of the 2006 American League playoffs, began on October 10 and ended on October 14. The wild card Detroit Tigers swept the West Division champion Oakland Athletics 4 games to none to advance to the 2006 World Series, and became the fourth AL team to win 10 pennants, joining the New York Yankees (39), the Athletics (15), and the Boston Red Sox (11). Magglio Ordóñez's game-winning walk-off home run in the bottom of the 9th inning of Game 4 sealed the pennant for the Tigers. This ALCS marked the 5th different AL pennant winner in as many years (following 2005 with the White Sox, 2004 with the Red Sox, 2003 with the Yankees, and 2002 with the Angels).

The Athletics defeated the Minnesota Twins 3 games to none in the AL Division Series, and the Tigers defeated the Yankees 3 games to 1. The Tigers faced the National League champions St. Louis Cardinals in the World Series, but lost in five games. The Athletics had home-field advantage (despite the Tigers having a better regular season record) as the wild card team defers home field advantage in the LCS regardless of regular season record.

The Athletics were seeking their first AL pennant since 1990, while the Tigers captured the league title for the first time since their win in the 1984 World Series. The series was a rematch of the 1972 American League Championship Series (then a best-of-five series), in which Oakland defeated Detroit in 5 games. Detroit manager Jim Leyland, who led the Florida Marlins to the 1997 World Series title, became the seventh manager in history to win pennants in both leagues. It was the second consecutive ALCS without the Yankees and Red Sox.

Summary

Oakland Athletics vs. Detroit Tigers

Game summaries

Game 1

Tuesday, October 10, 2006 at McAfee Coliseum in Oakland, California

Oakland was 0-for-13 with runners in scoring position, while Detroit turned four double plays (both are LCS records). Tigers first baseman Sean Casey left the game in the bottom of the sixth inning due to an apparent leg injury. Brandon Inge homered with two outs in the third off Barry Zito, who allowed a double and two walks to load the bases before Magglio Ordóñez's single scored another run. Next inning, Iván Rodríguez hit a leadoff home run off Zito, who then walked Craig Monroe. Marcus Thames then hit into a forceout, advancing to second on D'Angelo Jiménez's error and scoring on Inge's double. Inge moved to third on Curtis Granderson's groundout, then scored on Plácido Polanco's single. Oakland avoided a shutout when Milton Bradley doubled to lead off the eighth off Joel Zumaya, moved to third on Frank Thomas's groundout, and scored on Jay Payton's groundout.

Game 2
Wednesday, October 11, 2006 at McAfee Coliseum in Oakland, California

Oakland struck first in Game 2 when Mark Kotsay doubled in the first with one out off Justin Verlander, moved to third on a wild pitch, and scored on Milton Bradley's single, but Detroit tied it when Carlos Guillén doubled to lead off the second off Esteban Loaiza, moved to third on a groundout, and scored on Craig Monroe's sacrifice fly. In the third, Kotsay doubled with two outs off Verlander before Bradley homered to put Oakland up 3-1. In the fourth, Detroit loaded the bases on two singles and a walk with one out off Loaiza before Monroe's single scored a run, Alexis Gomez's 2-run single gave Detroit the lead, and Brandon Inge's sacrifice fly put the Tigers up 5-3. In the sixth, Monroe doubled off Loaiza with two outs before Gomez homered to put Detroit up 7-3. Eric Chavez's leadoff home run off Verlander in the bottom of the inning cut the lead to 7-4. Next inning, Bradley homered with two outs off Wilfredo Ledezma to make it 7-5 Detroit, but the Tigers got that run back in the ninth on Granderson's leadoff home run off Huston Street. In the bottom of the inning, Oakland got three straight two-out singles off Todd Jones to load the bases, but Frank Thomas flew out to center to end the game. Since the ALCS has been increased to a seven-game series, no team has come back to win the series after losing the first two games at home.

Game 3
Friday, October 13, 2006 at Comerica Park in Detroit, Michigan

Oakland infielder Mark Kiger, who was called up from the minors for the ALCS following an injury to Mark Ellis, entered the game in the eighth inning as a defensive replacement for second baseman D'Angelo Jiménez, thereby becoming the first player in modern baseball history to make his major-league debut in a postseason game.  Kenny Rogers also continued to dominate, not allowing the A's to score once for his second victory in the postseason. Curtis Granderson walked to lead off the first off Rich Harden, moved to third on Craig Monroe's single, and scored on Plácido Polanco's single. Magglio Ordóñez's sacrifice fly made it 2-0 Tigers. Monroe's leadoff home run in the fifth off Harden made it 3-0. Todd Jones picked up his second save with a 1-2-3 ninth.

Game 4
Saturday, October 14, 2006 at Comerica Park in Detroit, Michigan

In Game 4, Mark Kotsay walked with one out in the first off Jeremy Bonderman, then scored on Milton Bradley's double. One out later, Bradley scored on Eric Chavez's double to put Oakland up 2-0. Jay Payton homered in the fourth to make it 3–0. In the fifth, however, Brandon Inge singled off Dan Haren, moving to second on an error. After moving to third on a groundout, Inge scored on a double by Curtis Granderson, who then scored on Craig Monroe's double. Magglio Ordóñez homered in the sixth to tie the game at three. In the bottom of the ninth, Huston Street got two outs, then allowed back-to-back singles to Polanco and Monroe before Ordóñez launched a three-run walk-off home run to win the game and advance the Tigers to the 2006 World Series. Ordóñez's blast was the first pennant-winning home run since Aaron Boone's in Game 7 of the 2003 ALCS and came on the 30th anniversary of Chris Chambliss' pennant-winning walk-off in Game 5 of the 1976 ALCS.

Composite box
2006 ALCS (4–0): Detroit Tigers over Oakland Athletics

Aftermath

A few days after the conclusion of the series, Billy Beane fired manager Ken Macha. Although the A's went 368-280 in his four seasons as manager, Macha frustrated management and players throughout his tenure. Macha's fractured relationships with players such as Nick Swisher and Rich Harden had been the source of Bay Area stories for several seasons. Even prior to the 2006 season, there was controversy with Macha as he opted out of the last year of his contract and almost took the Pittsburgh Pirates' manager job, but was later rehired by Oakland for the 2006 season. After his firing following the AL Championship Series, Macha would later serve as the Milwaukee Brewers' manager from 2009 and 2010.

After the season, ace pitcher Barry Zito signed a record seven year free agent contract with the San Francisco Giants, ending his seven year run with the Athletics. Zito was the last man standing in Oakland's Big Three rotation of Zito, Mark Mulder, and Tim Hudson. From 2000-2004, the Big Three helped the A's win a division title in 2000, 2002, 2003 and a wild card berth in 2004. In those years, each man made an All-Star appearance multiple times and Zito won the 2002 Cy Young Award. To date, Zito was Oakland's last Cy Young award winner.

The Tigers and Athletics would meet again in the postseason in the American League Division Series in 2012 and 2013, with the Tigers winning both series in five games. By 2012, Justin Verlander was the only player on either team that played in the 2006 American League Championship Series. Verlander's pitching performance in 2012 and 2013 gave him 30 straight scoreless innings against the A's in the playoffs, breaking the record for scoreless innings against one team in the postseason set by Christy Mathewson (28).

As of 2022, the Athletics and Tigers have not won a World Series since the 1980s (1984 for Detroit and 1989 for Oakland).

References

External links
2006 ALCS at Baseball Reference

American League Championship Series
American League Championship Series
Detroit Tigers postseason
Oakland Athletics postseason
American League Championship series
American League Championship Series
American League Championship Series
2006 in Detroit
American League Championship Series
Baseball competitions in Detroit
Baseball competitions in Oakland, California