Shakespeare’s As You Like It is a play without a theme. Instead, it repeatedly poses one question in a variety of forms: What if the world were other than it is? As You Like It is a set of experiments in which its characters conditionally change an aspect of their world and see what comes of it: what if I were not a girl but a man? What if I were not a duke, but someone like Robin Hood? What if I were a deer? “What would you say to me now an [that is, “if”] I were your very, very Rosalind?” (4.1.64-65). “Much virtue in ‘if’,” as one of its characters declares near the play’s end; ‘if’ is virtual. It releases force even if the force is not that of what is the case. Change one thing in the world, the play asks, and how else does everything change?
In As You Like It, unlike Shakespeare’s other plays, the characters themselves are both experiment and experimenters. They assert something about the world that they know is not the case, and their fictions let them explore what would happen if it were—and not only if it were, but something, not otherwise apparent, about how it is now. What is as you like it? What is it that you, or anyone, really likes or wants? The characters of As You Like It stand in ‘if’ as at a hinge of thought and action, conscious that they desire something, not wholly capable of getting it, not even able to say what it is. Their awareness that the world could be different than it is, is a step towards making it something that they wish it to be, and towards learning what that would be.
Their audiences are not exempt. As You Like It doesn’t tell us that it knows what we like and will give it to us. It pushes us to find out. Over the course of the play, characters and audiences experiment with other ways the world could be and come closer to learning what they do like, and how their world can be more as they like it. By exploring ways the world can be different than it is, the characters of As You Like It strive to make the world a place in which they can be at home, not as a utopia—Arden may promise that, but certainly doesn’t fulfill it—but as an ongoing work of living. We get a sense at the play’s end not that things have been settled once and for all, but that the characters have taken time to breathe—to live in their new situations until they discover better ones, or until they discover newer desires.
As You Like It, in other words, is a kind of essay: a set of tests or attempts to be differently in the world, and to see what happens. These essays in As If: As You Like It, originally commissioned as an introductory guide for students, actors, and admirers of the play, trace the force and virtue of some of the claims of the play that run counter to what is the case—its ‘ifs.’
Shakespeare's As You Like It ni mchezo bila mandhari. Badala yake, mara kwa mara inauliza swali moja katika namna mbalimbali: Namna gani ikiwa ulimwengu ungekuwa tofauti na ulivyo? Kama Unavyopenda ni seti ya majaribio ambayo wahusika wake hubadilisha hali ya ulimwengu wao na kuona nini kinatokea: nini ikiwa sikuwa msichana bali mtu? Namna gani ikiwa mimi si Duke, bali mtu kama Robin Hood? Namna gani ikiwa ningekuwa mnyama-mwitu? <unk>Unaweza kuniambia nini sasa [yaani, <unk>kama<unk>] ningekuwa Rosalind wako sana, sana?<unk> (4.1.64-65). <unk>Mzuri sana katika <unk>kama<unk>,<unk>kama mmoja wa wahusika wake anavyotangaza karibu na mwisho wa mchezo; <unk>kama<unk> ni virtual. Inatoa nguvu hata kama nguvu si ile ya kile kilichofanyika. Kubadili kitu kimoja katika ulimwengu, mchezo unauliza, na jinsi nyingine kila kitu hubadilika? Katika As You Like It, tofauti na michezo mingine ya Shakespeare, wahusika wenyewe ni majaribio na wajaribio. Wao kudai kitu kuhusu dunia kwamba wanajua si kesi, na fiction yao kuruhusu wao kuchunguza nini kitatokea kama ilikuwa - na si tu kama ilikuwa, lakini kitu, si vinginevyo dhahiri, kuhusu jinsi ni sasa. Ni nini kama wewe kama ni? Ni nini ambacho wewe, au mtu mwingine yeyote, anapenda au anataka? Wahusika wa Kama Unavyopenda wamesimama katika 'kama' kama kwenye hinge ya mawazo na vitendo, wakitambua kwamba wanataka kitu, hawawezi kabisa kupata, hawawezi hata kusema ni nini. Ujuzi wao kwamba ulimwengu unaweza kuwa tofauti na ilivyo, ni hatua kuelekea kuifanya kuwa kitu ambacho wanataka iwe, na kuelekea kujifunza nini itakuwa. Wasikilizaji wao hawawezi kuepuka jambo hilo. Kama Unavyopenda haituambie kwamba inajua tunavyopenda na itatupa. Inatuchochea tujifunze. Katika kipindi cha mchezo, wahusika na watazamaji majaribio na njia nyingine dunia inaweza kuwa na kuja karibu na kujifunza nini wao kufanya kama, na jinsi dunia yao inaweza kuwa zaidi kama wao kama. Kwa kuchunguza njia ulimwengu unaweza kuwa tofauti na ni, wahusika wa Kama Wewe Kama Ni kujitahidi kufanya dunia mahali ambapo wanaweza kuwa nyumbani, si kama utopia - Arden inaweza kuahidi kwamba, lakini hakika haina kutimiza - lakini kama kazi ya kuendelea ya kuishi. "Hatuwezi kupata hisia mwishoni mwa mchezo, sio kwamba mambo yamekamilika mara moja na kwa wote, lakini kwamba wahusika wamechukua muda wa kupumua, kuishi katika hali zao mpya hadi watakapogundua bora, au mpaka watagundua tamaa mpya. """ Kama Unavyopenda ni aina ya insha, seti ya majaribio au majaribio ya kuwa tofauti katika ulimwengu na kuona nini kinatokea. Maandishi haya katika Kama Kama: Kama Unavyopenda, awali aliagiza kama mwongozo wa kuanzisha kwa wanafunzi, waigizaji, na mashabiki wa mchezo, kufuatilia nguvu na wema wa baadhi ya madai ya mchezo kwamba kukimbia kinyume na nini ni kesi <unk> yake <unk>if<unk>.