SOURCE: Fowler, Alastair. Pastoral Instruction in As You Like It, pp. 1-14. London: University of London, 1984.

In the following essay, a printed version of a lecture delivered at the University of London on February 18, 1984, Fowler discusses As You Like It as a blend of genres with a particular indebtedness to “realistic pastoral.” The critic maintains that the Forest of Arden is not a timeless, static world but rather one in which time must be spent in productive activity, especially in learning the significance of human mortality and the meaning of faithfulness in love.

If critics of As You Like It agree on one thing, it is that the play is pastoral-romantic by genre. The plot, what there is of it, conforms to ‘the standard dramatic pastoral pattern … of extrusion or exile, recreative sojourn in a natural setting, with ultimate return “homeward” … a return in moral strength reinforced by...