Essay: Uncover Higher Truths in Shakespeare’s As You Like It with Gender-Bending Disguises

Shakespeare’s comedy, As You Like It, employs the use of disguises for the initial purpose of deception. While the trickery involved with identity bending and disguise in both cases is used for temporary gain, at the end of the play, the final outcome of such deceit leads to revelations of a higher truth. Thus, while there is obvious lies and deception throughout the story, the end result leads to the exact opposite. The characters most intimately involved with these instances of disguise and deceit generally learn something about themselves by the end of the comedy and perhaps more importantly, the reader can interpret As You Like It as Shakespeare’s comment on the mutability of individual personality and character.
In As You Like It, Rosalind is arguably the most powerful, independent character within the story line, and throughout Shakespeare’s works entirely. In terms of her personality and wit, she seems to be unmatched. One of the reasons she is able to express herself so fully is that she remains disguised as a male for the majority of the play. This allows her to experience her emotions and thoughts outside of the more constrained world of the female, going so far as to say, “Now go we in content, / To liberty, and not to banishment” (I.iii.131–132). The utilization of the word “banishment” here implies that her view of femininity is that of having been expelled from everyday life, exiled somehow from the world by nature of her gender. This realization, as she clearly expresses, allows her to offer her advice and instruction to Orlando without fear of ridicule or persecution. In the final scene when she delivers the epilogue, the reader feels as though she has gained her confidence by living as Ganymede. Her epilogue is delivered with confidence and zeal. The dramatic irony of this, and of Shakespeare’s plays in general is that during Shakespeare’s time, only men were acting in these productions. Therefore, the gender-bending result of the disguises in this play are two fold since in actuality, the actor playing Rosalind would be a man dressed up as a woman, but then dressed up as a man with womanly characteristics. The result is certainly confusing, but it sheds light on the argument that Shakespeare is using gendered disguises to present higher truths—in this case, the malleability of gender through the use of role-playing and disguise.
In the case of Rosalind’s disguise as a man, she at once engages in deceit for the purposes of short-term gain, but in the end, this becomes a long-term benefit for her as a character. In her disguise as Ganymede, she is able to criticize poetry and engage in long debates about the meaning of life with other men—a role that she would have been “banished” from had she appeared without the disguise. By the end of the play, Shakespeare has skillfully aided the reader in forgetting about the deceit that began Rosalind’s transformation from mere female to main character and in turn, the reader is pushed to focus more fully on her accomplishments as playing the role of both genders. When Jacques recites the famous lines, “All the world’s a stage, / And all the men and women merely players” (II.vii.138–139) the message that Shakespeare is trying to get across makes more sense when thought about in terms of Rosalind. She is able to play both roles, to match both of her disguises; that of Ganymede, and that of herself. Thus, in many respects, the subversion of these roles through disguise becomes more honest than deceitful.
As You Like It features many themes that are at first glance more apparent than disguise and gender- role irregularities. However, it is clear that Shakespeare employs the use of disguise to firstly show the prevalence of deception between men and women, which later leads to an unforeseen result of higher truths behind the inner workings of human beings. In the play, the universal theme of gender portrayal and perception were explored through the use of disguise—the disguise being the main driver in the ultimate realizations. By allowing Rosalind to play both the roles of man and woman, Shakespeare opens the discussion on gender inequality and archetypal roles within society, while still keeping to his light hearted tone that his comedies usually possess.