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List Price: $25.00 | | Publisher: Caedmon
Salesrank: 1324611
Released: January 17, 1997 |
| Our Price: $6.00 |
| Used Price: $2.94 |
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| Media: CD-ROM |
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Editorial Review:
All the world's a stage... - Jaques
The complete play in five acts. A Shakespeare Recording Society Production.
As You Like It is quintessential Shakespearean comedy, complete with a loquacious clown, lovers, disguises, rifts and reconciliation's, and all within the atmospheric confines of the enchanted Forest of Arden. As the title suggests, As You Like It is a play in which everyone gets their way, where sinners are redeemed and where love holds sway over all. And because it is Shakespeare, even so light a comedy contains a wealth of keen observations about humanity in general, and in particular about the age-old tension between so-called civilized society and the state of nature from which it evolved. No less poetically-accomplished than Shakespeare's' more serious works, As You Like It is a stimulating literary pleasure from start to finish.
As You Like it Cd (Caedmon Shakespeare) Reviews:
Cambridge School Shakespeare: Nice Explanations for the Lay Reader 
2007-08-30 - Note: This is a review of the particular "Cambridge School Shakespeare" edition [Edited by Rex Gibson, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000] of As You Like it and not a review of the play itself.
This edition (a) contains the unabridged play and (b) tries to explain and elucidate Shakespeare's play to teenagers of the age of maybe 15-17. It clarifies difficult language, highlights the main conflicts, puts the play into a historical context and the context of the literary tradition that it belongs to. It encourages the reader to think of different possible ways to play the characters and different ways to understand the play.
I am not a teenager and I am not 16 years old any more, in fact, I am 53 years old with a PhD in Economics and a Masters in Psychology. I read Shakespeare for fun, to challenge my brain, and to grow personally. I found this edition of the play very helpful and enjoyable. The commentary neither spoiled my fun by overanalyzing or showing off its learnedness nor did it offend my intelligence by oversimplifying. In addition, the layout of the book is quite reader-friendly.
If you are a Shakespeare scholar or a scholar of English Lit, this edition will probably be too simple for you. For people of my caliber, however, I can really recommend this edition. Enjoy!
Recommended
2007-05-09 - The Caedmon recording of As You Like It is well worth the purchase just to hear two Redgraves soar in their performances.
Arguably the Greatest Shakespeare Comedy 
2006-07-15 - As far as Shakespeare's comedies go, "The Comedy of Errors" will probably always be my favorite. While "As You Like It" never quite obtained the popularity of "A Midsummer Night's Dream," or "The Taming of the Shrew," one could easily argue that this is his greatest comedy. The play contains several plots that Shakespeare cleverly intertwines, and offers a happy ending for virtually all the characters. Love is triumphant, but more importantly, the theme of reconciliation carries through to just about everyone in the story. (Much like in "Comedy of Errors.")
The story begins with the sibling rivalry of older Oliver and younger Orlando. Oliver has hoarded the family inheritance, and after a brief fight, Oliver hopes that Orlando will die in a wrestling match. This is where the 2nd plot comes in. Duke Frederick (who has a daughter named Celia) has banished his older brother (the true duke who has a daughter named Rosalind). But for now, Rosalind is allowed to stay with Celia. Orlando meets these 2 women and falls in love with Rosalind. After the wrestling match, things start to go bad. Orlando learns that his brother Oliver is plotting to kill him, and Rosalind is banished. But all is not lost. (Orlando takes his loyal servant Adam and flees while Rosalind (in the male disguise Ganymede), along with Celia, and the comical Touchstone will flee to look for Rosalind's father.
Here is where the play starts to become really comical. (Good comedies often have a sad start. The hilarious "Comedy of Errors" started quite sadly.) Moving on, we meet Rosalind's fatherand his crew who have made exile into paradise. From Duke Sr's party, we meet the melancholy Jacques. Jacques is the most interesting character in the story. (In fact, the most famous passage in the play belongs to him. 'The 7 stages of man.')
Duke Sr. welcomes Orlando and Adam, and it isn't long before Orlando and Rosalind (though in her male disguise) run into each other. Shakespeare maintains the comedy when Rosalind tells Orlando to practice wooing Rosalind. (Orlando obviously thinks the Rosalind he sees is a man.)
Touchstone has some comical moments with Audrey. And there is the interesting triangle between where the Shepherd Silvius loves Phoebe, but Pheobe loves Rosalind! But this is when things start to resolve. Oliver comes on the scene, meets Celia, and falls in love with her. (So much so, that the now penitent Oliver is willing to reconcile with Orlando and leave him all.) The play ends not only with the reunion of Rosalind and her father, but the joyous weddings of Rosalind/Orlando, Oliver/Celia, Touchstone/Audrey, and Silvius/Pheobe.
Even more good news comes. Celia's father mends his ways, and returns all to Rosalind's father. Jacques offers the crowning touch. Despite his cynical nature, he is NOT A VILLAIN. Ironically, this hermit talks to more characters in the story than anyone. And while he can not be a part of the final happiness, he does not envy the characters who can. He does wish everyone well. As I said, my favorite comedy will always be "The Comedy of Errors." But "As You Like It" is arguably the best.
One of the most entertaining of Shakespeare's comedies.
2005-07-03 - As with all of Shakespeare, the concept of love at first sight is given far too much credit, but other than that, this is a delightful romp filled with much amusement. The language is as beautiful as one expects in Shakespeare, but is somewhat less difficult for the modern reader to follow than in some of his plays; I found myself being more distracted than helped by most of the footnotes. As with most Shakespearean comedies, it was easy to see that this play was intended for the amusement of the common people; the similarities in style between the plot here and in much modern pop culture were striking (the sexual innuendo to be had when a woman passes for a man and finds another woman falling in love with her, for instance). If it had a flaw, it was that the ending was just a little TOO pat and contrived, even for a comedy, but that's just a minor quibble.
An Idyllic play - for romantics 
2003-11-20 - This has to be one of Shakespeare's gayest plays (no pun intended). Whatever tragedy may have occurred in the beginning - at the court - is totally forgotten when the action moves to the forest, where Robin-hood like; a banished duke, a melancholy philosopher and a cast of love sick characters act out their lives on the stage.
Much of the play is centered on Rosalind - the female lead in 'drag' - who falls in love with the third son of a nobleman, Orlando, who has been cheated out of his inheritance by his eldest brother. Her father, the duke, has also been cheated by a brother and is now living in the forest with his `merry men'. Her short stay at court is disrupted when her uncle changes his mind about her and `graciously' gives her a few days to get out of the kingdom. This event leads to her escape into the forests with her cousin, the daughter of the duke at Court. As the play progresses more and more characters end up in the forest which becomes the stage where all these actors play out their parts - to paraphrase Jacques.
As a reader you sometimes have to suspend rationality in order to swallow some of the larger than life events that occur in this story (The snake - Lion - Lion killer scene for example). It's not meant to be taken too seriously I'd imagine, just a play about love and romance and the lengths one will go to because of love. The only rational person in this play seems to be the Malvolio-like Jacques, whose deer hugging antiques (forerunner of modern day Environmentalism?) and refusal to take part in the revelry make him the butt of the other's jokes. Even the clown seems to have been pierced by Cupid's arrows as he too weds a country `wench', something unheard of in the other plays where the clowns all seem to be eunuchs.
If you're reeling from any of Shakespeare's tragedies, or want to escape the ordered, (courtly?) existence that is your life and take a dive into an almost fantasy-like world where all is love and laughter, this play may be your ticket.
