As You Like It is one of Shakespeare’s most delightful and most magical comedies. However, the magic in it is not the obvious and direct form of magic found in plays like A Midsummer Night’s Dream (with its fairies) or The Tempest (with its sorcerer and sprite). Rather, the magic is subtle: it is the influence of nature upon various citizens who have abandoned the city for various reasons and have come to live in the country and woodlands. And upon their arrival in the countryside, marvelous transformations begin to occur. Nature is a physician, a mystic healer, who cures its inhabitants of their anxieties, troubles, fears, and materialistic desires. Nature is a benevolent goddess who teaches and enlightens the inhabitants of the city who have become too far entrenched in the social, materialistic, and artificial environment of urban life. Living in the city, mankind forgets what is important in life. The visit to the countryside thus restores man to his natural self.
Shakespeare purposely creates a fairy tale setting. The story takes place once upon a time. His primary location, the Forest of Ardenne, may cause audiences to think of the Forest of Arden in England or Ardennes Forest in Belgium and France. However, it is neither of these. Or, it is both of these and more. Shakespeare’s mystical forest is located wherever the soothing influences of nature can be found.
To prevent his audiences from attempting to