In a most unusual wooing scene, Touchstone, the fool, courts a shepherdess named Audrey. The melancholy Jacques, meanwhile, stands nearby and critiques the odd courtship.
When Touchstone asks Audrey is she likes his “feature” (at line 3), she takes it to mean his appearance and responds negatively. Touchstone, however, is referring to his wit rather than his appearance; and he uses a simile to express his frustration: like “Ovid among the Goths,” he is Touchstone among the goats. The words goats and Goths were pronounced in a similar fashion during the Renaissance. The Classical Roman poet Ovid was exiled and had to live among the Goths, who did not understand and appreciate his poetry. And Touchstone is “exiled” and has to live among the shepherds and goats, who do not understand and appreciate his wit.
Thus, Touchstone declares that he wishes Audrey were “poetical” (12). He means that she should be someone who understands his “poetry”: she should understand his wit.
Audrey asks Touchstone what the word poetical means and whether it implies virtue and truth. Touchstone then shifts his topic from understanding poetry to love poetry. Touchstone explains that love poetry is false or untruthful, full of false exaggeration and false promises. Readers familiar with Shakespeare’s sonnets might recall Sonnet 130. In that famous poem, Shakespeare’s