Orlando expresses his love for Rosalind in the form of poems placed all about the forest. They allow him to speak his emotions without addressing Rosalind in person. The ubiquity of their placement around the forest and the sentimentality of their language attest to how great Orlando’s feelings are; their poor quality indicates how much he needs the romantic education he ultimately receives from Rosalind in the guise of Ganymede.
Orlando’s Poems Quotes in As You Like It
The As You Like It quotes below all refer to the symbol of Orlando’s Poems. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Act 3, Scene 2
Quotes
Run, run, Orlando, carve on every tree the fair, the chaste, and unexpressive she.
Related Characters:
Related Symbols:
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
O wonderful, wonderful, and most wonderful, and yet again wonderful, and after that, out of all whooping!
Related Characters:
Related Symbols:
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
Get the entire As You Like It LitChart as a printable PDF.
Orlando’s Poems Symbol Timeline in As You Like It
The timeline below shows where the symbol Orlando’s Poems appears in As You Like It. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Act 3, Scene 2
...the moon as a pale sphere in the sky, and includes a resolve to post poems about Rosalind on every tree in the forest. Having finished reading the poem in his...
(full context)
Rosalind, dressed as Ganymede, enters, reading one of Orlando’s poems that she has pulled from a tree and is holding in her hands. Touchstone, hearing...
(full context)
Celia enters, reading another of Orlando’s tree poems, which describes Rosalind as the synthesis of all the best features of Helen, Cleopatra, Atalanta,...
(full context)
Rosalind mentions the poems on the trees and expresses her desire to meet and advise the love-swept poet who’s...
(full context)
