What’s So Funny ‘Bout, Peace, Love, and Shakespeare?: A Peace Studies Approach to As You Like It

Abstract

ABSTRACTTaking As You Like It as its central case study, this essay explores how terms and ideas from the emergent field of Peace Studies might open new lines of inquiry into the work of Shakespeare. Previous scholarship on Shakespeare’s attitudes towards war and peace tend to assess his depictions of martial conflict. However, to focus solely on his attitudes toward war is to miss the possibilities he imagines for peace, not only in his time but also in our own. The present essay asks the question, “What happens if we go to Shakespeare for peace, not war?” In doing so, it considers a paradoxical phrase, “peace in action”, which assumes the perspective described by those in Peace Studies as “positive peace”. In order to offer an alternative to previous studies that have largely examined the histories, we examine a romantic comedy with its fair share of time wasting and frustrated plotting. As You Like It, we suggest, makes seemingly arbitrary movements towards peace into comedy and drama by indulging in their “pointlessness”. That is, Shakespeare presents a peaceful world through “pointless” or arbitrary changes in mindset in order to give an impression of a utopian peace, summarised by Touchstone: “Your ‘If’ is the only peace maker; much value in ‘If’” (5.4.91–92). He suggests that peace, love and understanding depend upon imagined alternatives, disparate plots and hypotheticals. Rosalind’s epilogue will underscore the point by suggesting new social alliances that are not in themselves permanent yet offer a temporary avenue towards peace-making.