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Robert B. Bennett (essay date 1976)

SOURCE: Bennett, Robert B. “The Reform of a Malcontent: Jaques and the Meaning of As You Like It.” Shakespeare Studies 9 (1976): 183-204.

[In the following essay, Bennett assesses Shakespeare's rationale for including Jaques—a cynical malcontent—in the pastoral realm of Arden, concluding that Jaques provides a satirical complement to the idealized romantic behavior of the other characters in the forest.]

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Shakespeare's portrayal of Jacques in As You Like It is one of the earliest significant studies in Elizabethan drama of the malcontent, that age's version of the social dropout or alienated intellectual. Moreover, Shakespeare is the only playwright to subject the malcontent to a pastoral experience, to make him more an object of social criticism and romantic correction than an authorial mouthpiece for anatomizing the ills of society. Jaques' kinship with the Italianate...

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1. Introduction
2. Criticism: Overviews And General Studies
   1. Ruth Nevo (essay date 1980)
   2. Linda Woodbridge (essay date 2004)
3. Criticism: Character Studies
   1. Robert B. Bennett (essay date 1976)
   2. Clare R. Kinney (essay date February 1998)
   3. Sharon Hamilton (essay date 2003)
4. Criticism: Production Reviews
   1. Ben Brantley (review date 9 August 1999)
   2. Brendan Lemon (review date 16 August 1999)
   3. Alastair Macaulay (review date 3 April 2000)
   4. Ian Shuttleworth (review date 5 January 2001)
   5. Patrick Carnegy (review date 29 March 2003)
   6. Katherine Duncan-Jones (review date 4 April 2003)
   7. Alastair Macaulay (review date 20 August 2003)
5. Criticism: Themes
   1. Michael Shapiro (essay date 1994)
   2. Nathaniel Strout (essay date spring 2001)
   3. Peter Milward (essay date 2001)
6. Further Reading
7. Copyright