Rosalind

Rosalind is the daughter of the banished Duke Senior, niece of the usurping Duke Frederick, and cousin to Duke Frederick’s daughter Celia. We know Rosalind and Celia have been best friends since they were tiny, so it’s no surprise that Celia will follow Rosalind out of court when she is banished. Rosalind is loyal to her cousin, and cares for her father (though she doesn’t show it much), and once she’s in love with Orlando, she’s squarely in love. Still, she has a sharp tongue and an even sharper wit, which she spares no one.

In this play full of contradictions, Rosalind seems the one best able to hold conflicting feelings and thoughts with perfect ease. She becomes a puppy when she dotes on Orlando, though when she gets to chat with him as Ganymede, she’s brutal. Rosalind faints from love constantly, though rarely misses an opportunity to talk of love as foolish madness. She is always at the ready with some witty comment, but is giddy like a schoolgirl when she thinks of Orlando. Perhaps best of all, she looks like a woman and dresses as a man.

Besides these contrasts, Rosalind is notable for being an incredibly strong female character – one of Shakespeare’s finest. Though she swoons for love, she does it with a healthy sense of making fun of herself. Her ability to balance contradictions so well shows her elegant yet pragmatic perspective on life. She’s smart, sassy, cute, and ultimately the one responsible for the play spinning and wheeling the way it does. She’s notable among Shakespeare’s heroines for being in control of her own fate and for making literary critic Harold Bloom fall in love with her. Though she is subject to circumstance, she’s willing to take matters into her own hands. Rosalind uses the special space of the forest to exercise her personal agency, rather than be "overthrown and acted upon," if you get our gist.