Orlando Allusions & Cultural References

When authors refer to other great works, people, and events, it’s usually not accidental. Put on your super-sleuth hat and figure out why.

Literature, Philosophy, and Mythology

Nick Greene and Orlando discuss the following writers: William Shakespeare, Christopher Marlowe, Ben Jonson, Sir Thomas Browne, John Donne, Cicero, John Milton, Joseph Addison, John Dryden, Alexander Pope, Alfred Lloyd Tennyson, Robert Browning, Thomas Carlyle, and Jonathon Swift.
Orlando meets and befriends Alexander Pope, Jonathon Swift, and Joseph Addison.
Early in Orlando’s writing career, he has plays based on various mythologies: Ajax, Pyramus, Iphigenia, Hippolytus, and Odysseus. (1.10)

Historical References

Queen Elizabeth
King Charles
Nell Gwyn (King Charles’s mistress)
Queen Victoria
King Edward
Queen Anne
Mary, Queen of the Scots

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