CF: ROSALIND | Thewell

Rosalind is a Catfish isn't she?

From Wikipedia:

AS YOU LIKE IT: ROSALIND'S LAYERED GENDER

The elaborate gender reversals in the story are of particular interest to modern critics interested in gender studies. Through four acts of the play, Rosalind, who in Shakespeare's day would have been played by a boy, finds it necessary to disguise herself as a boy, whereupon the rustic Phebe, also played by a boy, becomes infatuated with this "Ganymede", a name with homoerotic overtones. In fact, the epilogue, spoken by Rosalind to the audience, states rather explicitly that she (or at least the actor playing her) is not a woman. In several scenes, "Ganymede" impersonates Rosalind so a boy actor would have been playing a girl disguised as a boy impersonating a girl.

Rosalind is a Catfish isn't she?

There isn't a Wiki page that tells me how to peel back the layers of my own gender. Am I a girl dressed as a boy dressed as a not-girl dressed as a not-boy dressed as a ??? How deep do the layers go?

( All I know is that when I think about highschool I wish I had been a boy then, but when I think about me now, it gets slippery. )

Rosalind says, "if I were a woman." It is the if that carries possibilty. If Rosalind is not a woman, what are they? If I am not a woman, what am I?

I also am drawn to the way desire works in As You Like It. People become infatuated with false images, just as we do with profiles of strangers on Tinder or Instagram.

Who said that anyone has to be honest about who they are?

Peel back the layers.

Imagine a Well, but the bottom has fallen out. It just

goes down

and down

and down.

Rosalind is a Catfish isn't she?