As You Like It's Political, Critical Animal Allusions

Topical allusions abound in Shakespeare's plays, and scholars have been searching for allusions to Elizabeth I for decades. However, the majority of these allusions, and the critiques they mobilize, are voiced through other characters. I look beyond human representations to animals and the landscape, particularly Oliver's encounter with the serpent and lioness in a barren wood, in order to expand the definition of topical allusion to include nonanthropocentric representations. The animals and the land in Arden invite audiences to speculate about and critique the threat of Elizabeth's aging, nonreproductive, monstrous power.