Gender In As You Like It

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do outface it with their semblances.
(1:3 ll. 112-120)
At first glance, this transformation is a mere change of clothes and the addition of weapons, but it goes much deeper. To Rosalind, the taking on of a man’s appearance requires certain things. She believes that while dressed as a man, she cannot bring shame to the image of a man. A good example of this is in Act 2, Scene 4, where she says, "I could find in my heart to disgrace my man’s/ apparel and to cry like a woman; but I must comfort/ the weaker vessel, as doublet and hose ought to show/ itself courageous to petticoat. (ll. 4-7). This is not the only time she mentions a doublet and hose. It seems almost that the doublet and hose are the actual source of strength for a man, as in the next example when Rosalind is begging Celia for an answer, saying, "Good my complexion! Dost thou think,/ though I am caparisoned like a man, I have a doublet/ and hose in my disposition?" (3:2, ...

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