Adam and Orlando (D'Jara Culpepper)
The relationship between
Adam and Orlando in As You Like It is
one example of love that didn’t register upon my first reading of Acts I and
II. In Act I, Scene I, Adam begins as the loyal servant of Oliver.
Understandably, there is some familiarity between him and Orlando because of
Adam’s service to late Sir Roland de Bois, but there is no explicit elaboration
on Adam’s relationship with either of the young lords until his choosing to
protect Orlando from Oliver’s schemes in Act II, Scene III. Through this scene,
Adam reveals not only his disliking of Oliver’s ways but a possibly paternal if
not familial affection for Orlando. Though this is not to say that lord-servant
relationships are normally unaffectionate in nature, the sorrowful words Adam
delivers to Orlando before explaining Oliver’s scheme displays both phileo and agape
love:
What,
my young master? O my gentle master,
O my
sweet master, O you memory
Of
old Sir Roland, why, what make you here?
Why
are you virtuous? Why do people love you?
And
wherefore are you gentle, strong, and valiant?
. . .
Know
you not, master, to some kind of men
Their
graces serve them but as enemies?
No
more do yours: your virtues, gentle master,
Are sanctified and holy traitors to
you. (2.3.2-13)
Later on in Act II, Orlando displays similar love in
his effort to lift Adam’s spirits and care for him before his search for food
for both of their sakes:
Live
a little, comfort a little, cheer thyself a little. If this
Uncouth
forest yield anything savage I will either be food
for it or bring it for food to thee. […]
Yet thou liest in the bleak air.
Come,
I will bear thee to some shelter, and thou shalt not
die
for lack of a dinner if there live anything in this desert.
Picture: Adam and Orlando
as performed by Richard Briars (left) and David Oyelowo (right)
Picture URL:
http://www.shakespeare-navigators.com/as_you_like_it/AYLI_Note_1_1_3.html
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