Belonging; as You Like It

A person’s sense of belonging is created through their past experiences and their interactions within the world and society. These experiences and interactions can help to create a sense of belonging or even sense of alienation depending on the situations experienced. These elements must work in conjunction with each other to help create a sense of belonging suitable to increase their sense of identity and happiness. These essential elements of belonging have been effectively communicated through William Shakespeare’s comedy “As you like it”, John Donne’s poem “Batter My Heart” and David Fincher’s movie, “The Game”. It is through these texts, that the composers have been able to effectively communicate the concepts and features of belonging and not belonging.
William Shakespeare has been able to effectively demonstrate the impacts of the past experiences of belonging with the use of many characters within his comedy play, “As You Like It”. Shakespeare has been able to illustrate the implications of belonging and alienation through his use of dialogue and imagery whilst communicating his beliefs of love, alienation and belonging through the manipulation of his characters within the comedy. This manipulation of his characters is present within the characters of Orlando and Rosalind.
Shakespeare demonstrates that a person’s fundamental need to belong can be ‘fuelled’ by their past experiences and implications from their outcomes. For Orlando and Rosalind, their essential hunger to belong has been driven by their banishment from the court and their initial way of life. This hunger to belong has fed upon itself and has been the main impetus for the driven love of Orlando and Rosalind. Shakespeare has been able to effectively communicate this through his manipulation of the characters actions, language and dialogue. Within the character of Orlando this is extremely present within Act 3, Scene 2 where Orlando attempts to demonstrate his love for Rosalind by hanging his...