As You Like It is a pastoral comedy. It is based upon the early prose romance Rosalynde by Thomas Lodge. The play's first performance was at Wilton House in 1603. The heroine Rosalind flees persecution in her uncle's court, accompanied by her cousin Celia and Touchstone the court jester, to find safety and eventually love in the Forest of Arden. The play features one of Shakespeare's most famous and oft-quoted speeches, "All the world's a stage," and is the origin of the phrase "too much of a good thing." Illustrated by "Russian Ballet" by the German artist Macke