l I bear my folly back,And follow you no further. Let me go.(3.2.314-316) It is at this point that she is able to love Demetrius in a manner befitting mature adults. Helena becomes willing to change herself rather than Demetrius. Her journey into the forest enabled her to gain the qualities she lacked in order to have a relationship with the man she loved.Rosalind, unlike Helena, is very confident and takes matters into her own hands. Her conflicts are more external, rather than the internal conflicts of Helena’s. Rosalind has to deal with Orlando’s idealization of her and his inability to speak when she is around. She takes the responsibility of finding a way to make things work with Orlando. She (as Ganymede) tells him that she (he) will cure him of his lovesickness. Rosalind’s plan is to show Orlando that she is an ordinary woman with some of the same faults as every other woman. Rosalind’s maturity and self-confidence allows her to focus on her plan to show Orlando that she is not perfect: “would now like him, now loathe him; then entertain him, then forswear him; now weep for him, then spit at him” (3.2.415-417). Ganymede explains how Rosalind will behave:I will be more jealous of thee than a Barbary cockpigeon over his hen, more clamorous than a parrot against rain, more new-fangled than an ape, more giddy in my desires than a monkey. I will weep for nothing, like Diana in the fountain, and I will do that when you are dispos’d to be merry. I will laugh like a hyen, and that when thou art inclin’d to sleep.(4.1.149-156) We see here, that Rosalind knows herself quite well, whereas Helena did not. Helena needed to journey through the forest and experience some changes before she knew what she had to do. Rosalind seems to be able to rise above the failings of fate by using her resourceful, realistic understanding of the world around her. Because of this she is admired by...
