ENGLISH DEPARTMENT

COLLEGE OF ARTS
UNIVERSITY OF MOSUL/IRQ

TWELFTH NIGHT
BY WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

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Type of Work and Full Title

William Shakespeare's Twelfth Night is a romantic comedy written for the

Elizabethan stage. The full title is Twelfth Night, or What You Will. Shakespeare wrote the
play in the festive spirit of the Twelfth Night of the Christmas season, January 6, as part of

events celebrating the holiday season. The play uses mix-ups, pranks, and comic dialogue

to achieve its effect.

Significance of the Title
(Twelfth Night
Night or What You Will)
Will)
Significance Of The Title "Twelfth Night" • English Summary

Historically, the list of Shakespeare s play which appeared in 1598 doesn t include
the Twelfth Night. It was referred to by John Manningham in 1602 so it was perhaps

composed between these years. Other historical evidence suggests that it was presented to
Queen Elizabeth on Twelfth Night in 1601 and her guest of honor was an Italian nobleman

called Virginio Orsino. Probably the character of Duke was named to honor him. So, these

facts tell us about the historical ambiguity around the title of the play.
In a literal sense, Twelfth Night is the night preceding the Christian feast of the

Epiphany which occurs on January 6th. In earlier times, Christians used to celebrate the

Christmas festival for twelve days. They used to celebrate it with great merriment and show.
Before Christianity, the same ritual was celebrated according to nature because it was the

time of the year when cold used to end and season used to become warmer. The dimness of

winter used to change into the light. Keeping the historical and religious facts in mind, one
can understand the significance of the play s title. In the play, one sees the suggestions to

celebrate throughout its comic subplot. Both Sir Toby and Sir Andrew are in celebratory

mode always.
Maria accuses them of being drunk nightly. When Malvolio tries to correct them, Sir

Toby says, Dost thou think, because of thou art virtuous, there shall be no more cakes and

ale? All this hints at us about the festive mode of the play. Again and again, the characters
in the play say, let s have a song, let s have wine. Apart from the celebration, the title festival
used to have role plays where masters and servants used to come together too without any

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social boundary. Shakespeare utilizes the whole device of role-playing in another way by
putting it into gender roles.

Character List
Viola - A young woman of aristocratic birth, and the play s protagonist. Washed up on the
shore of Illyria when her ship is wrecked in a storm, Viola decides to make her own way in
the world. She disguises herself as a young man, calling herself "Cesario," and becomes a

page to Duke Orsino. She ends up falling in love with Orsino even as Olivia, the woman
Orsino is courting, falls in love with Cesario. Thus, Viola finds that her clever disguise has

entrapped her: she cannot tell Orsino that she loves him, and she cannot tell Olivia why she,
as Cesario, cannot love her. Her poignant plight is the central conflict in the play.

Read an in-depth analysis of Viola.

Orsino - A powerful nobleman in the country of Illyria. Orsino is lovesick for the beautiful
Lady Olivia, but becomes more and more fond of his handsome new page boy, Cesario, who

is actually a woman Viola. Orsino is a vehicle through which the play explores the absurdity
of love: a supreme egotist, Orsino mopes around complaining how heartsick he is over

Olivia, when it is clear that he is chiefly in love with the idea of being in love and enjoys
making a spectacle of himself. His attraction to the ostensibly male Cesario injects sexual
ambiguity into his character.

Read an in-depth analysis of Orsino.

Olivia - A wealthy, beautiful, and noble Illyrian lady, Olivia is courted by Orsino and Sir
Andrew Aguecheek, but to each of them she insists that she is in mourning for her brother,

who has recently died, and will not marry for seven years. She and Orsino are similar

characters in that each seems to enjoy wallowing in his or her own misery. Viola s arrival in
the masculine guise of Cesario enables Olivia to break free of her self-indulgent melancholy.

Olivia seems to have no difficulty transferring her affections from one love interest to the

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next, however, suggesting that her romantic feelings like most emotions in the play do not
run deep.

Sebastian - Viola s lost twin brother. When he arrives in Illyria, traveling with Antonio, his

close friend and protector, Sebastian discovers that many people think that they know him.
Furthermore, the beautiful Lady Olivia, whom he has never met, wants to marry him.

Sebastian is not as well rounded a character as his sister. He seems to exist to take on the

role that Viola fills while disguised as Cesario namely, the mate for Olivia.

Malvolio - The straitlaced steward or head servant in the household of Lady Olivia.

Malvolio is very efficient but also very selfrighteous, and he has a poor opinion of drinking,
singing, and fun. His priggishness and haughty attitude earn him the enmity of Sir Toby, Sir

Andrew, and Maria, who play a cruel trick on him, making him believe that Olivia is in love
with him. In his fantasies about marrying his mistress, he reveals a powerful ambition to rise
above his social class.

Feste - The clown, or fool, of Olivia s household, Feste moves between Olivia s and Orsino s

homes. He earns his living by making pointed jokes, singing old songs, being generally witty,

and offering good advice cloaked under a layer of foolishness. In spite of being a
professional fool, Feste often seems the wisest character in the play.

Sir Toby - Olivia s uncle. Olivia lets Sir Toby Belch live with her, but she does not approve of
his rowdy behavior, practical jokes, heavy drinking, late-night carousing, or friends

(specifically the idiotic Sir Andrew). Sir Toby also earns the ire of Malvolio. But Sir Toby has

an ally, and eventually a mate, in Olivia s sharp-witted waiting-gentlewoman, Maria.

Together they bring about the triumph of chaotic spirit, which Sir Toby embodies, and the

ruin of the controlling, self-righteous Malvolio.

Maria - Olivia s clever, daring young waiting-gentlewoman. Maria is remarkably similar to her

antagonist, Malvolio, who harbors aspirations of rising in the world through marriage. But

Maria succeeds where Malvolio fails perhaps because she is a woman, but, more likely,

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because she is more in tune than Malvolio with the anarchic, topsy-turvy spirit that animates
the play.

Sir Andrew Aguecheek - A friend of Sir Toby s. Sir Andrew Aguecheek attempts to court

Olivia, but he doesn t stand a chance. He thinks that he is witty, brave, young, and good at
languages and dancing, but he is actually an idiot.

Antonio - A man who rescues Sebastian after his shipwreck. Antonio has become very fond

of Sebastian, caring for him, accompanying him to Illyria, and furnishing him with money all
because of a love so strong that it seems to be romantic in nature. Antonio s attraction to
Sebastian, however, never bears fruit. Despite the ambiguous and shifting gender roles in

the play, Twelfth Night remains a romantic comedy in which the characters are destined for
marriage. In such a world, homoerotic attraction cannot be fulfilled.

Analysis of Major Characters

Viola
Like most of Shakespeare s heroines, Viola is a tremendously likable figure. She has
no serious faults, and we can easily discount the peculiarity of her decision to dress as a
man, since it sets the entire plot in motion. She is the character whose love seems the

purest. The other characters passions are fickle: Orsino jumps from Olivia to Viola, Olivia
jumps from Viola to Sebastian, and Sir Toby and Maria s marriage seems more a matter of
whim than an expression of deep and abiding passion. Only Viola seems to be truly,

passionately in love as opposed to being self-indulgently lovesick. As she says to Orsino,

describing herself and her love for him:

She pined in thought,

And with a green and yellow melancholy
She sat like patience on a monument,
Smiling at grief. Was not this love indeed?
(II.iv.111 114)

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The audience, like Orsino, can only answer with an emphatic yes. Viola s chief problem
throughout the play is one of identity. Because of her disguise, she must be both herself and
Cesario. This mounting identity crisis culminates in the final scene, when Viola finds herself

surrounded by people who each have a different idea of who she is and are unaware of who

she actually is. Were Twelfth Night not a comedy, this pressure might cause Viola to break
down. Sebastian s appearance at this point, however, effectively saves Viola by allowing her
to be herself again. Sebastian, who independent of his sister is not much of a character,

takes over the aspects of Viola s disguise that she no longer wishes to maintain. Thus
liberated by her brother, Viola is free to shed the roles that she has accumulated throughout

the play, and she can return to being Viola, the woman who has loved and won Orsino.

Orsino and Olivia

Orsino and Olivia are worth discussing together, because they have similar
personalities. Both claim to be buffeted by strong emotions, but both ultimately seem to be
self-indulgent individuals who enjoy melodrama and self-involvement more than anything.

When we first meet them, Orsino is pining away for love of Olivia, while Olivia pines away for
her dead brother. They show no interest in relating to the outside world, preferring to lock
themselves up with their sorrows and mope around their homes. Viola s arrival begins to

break both characters out of their self-involved shells, but neither undergoes a clear-cut
change. Orsino relates to Viola in a way that he never has to Olivia, diminishing his self-
involvement and making him more likable. Yet he persists in his belief that he is in love with

Olivia until the final scene, in spite of the fact that he never once speaks to her during the
course of the play. Olivia, meanwhile, sets aside her grief when Viola (disguised as Cesario)

comes to see her. But Olivia takes up her own fantasy of lovesickness, in which she pines

away with a self-indulgence that mirrors Orsino s for a man who is really a woman.
Ultimately, Orsino and Olivia seem to be out of touch with real emotion, as demonstrated by

the ease with which they shift their affections in the final scene Orsino from Olivia to Viola,

and Olivia from Cesario to Sebastian. The similarity between Orsino and Olivia does not
diminish with the end of the play, since the audience realizes that by marrying Viola and

Sebastian, respectively, Orsino and Olivia are essentially marrying female and male versions

of the same person.

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 Important Quotations Explained

Act I

Act I Scene i
If music be the food of love, play on,
Give me excess of it that, surfeiting,
The appetite may sicken and so die.
That strain again, it had a dying fall.
O, it came o er my ear like the sweet sound
That breathes upon a bank of violets,
Stealing and giving odour. Enough, no more,
Tis not so sweet now as it was before.
[Music ceases]
O spirit of love, how quick and fresh art thou
capacity
That, notwithstanding thy capacity
Receiveth as the sea, naught enters there,
Of what validity and pitch so e er,
But falls into abatement and low price
Even in a minute! So full of shapes is fancy
That it alone is high fantastical.
(I.i.1
(I.i.1 15)
15)

The play s opening speech includes one of its most famous lines, as the unhappy, lovesick
Orsino tells his servants and musicians, If music be the food of love, play on. In the speech
that follows, Orsino asks for the musicians to give him so much musical love-food that he will
overdose ( surfeit ) and cease to desire love any longer. Through these words, Shakespeare
introduces the image of love as something unwanted, something that comes upon people
unexpectedly and that is not easily avoided. But this image is complicated by Orsino s
comment about the relationship between romance and imagination: So full of shapes is
fancy / That it alone is high fantastical, he says, relating the idea of overpowering love
( fancy ) to that of imagination (that which is fantastical ). Through this connection, the play
raises the question of whether romantic love has more to do with the reality of the person
who is loved or with the lover s own imagination. For Orsino and Olivia, both of whom are

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willing to switch lovers at a moment s notice, imagination often seems more powerful than
reality.

Act I Scene v
Make me a willow cabin at your gate
And call upon my soul within the house,
Write loyal cantons of contemnèd love,
And sing them loud even in the dead of night;
Hallow your name to the reverberate hills,
And make the babbling gossip of the air
Cry out Olivia! O, you should not rest
Between the elements of air and earth
But you should pity me.
(I.v.237
(I.v. 245))
237 245

Viola (in her disguise as Cesario) delivers this speech to Olivia after Orsino has sent her to
carry his messages of love to Olivia. In this speech, however, Cesario sets aside the
prepared messages and instead tells Olivia what he would do if he were in love with her.
This speech is significant, then, because it sets the stage for Olivia s infatuation with the
person she thinks is Cesario: instead of helping win Olivia for Orsino, Cesario s passionate
words make Olivia fall in love with him. This development is understandable, when one
considers what Viola says here she insists that she would be outside Olivia s gate night
and day, proclaiming her love, until Olivia took pity on her. This kind of devotion contrasts
sharply with the way Orsino actually pursues his courtship of Olivia: instead of planting
himself outside her door and demonstrating his devotion, he prefers to remain at home,
lolling on couches and complaining of his broken heart. The contrast, then, between the
devotion that Viola imagines here and the self-involvement that characterizes Orsino s
passion for Olivia, suggests that Viola has a better understanding than Orsino of what true
love should be.

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 Act II
II

Act II
II Scene iv
There is no woman s sides
Can bide the beating of so strong a passion
As love doth give my heart; no woman s heart
So big, to hold so much. They lack retention.
Alas, their love may be called appetite,
No motion of the liver, but the palate,
That suffer surfeit, cloyment, and revolt.
But mine is all as hungry as the sea,
And can digest as much. Make no compare
Between that love a woman can bear me
And that I owe Olivia.
(II.iv.91
(II.iv. 101))
91 101

Orsino speaks these words as he discusses his love for Olivia with Cesario. Here, he argues
that there can be no comparison between the kind of love that a man has for a woman and

the kind of love that women feel for men. Women, he suggests, love only superficially in
the palate, not the liver, implying that for men love is somehow deeper and less
changeable. While his love is constant, he insists, a woman s love suffers surfeit, cloyment,
and revolt. This speech shows the extent of Orsino s self-involvement by demonstrating that
he cares only about his own emotions and assumes that whatever Olivia feels, it cannot

compare to his own feelings for her. But there is also an irony here, since Orsino ascribes
qualities to women s love that actually apply to his own infatuations. He claims that women
love superficially and can have their feelings change easily; in fact, later in the play, he
happily transfers his affections from Olivia to the revealed-as-female Viola. It is the woman,

Viola, whose love for Orsino remains constant throughout. Indeed, Viola answers this
speech by citing herself as an example of a woman who remains constant in love (without
revealing that she is talking about herself, of course). Thus, given what the audience sees
onstage, Orsino s opinions about love seem to be wrong on almost every count.

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Act II
II Scene v
Daylight and champaign discovers not more. This is open. I will be proud, I will read politic
point--device the
authors, I will baffle Sir Toby, I will wash off gross acquaintance, I will be point
very man. I do not now fool myself, to let imagination jade me; for every reason excites to
this, that my lady loves me. She did commend my yellow stockings of late, she did praise my
cross--gartered, and in this she manifests herself to my love, and with a kind of
leg, being cross
injunction drives to these habits of her liking. I thank my stars, I am happy. I will be strange,
cross--gartered, even with the swiftness of putting on. Jove
stout, in yellow stockings, and cross
and my stars be praised.
(II.v.140
(II.v. 150))
140 150

Malvolio speaks these words after he finds the letter written by Maria that seems to reveal
that Olivia is in love with him. Until this point, Malvolio has seemed a straitlaced prig with no
enthusiasms or desires beyond decorum and an orderly house. Here we see his puritanical
exterior is only a veneer, covering powerful ambitions. Malvolio dreams of being loved by
Olivia and of rising in the world to become a nobleman both of these dreams seem to be
fulfilled by the letter. For the audience, this scene is tremendously comic, since we can
easily anticipate that Malvolio will make a fool of himself when he follows the letter s
instructions and puts on yellow stockings and crossed garters. But there is also a hint of
pathos in Malvolio s situation, since we know that his grand ambitions will come crashing
down. Our pity for him increases in later scenes, when Sir Toby and Maria use his
preposterous behavior to lock him away as a madman. Malvolio is not exactly a tragic figure;
he is too absurd for that. But there is something at least pitiable in the way the vanity he

displays in this speech leads to his undoing.

ACT III

Act III Scene i

This fellow is wise enough to play the fool,
And to do that well, craves a kind of wit
(III.i.53 54)

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Once again we meet Feste the clown, and once again we notice that beneath his nonsense,

he is obviously intelligent. In fact, Viola is inspired to comment on this after her conversation
with Feste. She realizes that a good clown must be able to judge the personalities and

moods of all the people with whom he interacts, and to know when to talk, what to say, and
when to keep quiet.

Act III Scene iii

[Y]our store
I think is not for idle markets, sir
(III.iii.45 46)

Antonio s attachment to Sebastian comprises not only concern for his safety but also a

willingness to spend money on him (he even entrusts his purse to him). Antonio tells
Sebastian this statement with a double meaning. The more apparent meaning is that
Sebastian doesn t have enough money to spend on trivial things, but the words also suggest
that Sebastian is too good to spend time with just anyone and deserves the best. Once

again, Antonio s passion for his male friend and the words he uses, like jealousy and
desire strongly suggest that he feels an erotic attraction to Sebastian.

Act III Scene iv

Why, this is very midsummer madness,
(III.iv.52)

Olivia, of course, is bewildered by the change in her normally somber steward, and his
apparently illogical responses to her questions make her assume, naturally enough, that he

must be out of his mind. She interprets his quotations from the letter as simple insanity in
these words she says after listening to a string of them. But Malvolio, cut off from reality,

willfully ignores these signs that all may not be as he thinks. He fits Olivia s words to his
mistaken understanding of the situation.

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 ACT IV
Act IV Scene i
Are all the people mad? […]
Or I am mad, or else this is a dream
(IV.i.26, 60)

Sebastian briefly takes center stage in these scenes, but he fails to make much of an
impression as a character in his own right: his principal role is to serve as a male substitute

for his resourceful and attractive twin sister, Viola. Sebastian s primary state of mind in these

scenes is total confusion, which is understandable. Having arrived in a country that he has
never seen before, he is suddenly surrounded by people who seem to think they know him

and who have extreme attitudes toward him: some want to kill him, while others appear to be
in love with him. It is not surprising that, after trying to fend off the insistent Feste and being
abruptly attacked by Sir Andrew, Sebastian asks in bewilderment if these people are mad.
On the other side, Olivia s approach forces him to wonder about his own state of mind I am
mad or this is a dream . These references to insanity are significant. As he does with
Antonio and Malvolio, Shakespeare suggests here that madness and the chaos associated

with comedy are closely linked.

Act IV Scene ii
I say this house is as dark as ignorance,
ignorance, though ignorance were as dark as hell; and I say
there was never man thus abused
(IV.ii.46 48)

Malvolio is hardly a tragic figure. After all, he is only being asked to endure a single night in
darkness. But he earns our respect, nevertheless, as he stubbornly clings to his sanity, even
in the face of Feste s insistence that he is mad. Malvolio, perhaps more than anyone else in

this frenetic, zany play, knows that he is sane, and he will not allow the madness swirling in
the air of Olivia s home to destroy his sense of his own sanity. One cannot help pitying him,
in spite of his flaws. He seems to be punished for not being as mad as everyone else, more
than he is for any real sin. He cries, these words, making the darkness of his prison a

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powerful symbol for the madness that seems to have taken over the world of the play

Malvolio is right but being right avails him nothing. Twelfth Night is a play filled with
absurdity and madcap fun, and Malvolio suffers his unhappy fate because he is unable to

put his scruples, his puritanism, and his pride aside to join in the revelry.

Act IV Scene iii

[T]hough tis wonder that enwraps me thus,
Yet tis not madness,
(IV.iii.3 4)

These lines are said by Sebastian. By Act IV, scene iii, however, Sebastian begins to come
to terms with his situation. He decides that the sun that he sees is real, as are the air that he

breathes and the pearl that Olivia has given him. He even reasons out the situation with the
beautiful woman who claims to love him. If Olivia were mad, he figures, surely her servants
wouldn t obey her so she must be sane.

Act V

Act V Scene i

Orsino: If this be sso,

o, as yet the glass seems true,
I shall have share in this most happy wrack.
[To Viola
Viola]] Boy, thou hast said to me a
thousand times
Thou never shouldst love woman like to me.

Viola: And all those sayings will I overswear,

And all those swearings keep as true in soul
As doth that orbèd continent the fire
That severs day from night.

Orsino: Give me thy hand,

And let me see thee in thy woman s weeds.
(V.i.258
(V.i. 266))
258 266

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This exchange follows the climax of the play, when Sebastian and Viola are reunited, and all
the misunderstandings are cleared up. Here, Orsino ushers in a happy ending for his long-

suffering Viola by declaring his willingness to wed her. This quote thus sets the stage for
general rejoicing but it is worth noting that even here, the -gender ambiguities that Viola s
disguise has created still persist. Orsino knows that Viola is a woman and a woman,
apparently, to- whom he is attracted. Yet he addresses her as Boy in this speech, even as

he is accepting her vows of love. This incident is not isolated: later, Orsino continues to call
his new betrothed Cesario, using her male name. This odd mode of address raises, and

leaves un-answered, the question of whether Orsino is in love with Cesario, the beautiful

young man, or with Viola, the beautiful young woman.

Themes, Motifs & Symbols

Themes
Themes are the fundamental and often universal ideas explored in a literary work.

LOVE AS A CAUSE OF SUFFERING

Twelfth Night is a romantic comedy, and romantic love is the play s main focus.
Despite the fact that the play offers a happy ending, in which the various lovers find one

another and achieve wedded bliss, Shakespeare shows that love can cause pain. Many of

the characters seem to view love as a kind of curse, a feeling that attacks its victims
suddenly and disruptively. Various characters claim to suffer painfully from being in love, or,

rather, from the pangs of unrequited love. At one point, Orsino depicts love dolefully as an

appetite that he wants to satisfy and cannot (I.i.1 3); at another point, he calls his desires
fell and cruel hounds (I.i.21). Olivia more bluntly describes love as a plague from which

she suffers terribly (I.v.265). These metaphors contain an element of violence, further

painting the lovestruck as victims of some random force in the universe. Even the less
melodramatic Viola sighs unhappily that My state is desperate for my master s love

(II.ii.35). This desperation has the potential to result in violence as in Act V, scene i, when

Orsino threatens to kill Cesario because he thinks that -Cesario has forsaken him to become
Olivia s lover. Love is also exclusionary: some people achieve romantic happiness, while

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others do not. At the end of the play, as the happy lovers rejoice, both Malvolio and Antonio
are prevented from having the objects of their desire. Malvolio, who has pursued Olivia, must
ultimately face the realization that he is a fool, socially unworthy of his noble mistress.

Antonio is in a more difficult situation, as social norms do not allow for the gratification of his

apparently sexual attraction to Sebastian. Love, thus, cannot conquer all obstacles, and
those whose desires go unfulfilled remain no less in love but feel the sting of its absence all

the more severely.

THE UNCERTAINTY OF GENDER

Gender is one of the most obvious and much-discussed topics in the play. Twelfth

Night is one of Shakespeare s so-called transvestite comedies, in which a female

character in this case, Viola disguises herself as a man. This situation creates a sexual

mess: Viola falls in love with Orsino but cannot tell him, because he thinks she is a man,
while Olivia, the object of Orsino s affection, falls for Viola in her guise as Cesario. There is a
clear homoerotic subtext here: Olivia is in love with a woman, even if she thinks he is a man,

and Orsino often remarks on Cesario s beauty, suggesting that he is attracted to Viola even
before her male disguise is removed. This latent homoeroticism finds an explicit echo in the

minor character of Antonio, who is clearly in love with his male friend, Sebastian. But

Antonio s desires cannot be satisfied, while Orsino and Olivia both find tidy heterosexual
gratification once the sexual ambiguities and deceptions are straightened out. Yet, even at

the play s close, Shakespeare leaves things somewhat murky, especially in the Orsino-Viola

relationship. Orsino s declaration of love to Viola suggests that he enjoys prolonging the
pretense of Viola s masculinity. Even after he knows that Viola is a woman, Orsino says to

her, Boy, thou hast said to me a thousand times / Thou never should st love woman like to

me (V.i.260 261). Similarly, in his last lines, Orsino declares, Cesario, come / For so you
shall be while you are a man; / But when in other habits you are seen, / Orsino s mistress,

and his fancy s queen (V.i.372 375). Even once everything is revealed, Orsino continues to

address Viola by her male name. We can thus only wonder whether Orsino is truly in love
with Viola, or if he is more enamoured of her male persona.

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THE FOLLY OF AMBITION

The problem of social ambition works itself out largely through the character of
Malvolio, the steward, who seems to be a competent servant, if prudish and dour, but proves

to be, in fact, a supreme egotist, with tremendous ambitions to rise out of his social class.

Maria plays on these ambitions when she forges a letter from Olivia that makes Malvolio
believe that Olivia is in love with him and wishes to marry him. Sir Toby and the others find

this fantasy hysterically funny, of course not only because of Malvolio s unattractive
personality but also because Malvolio is not of noble blood. In the class system of
Shakespeare s time, a noblewoman would generally not sully her reputation by marrying a

man of lower social status. Yet the atmosphere of the play may render Malvolio s aspirations

less unreasonable than they initially seem. The feast of Twelfth Night, from which the play
takes its name, was a time when social hierarchies were turned upside down. That same

spirit is alive in Illyria: indeed, Malvolio s antagonist, Maria, is able to increase her social

standing by marrying Sir Toby. But it seems that Maria s success may be due to her
willingness to accept and promote the anarchy that Sir Toby and the others embrace. This

Twelfth Night spirit, then, seems to pass by Malvolio, who doesn t wholeheartedly embrace
the upending of order and decorum but rather wants to blur class lines for himself alone.

Motifs
Motifs are recurring structures, contrasts, or literary devices that can help to develop and
inform the text s major themes.

LETTERS, MESSAGES, AND TOKENS

Twelfth Night features a great variety of messages sent from one character to
another sometimes as letters and other times in the form of tokens. Such messages are
used both for purposes of communication and miscommunication sometimes deliberate
and sometimes accidental. Maria s letter to Malvolio, which purports to be from Olivia, is a

deliberate (and successful) attempt to trick the steward. Sir Andrew s letter demanding a
duel with Cesario, meanwhile, is meant seriously, but because it is so appallingly stupid, Sir

Toby does not deliver it, rendering it extraneous. Malvolio s missive, sent by way of Feste
from the dark room in which he is imprisoned, ultimately works to undo the confusion caused

15
by Maria s forged letter and to free Malvolio from his imprisonment. But letters are not the
only kind of messages that characters employ to communicate with one another. Individuals
can be employed in the place of written communication Orsino repeatedly sends Cesario,

for instance, to deliver messages to Olivia. Objects can function as messages between

people as well: Olivia sends Malvolio after Cesario with a ring, to tell the page that she loves
him, and follows the ring up with further gifts, which symbolize her romantic attachment.

Messages can convey important information, but they also create the potential for

miscommunication and confusion especially with characters like Maria and Sir Toby
manipulating the information.

MADNESS
No one is truly insane in Twelfth Night, yet a number of characters are accused of

being mad, and a current of insanity or zaniness runs through the action of the play. After Sir
Toby and Maria dupe Malvolio into believing that Olivia loves him, Malvolio behaves so
bizarrely that he is assumed to be mad and is locked away in a dark room. Malvolio himself

knows that he is sane, and he accuses everyone around him of being mad. Meanwhile,
when Antonio encounters Viola (disguised as Cesario), he mistakes her for Sebastian, and

his angry insistence that she recognize him leads people to assume that he is mad. All of

these incidents feed into the general atmosphere of the play, in which normal life is thrown
topsy-turvy, and everyone must confront a reality that is somehow fractured.

DISGUISES
Many characters in Twelfth Night assume disguises, beginning with Viola, who puts
on male attire and makes everyone else believe that she is a man. By dressing his

protagonist in male garments, Shakespeare creates endless sexual confusion with the
Olivia-Viola Orsino love triangle. Other characters in disguise include Malvolio, who puts on
crossed garters and yellow stockings in the hope of winning Olivia, and Feste, who dresses

up as a priest Sir Topas when he speaks to Malvolio after the steward has been locked in
a dark room. Feste puts on the disguise even though Malvolio will not be able to see him,

since the room is so dark, suggesting that the importance of clothing is not just in the eye of
the beholder. For Feste, the disguise completes his assumption of a new identity in order

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to be Sir Topas, he must look like Sir Topas. Viola puts on new clothes and changes her
gender, while Feste and Malvolio put on new garments either to impersonate a nobleman
(Feste) or in the hopes of becoming a nobleman (Malvolio). Through these disguises, the

play raises questions about what makes us who we are, compelling the audience to wonder

if things like gender and class are set in stone, or if they can be altered with a change of
clothing.

MISTAKEN IDENTITY
The instances of mistaken identity are related to the prevalence of disguises in the
play, as Viola s male clothing leads to her being mistaken for her brother, Sebastian, and

vice versa. Sebastian is mistaken for Viola (or rather, Cesario) by Sir Toby and Sir Andrew,
and then by Olivia, who promptly marries him. Meanwhile, Antonio mistakes Viola for

Sebastian, and thinks that his friend has betrayed him when Viola claims to not know him.
These cases of mistaken identity, common in Shakespeare s comedies, create the tangled
situation that can be resolved only when Viola and Sebastian appear together, helping

everyone to understand what has happened.

Symbols
Symbols are objects, characters, figures, or colors used to represent abstract ideas or
concepts.

OLIVIA S GIFTS
When Olivia wants to let Cesario know that she loves him, she sends him a ring by

way of Malvolio. Later, when she mistakes Sebastian for Cesario, she gives him a precious

pearl. In each case, the jewel serves as a token of her love a physical symbol of her
romantic attachment to a man who is really a woman. The gifts are more than symbols,
though. Youth is bought more oft than begged or borrowed, Olivia says at one point,

suggesting that the jewels are intended almost as bribes that she means to buy Cesario s
love if she cannot win it (III.iv.3).

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THE DARKNESS OF MALVOLIO S PRISON

When Sir Toby and Maria pretend that Malvolio is mad, they confine him in a pitch-
black chamber. Darkness becomes a symbol of his supposed insanity, as they tell him that

the room is filled with light and his inability to see is a sign of his madness. Malvolio reverses

the symbolism. I say this house is as dark as ignorance, though ignorance were as dark as
hell; and I say there was never man thus abused (IV.ii.40 42). In other words, the

darkness meaning madness is not in the room with him, but outside, with Sir Toby and
Feste and Maria, who have unjustly imprisoned him.

CHANGES OF CLOTHING
Clothes are powerful in Twelfth Night. They can symbolize changes in gender Viola
puts on male clothes to be taken for a male as well as class distinctions. When Malvolio

fantasizes about becoming a nobleman, he imagines the new clothes that he will have.
When Feste impersonates Sir Topas, he puts on a nobleman s garb, even though Malvolio,
whom he is fooling, cannot see him, suggesting that clothes have a power that transcends

their physical function.

Study Question

Disguises and changes of clothing are central to the plot of Twelfth Night. Which characters
in the play spend time in disguise, and how is this thematically important?

Answer for Study Question 1 >>

Many people in Twelfth Night assume a disguise of one kind or another. The most obvious
example is Viola, who puts on the clothing of a man and makes everyone believe that she is
a male. This disguise causes great sexual confusion, as a bizarre love triangle results in
which Viola is in love with Orsino, who loves Olivia who loves Cesario, the male identity
that Viola assumes. Thus, by dressing his protagonist in male garments, Shakespeare
shows how malleable and self-delusional human romantic attraction can be.
Another character in disguise is Malvolio, who dresses oddly (in crossed garters and yellow
stockings) in the hope of winning Olivia. In his case, the change of clothing suggests his

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belief that altering his wardrobe can lead to an alteration of his social status. When he
dreams of being Olivia s husband, he imagines himself above all in a different set of clothes,
suggesting that class and clothing are inextricably linked. Later, after Malvolio has been
declared mad and has been confined to a dark room, Feste, pretending to be the fictional
priest Sir Topas in order to deceive Malvolio, puts on a disguise even though Malvolio will
not be able to see him since the room is so dark. This scene is particularly suggestive:
Feste s desire to wear a disguise even though his victim won t see it implies that the link
between clothes and reality goes deeper than mere appearances. For Feste, at least, the
disguise makes the man in order to be Sir Topas, he must look like Sir Topas. Ultimately,
then, Shakespeare raises questions about human identity and whether such classifications
as gender and class status are fixed entities or can be changed with a simple shift of
wardrobe.
Close
Twelfth Night

Cumming Study Guide

Comic Ingredients of the Play

Shakespeare mixes Twelfth Night with a potpourri of ingredients to achieve his comic

effect a set of twins, some situation comedy, a dash of dramatic irony, a goodly dollop of
romance, three boisterous merrymakers, and a puritanical sourpuss. Following is an
explanation of how Shakespeare uses these ingredients:

The Twins
Twins
Viola and her brother, Sebastian, are twins born about an hour apart who survive a
shipwreck. When they cannot find each other, each thinks the other may be dead. Then they

go their separate ways, establishing two story lines that undergird plot surprises involving

mistaken identities.

Situation Comedy
Viola complicates the plot after she disguises herself as a young man, calling herself

Cesario, and obtains employment as a page with Duke Orsino. When she acts as a go-

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between to help the duke woo Olivia, Viola begins to fall in love with the duke while Olivia
begins to fall in love with Viola, thinking him a handsome young fellow. Thus, the play takes
on the characteristics of a modern situation comedy. Realizing her predicament, Viola says

that

My master loves her [Olivia] dearly;

And I, poor monster, fond as much on him;
And she, mistaken, seems to dote on me.
What will become of this? As I am man,
My state is desperate for my master's lo ve;
As I am woman, now alas the day!
What thriftless sighs shall poor Olivia b reathe!
O time! thou must untangle this, not I;
It is too hard a knot for me to untie! (2 .2.24-32)

Dramatic Irony
Dramatic irony occurs when a character in a play, novel, film, or any other work is unaware
of plot developments or background information known to the audience. In Twelfth Night,
Shakespeare uses dramatic irony numerous times. A memorable example of it begins with

line 23 in the second scene of Act 1, when Duke Orsino notices that Viola (disguised as
Cesario) seems preoccupied. It is, of course, budding love for the duke that preoccupies her.
Although she comes close to giving away her feelings, Orsino remains dumb to the cause of

her distraction. Here is the dialogue in which they engage:

DUKE ORSINO: My life upon't, young though thou art,

thine eye
Hath stay 'd upon some favour that it loves:
Hath it not, boy?
VIOLA: A little, b y your favour.
DUKE ORSINO: What kind of w oman is't?
VIOLA: Of your complexion.
DUKE ORSINO: She is not w orth thee, then. What
years, i' faith?
VIOLA: About your years, my lord. (2.4.23-30)

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Another example of dramatic irony occurs when Olivia declares her love for the disguised
Viola:

Cesario, by the roses of the spring,

By maidhood, honour, truth and eve ry thing,
I love thee so, that, maugre [despite] all thy p ride.
(3.1.113-115)

Romance
The love bug bites not only Viola, Orsino, and Olivia but also Viola s brother, Sebastian,
along with Sir Toby Belch and Maria and even priggish Malvolio. However, Malvolio is
more in love with himself than with Olivia.

The Merrymakers and Malvolio

The adventures of Sir Toby Belch, Sir Andrew Aguecheek, and Feste the Fool provide

rousing comic interludes between the other parts of the play. Especially delightful is the trick
the threesome play on dour Malvolio with the help of Maria in which they convince him

that Viola loves him. Malvolio helps make the play work; he is the gray cloud that blocks the
sunlight and evokes cheers when he passes

THE END

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