Introduction
Twelfth Night, set in Illyria (Turkey), is often considered one of Shakespeare’s greatest comedies. It is a very energetic play, which refuses to take itself too seriously. It moves at a very fast comedic pace, while the the narrative is punctuated by impersonation and mistaken identity. Olivia is in mourning and refuses to admit Duke Orsino, who wishes desperately to woo her. Sir Andrew Aguecheek and Malvolio, her steward, are also in love with her. A shipwreck brings Viola to court, also in mourning, as she was separated from her brother in the shipwreck and presumes him to be dead. She disguises herself as Cesario, a man, in order to protect herself from the advances of men, and serves Duke Orsino as his page. Complex comedy results when ‘Cesario’ is sent by Orsino to plead his love to Olivia, but Olivia falls in love with Cesario and Duke Orsino is smitten by Viola. Viola / Cesario may be one and the same but are a major catalyst for most of the other characters in the play. Meanwhile, Viola’s brother, Sebastian, shows up and the confusion only mounts. Sir Andrew Aguecheek, in love with Olivia, challenges ‘Cesario’ to a most farcical duel. The Puritan Malvolio is duped into thinking his mistress, Olivia, is in love with him, and he suffers a profound humiliation at the hands of those who genuinely despise him. He is a humourless Puritan and no one mourns his demise. In the end, this being a comedy, all is well for the Duke, who marries Viola, while Olivia marries the resurrected Sebastian. Only Malvolio remains miserable in the end. Amid these various characters wanders Feste, the professional fool, and perhaps the only sane and truly intelligent person in the play, who mocks everyone and has a large presence in his brief time on the stage. Feste is a classic example of the typical court fool, who seemingly directs the spirit of the play. He demonstrates the play’s highest wisdom and its lowest buffoonery, making him one of Shakespeare’s finest fools. It may be presented as either Feste’s play or Malvolio’s, depending on the production. Feste is the most charming of Shakespeare’s many fools and Malvolio one of his most original creations.
Twelfth Night is a gender bender of a play with mistaken identity a plenty. The play’s title refers to the twelfth night of Christmas celebrations, on January 5th, the Feast of the Epiphany. In Elizabethan England this was the great riotous night of revels, with much eating, drinking and masking, before things returned to normal the following day. This is a thoroughly delightful comedy, making us laugh at the follies of mankind. There is afforded ample absurdity and nonsense a plenty. It is the apex of the Bard’s achievement in comedy and his last free and easy comedy.
Act I (5 scenes)
Scene i
The Duke’s palace
Enter Duke Orsino and Curio
Duke: “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. Enough, no more; ’tis not so sweet now as it was before. O spirit of love, how quick and fresh art thou! So full of shapes is fancy, that it alone is high fantastical. O, when mine eyes did see Olivia first, methought she purged the air of pestilence!”
Enter Valentine
Duke: “What news from her?”
Valentine: “From her handmaid returns this answer: the elements themselves, for seven years, shall not behold her face at ample view; but like a cloistress she will veiled walk; all this to season a brother’s dead love, which she would keep fresh and lasting inner sad remembrance.”
Duke: “O, to pay this debt of love but to a brother.”
Analysis
The entire play begins with its most famous passage: ‘If music be the food of love, play on…’ Duke Orsino is hopelessly in love with Olivia, who refuses to see anyone for seven years, following the death of her brother. The Duke instructs the musicians to give him an overdose of music – the food of love – so that he will no longer be hungry for love.
Act I
Scene ii
The sea coast
Enter Viola and a captain and sailors.
Viola: “What country is this?”
Captain: “This is Illyria, lady.”
Viola: “And what should I do in Illyria? My brother is in Elysium. Perchance he is not drowned – what think you sailor?”
Captain: “It is perchance that you yourself were saved.”
Viola: “O my poor brother! And so perchance may he be.”
Captain: “After our ship did split, I saw your brother, most provident in peril, bind himself to a strong mast; where I saw him hold acquaintance with the waves so long as I could see.”
Viola: “For saying so, there’s gold. Know’st thou this county?”
Captain: “Ay, madam, well.”
Viola: “Who governs here?”
Captain: “A noble duke.”
Viola: “What is his name?”
Captain: “Orsino.”
Viola: “Orsino! I have heard my father name him. He was a bachelor then.”
Captain: “He did seek the love of fair Olivia, a virtuous maid, and the daughter of a count who died some twelve months hence, leaving her in the protection of her brother, who shortly also died, for whose dear love, she hath abjured the company and sight of men.”
Viola: “O that I served that lady.”
Captain: “She will admit no kind of suit.”
Viola: “Conceal me what I am, and be my aid for such disguise, as happily shall become the form of my intent. I’ll serve this duke: thou shall present me as a eunuch to him, only shape thou thy silence to my wit.”
Captain: “Be you this eunuch and your mute I’ll be; when my tongue blabs, then let mine eyes not see.”
Viola: “I thank thee. Lead me on.”
Analysis
Viola survives a shipwreck and is distressed that her brother is missing. She finds herself in a strange new land, where the captain tells her Duke Orsino presides. She hears about how Olivia is in mourning for her brother’s death and wishes she could serve Olivia, as she too suffers the loss of a brother and would like to hide herself away from the world, as Olivia has done. But Olivia will admit no one so Viola decides to disguise herself as a man and serve the Duke as a eunuch, which introduces the motif of mistaken identity, which will generate endless plot advancements. Shakespeare has Viola suggest she will present herself in Illyria as a eunuch, but this is never developed. She will merely be a delicate young man, named Cesario.”
Act I
Scene iii
Olivia’s house
Enter Sir Toby Belch and Maria
Sir Toby: “What a plague means my niece to take the death of her brother thus? I am sure care’s an enemy to life.”
Maria: “By my troth, Sir Toby, you must come in earlier at nights; my lady takes great exceptions to your ill hours. You must confine yourself within the modest limits of order.”
Sir Toby: “Confine! I’ll confine myself no finer than I am.”
Maria: “Quaffing and drinking will undo you; I heard my lady talk of it yesterday, and of a foolish knight who you brought in one night here to be her wooer.”
Sir Toby: “Who? Sir Andrew Aguecheek?”
Maria: “Ay, he. He’s a very fool and a prodigal.”
Sir Toby: “Fie that you’ll say so! He speaks three or four languages word for word and hath all the good gifts of nature.”
Maria: “Besides that he’s a fool, he’s a great quarreller.”
Sir Toby: “They are scoundrels that say so of him.”
Maria: “He’s drunk nightly in your company.”
Sir Toby: “With drinking health to my niece; I’ll drink to her so long as there is a passage in my throat and drink in Illyria. Here comes Sir Andrew.”
Enter Sir Andrew Aguecheek
Sir Andrew: “How now, Sir Toby Belch!”
Sir Toby: “Sweet Sir Andrew!”
Sir Andrew: “Bless you, fair shrew.”
Maria: “And you too, sir.”
Sir Andrew: “Fair lady, do you think you have fools in hand?”
Maria: “Sir, I have not you by the hand.”
Exit Maria
Sir Andrew: “Methinks sometimes I have no more wit than a Christian. O , had I but followed the arts. I’ll stay a month longer. I am a fellow of the strangest mind in the world; I delight in masques and revels. Shall we set about some revels?”
Sir Toby: “What shall we do else?”
Analysis
Sir Toby Belch is Olivia’s uncle, and lives in the house with her. Sir Toby has a friend visiting and Maria, Olivia’s woman in waiting, thinks Sir Andrew is but a fool, a brawler and a drunkard. Sir Andrew will, along with the Duke and Malvolio, pursue Olivia as a love interest. Sir Toby, Sir Andrew and Maria are comic characters. Sir Toby and Maria often use a wit that Sir Andrew cannot even follow.
At this point we have met most of the principle characters: Duke Orsino in scene I, Viola in scene ii and Maria, Sir Toby and Sir Andrew in scene iii. Olivia, Feste the fool and Malvolio are still to come in Act I. Sebastian, Viola’s brother, will enter the story in Act III.
Act I
Scene iv
The Duke’s palace
Enter Valentine and Viola, disguised as a man named Cesario.
Valentine: “If the Duke continue these favours towards you, Cesario, you are like to be much advanced; he hath known you but three days, and already you are no stranger.”
Viola: “I thank you. Here comes the Count.”
Duke: “Who saw Cesario, ho?”
Violo: “On your attendance, my lord, here.”
Duke: “Cesario, thou know’st no less than all; I have unclasped to thee the book even of my secret soul. Therefore, good youth, address thy gait unto her; be not denied access, stand at her doors.”
Viola: “If she be so abandoned to her sorrow as it is spoke, she never will admit me.”
Duke: “Be clamorous and leap all civil bounds.”
Viola: “Say I do speak with her, my lord, what then?”
Duke: “Unfold the passion of my love. It shall become thee well to act my woes: she will attend it better in thy youth.”
Viola: “I think not so, my lord.”
Duke: “Dear lad, believe it, for they shall yet belie thy happy years that say thou art a man; Diana’s lip is not more smooth and thy small pipe is as the maiden’s organ, shrill and sound, and all is semblative a woman’s part. Prosper well in this, and thou shall live as freely as thy lord to call his fortune thine.”
Viola: “I’ll do my best to woo your lady. (aside) Yet, a barful strife! Whoever I woo, myself would be his wife.”
Analysis
Viola works as a page to Duke Orsino and has adopted a new look and name. ‘He’ is now Cesario and the Duke is exceedingly fond of ‘him’, and asks that Cesario deliver his messages of love to Olivia. The Duke believes that when the messages are delivered from such a handsome young man, Olivia may be more likely to accept them. In fact, the Duke perceives Cesario as having the attractive features of a beautiful woman: his smooth lips and high pitched voice, etc. He asks Cesario to essentially woo Olivia on his behalf. She reluctantly agrees and then admits to us that she, Viola, has fallen in love with Duke Orsino, and wishes she could be his wife. So the plot is about to turn complex as we have a scenario developing here wherein the Duke is in love with Olivia, but is increasingly in love with Cesario (Viola) as well, while Viola is in love with the Duke, but Olivia will also become smitten by Cesario. The gender bending gets complicated as the Duke is attracted to Cesario because of his strong feminine characteristics. Only we know, along with Viola, that Cesario really is a woman. Meanwhile Olivia will fall in love with the disguise itself, Cesario, even though he does not really exist, but as Viola. The Duke loves this man who has female characteristics and will, in fact, turn out to be a woman, while Olivia falls for a man who is simply a woman. That will not work out for her, and yet she will prove very content in the end. Hmmm. Very complex, but then we must consider, also, that in Shakespeare’s day no women were permitted on stage so that Viola would have been portrayed as a woman being played on stage by a man playing a woman, who is also acting in disguise as a man. Goodness!
Act I
Scene v
Olivia’s house
Enter Maria and the Fool
Maria: “Nay, either tell me where thou hast been, or I will not open my lips. My lady will hang thee for thy absence.”
Fool: “Let her hang me.”
Maria: “Yet you will be hanged for being so long absent; or to be turned away – is that not as good as a hanging to you?”
Fool: “Many a good hanging prevents a bad marriage.“
Maria: “Here comes my lady. Make your excuse wisely.”
Exit Maria
Enter Olivia and Malvolio
Fool: “Wit, put me into good fooling! Better a witty fool than a foolish wit. God bless thee lady!”
Olivia: “Take the fool away.”
Fool: “Do you not hear, fellows? Take away the lady.”
Olivia: “You are a dry fool; I’ll no more of you. Besides, you grow dishonest.”
Fool: “Two faults, Madonna, that drinks and good counsel will amend; for give the dry fool drink, then is the fool not dry. Bid the dishonest man mend himself; if he mend, he is no longer dishonest. The lady bade take away the fool; therefore, I say again, take her away.”
Olivia: “Sir, I bade them take you away.”
Fool: “Lady, give me leave to prove you a fool.”
Olivia: “Can you do it?”
Fool: “Dexteriously, good Madonna.”
Olivia: “Make your proof.”
Fool: “Good Madonna, why mourns thou?”
Olivia: “Good fool, for my brother’s death.”
Fool: “I think his soul is in hell, Madonna.”
Olivia: “I know his soul’s in heaven, fool.”
Fool: “The more fool, Madonna, to mourn for your brother’s soul being in heaven. Take away the fool, gentlemen.”
Olivia: “What think you of this fool, Malvolio?”
Malvolio: “I marvel your ladyship takes delight in such a barren rascal.”
Olivia: “O, you are sick of self-love, Malvolio, and taste with a distempered appetite. There is no slander in an allowed fool, though he do nothing but rail.”
Fool: “Now Mercury endue thee with leasing, for thou speaks well of fools!”
Enter Maria
Maria: “Madam, there is at the gate a young gentleman who much desires to speak with you. ‘Tis a fair young man, and well attended.”
Olivia: “Go you, Malvolio: if it be a suit from the Count, I am sick, or not at home – what you will to dismiss it.”
Exit Malvolio
Enter Sir Toby
Olivia: “By mine honour, half drunk! What is he at the gate, cousin?”
Sir Toby: “A gentleman.”
Enter Malvolio
Malvolio: “Madam, yonder fellow swears he will speak with you.”
Olivia: “What kind of man is he? What manner of man?”
Malvolio: “Of very ill manner.”
Olivia: “Of what personage and years is he?”
Malvolio: “Not yet old enough for a man, nor young enough for a boy; between boy and man. He is very well-favoured.”
Olivia: “Let him approach. Give me my veil; come, throw it over my face; we’ll once more hear Orsino’s embassy.”
Enter Viola
Viola: “The honourable lady of the house, which is she?”
Olivia: “Speak to me; I shall answer for her. Your will? Whence come you, sir? Are you a comedian?”
Viola: “No, my profound heart; I am not that I play. Are you the lady of the house?”
Olivia: “I am.”
Viola: “This is from my commission. I will on with my speech in your praise, and then show you the heart of my message.”
Olivia: “Come to what is important in it. I forgive you the praise. I heard you were saucy at my gates.”
Maria: “Will you hoist sail, sir? Here lies your way.”
Viola: “No, good swabber, I am here to hull a little longer.”
Olivia: “Tell me your mind.”
Viola: “I am a messenger.”
Olivia: “Sure, you have some hideous matter to deliver.”
Viola: “It alone concerns your ear. I hold the olive in my hand; my words are as full of peace as matter.”
Olivia: “Yet you begin rudely. What are you? What would you?”
Viola: “What I am and what I would are as secret as maidenhead – to your ears, divinity; to any other’s profanation.”
Olivia: “Give us the place alone; we will hear this divinity.”
Exit Maria and attendants
Olivia: “Where lies your text?”
Viola: “In Orsino’s bosom.”
Olivia: “In his bosom! O, I have read it; it is heresy. Have you no more to say?”
Viola: “Good maid, let me see your face.”
Olivia: “We will draw the curtain and show you the picture. (unveiling). Look you, sir; is it not well done?”
Viola: “Excellently done. Lady, you are the cruellest she alive, if you will leave these graces to the grave, and leave the world no copy.”
Olivia: “Were you sent hither to praise me?”
Viola: “My lord and master loves you.”
Olivia: “How does he love me?”
Viola: “With adoration, fertile tears, with groans that thunder love, with sighs of fire.”
Olivia: “I cannot love him. Yet I suppose him virtuous, know him noble, of great estate, in voices well divulged, free, learned and valiant, and in dimension a gracious person; but yet I cannot love him. He might have took his answer long ago.”
Viola: “If I did love you in my master’s flame, with such a suffering, such a deadly life, in your denial I would find no sense; I would not understand it.”
Olivia: “What would you?”
Viola: “Write loyal cantons of contemned love; halloo your name to the reverberate hills; cry out Olivia!”
Olivia: “You might do much. What is your parentage? Get you to your lord. I cannot love him, let him send no more – unless perchance you come to me again to tell me how he takes it. Fare you well. Spend this for me.”
Viola: “I am no fee’d post, lady; keep your purse. Farewell, fair cruelty.”
Exit Viola
Olivia: “‘I am a gentleman.’ I’ll be sworn thou art; thy tongue, thy face, thy limbs, actions and spirit, do give thee five-fold blazon. How now! Even so quickly may one catch the plague? Methinks I feel this youth’s perfections.”
Enter Malvolio
Olivia: “Run after that same peevish messenger. He left this ring behind him. Tell him I’ll none of it. Desire him not to flatter with his lord, nor hold him up with hopes; I am not for him. If that the youth will come this way tomorrow, I’ll give him reason for it.”
Analysis
This scene affords us a glimpse at Olivia’s household and three of her attendants. Maria is her waiting woman and she spares with Feste, her fool. Malvolio is her steward and does not understand why Feste is allowed to remain in her service, as all he does is insult everyone, including Olivia. She assures Malvolio that the Fool is harmless. Many well to do households kept a fool to entertain the family and to speak the truth when no one else dared to. Fools were actually anything but fools and possessed exceptional wit and intelligence and Feste is one of Shakespeare’s finest fools. Malvolio is one of the best known characters in Twelfth Night. He is in a riotous household and an uproarious comedy even though he is as humourless as any character in all of Shakespeare. He seems out of place in Twelfth Night. It is suggested that he is a Puritan, which might explain why Shakespeare allows him to be so abused in the acts that follow. After all, it was the Puritans who were constantly threatening to shut down the theatre scene in London. When Maria reports that there is a young man at the gates, Olivia sends Malvolio to get rid of him but Malvolio comes back to report that the young man refuses to leave. Olivia is intrigued and agrees to see Viola, dressed as Cesario. Viola delivers her wooing message from Duke Orsino but Olivia is less and less interested in the Duke and increasingly intrigued by Viola as Cesario. She instructs Cesario to inform the Duke that she can never love him, but then she invites Cesario back, if he wishes, to discuss how Orsino took the news of rejection. It seems that Olivia has fallen in love with Cesario. So, Act I has introduced us to nearly all of the main characters and the plot has begun to twist with the arrival of Viola / Cesario, as both Duke Orsino and Olivia are attracted to ‘him’. The middle three acts will build upon on these complexities and all will be resolved well for everyone other, than Malvolio, in Act V.
Act II (5 scenes)
Scene i
The Sea coast
Enter Antonio and Sebastian
Sebastian: “For some hour before you took me from the breach of the sea was my sister drowned.”
Antonio: “Alas the day.”
Sebastian: “It was said she much resembled me. She bore a mind the envy could not but call fair. She is drowned already, sir, with salt water, though I seem to drown her remembrance again with more.”
Antonio: “Let me be your servant.”
Sebastian: “I am bound to Count Orsino’s court. Farewell.”
Exit Sebastian
Antonio: “I have many enemies in Orsino’s court, else would I very shortly see thee there. But come what may, I do adore thee so that danger shall seem sport, and I will go.”
Analysis
Sebastian is Viola’s brother, who we now know was also rescued in their shipwreck, although each fears the other did not survive. Apparently Antonio recused Sebastian and has taken care of him. Sebastian is now prepared to venture off on his own to, of all places, Orsino’s Court. Antonio is exceedingly fond of Sebastian, and although he has many enemies in Orsino’s court, he is prepared to follow him there nonetheless. We must remember that Sebastian and Viola are twins and look much alike, so the confusions could increase significantly with the arrival of a Viola look alike brother in Duke Orsino’s court.
Act II
Scene ii
A street
Enter Viola and Malvolio
Malvolio: “Were you not even now with the Countess Olivia?”
Viola: “Even now, sir.”
Malvolio: “She returns this ring to you, sir; you might have saved me my pains, to have taken it away yourself. She adds, moreover, that you should put your lord into a desperate assurance she will none of him. And one thing more: that you be never so hardy to come again in his affairs, unless it be to report your lord’s taking of this. Receive it so.”
Viola: “She took the ring of me; I’ll none of it.”
Malvolio: “Her will is it should be so returned.”
Malvolio exits
Viola: “I left no ring with her; what means this lady? She made good view of me; she loves me, sure. I am the man. Poor lady, she would better love a dream. Disguise, I see thou art a wickedness. My master loves her 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 love; as I am woman, what thriftless sighs shall poor Olivia breathe! O time, thou must untangle this, not I; Its too hard a knot for me to untie!”
Analysis
Viola did not leave a ring behind with Olivia, so she knows that Olivia has planted the ring and is interested in her. She plays along, intrigued where this is going. Olivia has, in fact, fallen in love with another woman, as she seems to believe that Cesario is really just Cesario and not Viola in disguise. ‘Poor lady, she would better love a dream.’ And Viola, dressed again as a man, has fallen for the Duke, who has also fallen for her, only again, disguised as a very feminine Cesario. Viola is in love with Orsino and loved by Olivia, but both in disguise as Cesario. She can only hope that time will untangle this web of intrigue, since she has no idea how to do so. As in The Comedy of Errors, Shakespeare expands upon the confusions of mistaken identity and plays them for every conceivable plot device.
Act II
Scene iii
Olivia’s house
Enter Sir Toby and Sir Andrew
Sir Toby: “Does not our lives consist of four elements?”
Sir Andrew: “Faith, so they say; but I think it rather consists of eating and drinking.”
Enter the Fool
Sir Andrew: “Here comes the fool, in faith.”
Sir Toby: “Welcome, ass.”
Sir Andrew: “In sooth, thou wast in very gracious fooling last night.”
Sir Toby: “Come on, there is sixpence for you. Let’s have a song.”
Fool: “Would you have a love song or a song of good life?”
Sir Toby: “A love song, a love song.”
Sir Andrew: “Ay, ay; I care not for good life.”
The Fool sings
Sir Andrew: “Excellent good, in faith.”
Sir Toby: “Good, good!”
Sir Andrew: “A mellifluous voice, as I am a true knight.”
Sir Toby: “A contagious breath.”
Sir Andrew: “Begin again, fool: it begins ‘Hold thy peace.’
Fool: “I shall never begin if I hold my peace.”
Enter Maria
Maria: “What a caterwauling do you keep here! If my lady has not called up her steward Malvolio, and bid him turn you out of doors, never trust me.”
Sir Toby: (singing) “O the twelfth day of December -“
Maria: “For the love of God, peace!”
Enter Malvolio
Malvolio: “My masters, ae you mad? Have you no wit, manners, not honesty, but to gabble like tinkers at this time of night? Do ye make an ale-house of my lady’s home? Is there no respect of place, persons, nor time in you? Sir Toby, I must be round with you. My lady bade me tell you that, though she harbours you as her kinsman, she’s nothing allied to your disorders. If you can separate yourself and your misdemeanours, you are welcome to the house; if not she is very willing to bid you farewell.”
Sir Toby: “Does thou think, because thou art virtuous, there shall be no more cakes and ale?”
Malvolio: Mistress Maria, if you prized my lady’s favour at anything more than contempt, you would not give means for this uncivil rule; she shall know of it, by this hand.”
Malvolio exits
Maria: “Go shake your ears. Sweet Sir Toby, be patient tonight. For Monsieur Malvolio, let me alone with him; if I do not make him a common recreation, do not think I have wit enough to lie straight in my bed. I know I can do it.”
Sir Toby: “Posses us, possess us; tell us something of him.”
Maria: “He is a kind of Puritan.”
Sir Andrew: “O, if I thought that, I’d beat him like a dog.”
Sir Toby: “What, for being a Puritan?”
Sir Andrew: “I have no exquisite reason for it, but I have reason good enough.”
Maria: “The devil a Puritan that he is. It is his grounds of faith that all that look on him love him; and on that vice in him, will my revenge find notable cause to work.”
Sir Toby: “What wilt thou do?”
Maria: “I will drop in his way some obscure epistles of love. He shall find himself most feelingly personated. I can write very like my lady.”
Sir Toby: “Excellent! I smell a device. He shall think by the letters that they come from my niece, and that she’s in love with him.”
Maria: “My purpose is, indeed, a horse of that colour.”
Sir Andrew: “And your horse now would make him an ass.”
Maria: “Ass, I doubt not. I know my physic will work on him.”
Analysis
And so the play’s most significant intrigue begins. Maria will set up Malvolio to believe that his Mistress, Olivia, who he pines for, is in love with him. Maria will leave notes in Olivia’s handwriting, suggesting as much. Sir Toby and Sir Andrew are very excited because they all hold the stuffy old Puritan, Malvolio, in harsh contempt. Maria is certain her prank will prove effective because Malvolio suffers from too much self-love and his ego will ensure he falls for this joke. The man who hates folly will be tricked into displaying it at his own expense. Clearly Sir Toby and Sir Andrew are out of control with the noise they make in the middle of the .night. But they cannot handle Malvolio being the one to shut them down and so they are extremely excited about Maria’s jest.
Act II
Scene iv
The Duke’s palace
Enter the Duke, Viola and Curio
Duke: “Give me some music!”
Music plays
Duke: “For such as I am all true lovers are, unstaid and skittish in all motions else save in the constant image of the creature that is beloved. How dost thou like this tune?”
Viola: “It gives a very echo to the seat where love is throned.”
Duke: “Thou dost speak masterly. Thine eye hath stayed upon some favour that it loves; hath it not, boy?”
Viola: “A little.”
Duke: “What kind of woman is it?”
Viola: “Of your complexion.”
Duke: “What years, in faith?”
Viola: “About your years, my lord.”
Duke: “Too old, by heaven!”
Fool: “Are you ready, sir?”
Duke: “Ay; prithee, sing.”
The Fool sings
Duke: “There’s for thy pains.”
Fool: “No pains, sir; I take pleasure in singing, sir.”
Duke: “I’ll pay thy pleasure then.”
Fool: “Now the melancholy god protect thee.”
Exit the Fool
Duke: “Once more, Cesario, tell her my love.”
Viola: But if she cannot love you, sir?”
Duke: “I cannot be so answered.”
Viola: “Sooth, but you must.”
Duke: “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; 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.”
Viola:” Ay, but I know -“
Duke: “What dost thou know?”
Viola: “What love women to men may owe. In faith, they are as true of heart as we. My father had a daughter loved a man, as it might be perhaps, were I a woman, I should your lordship. We men say more, swear more, but indeed our shows are more than will; for still we prove much in our vows, but little in our love.”
Duke: “But died thy sister of her love, my boy?”
Viola: I am all the daughters of my father’s house, and all the brothers too – and yet I know not. Sir, shall I to this lady?”
Duke: “Ay, that’s the theme. To her in haste.”
Analysis
Orsino is discussing love with Viola, disguised as Cesario. The Duke perceives that Viola is in love and she responds that this may be true, even though it is the Duke she is in love with, but of course he only knows her to be Cesario, so he can hardly pick up her hints that she is really in love with the Duke himself. ‘What kind of woman is it’, he asks. ‘Of your complexion.’ ‘What years?’ ‘About your years, my lord’. He sends her off to Olivia again and Viola tries to tell him that he has no hope in Olivia, since she is resolved that she cannot love him. But he refuses to accept that possibility. Viola tells the story of a woman who died for the love of a man she could never tell of her love. She claims the woman is her father’s daughter and that she herself is her father’s only daughter. But the disguise as a man throws the Duke off the trail and he does not follow what she is trying to tell him. He asks her if her sister died of her love and Viola’s response is honest: ‘Yet I know not.” The Duke is hopelessly in love with Olivia, as Viola, the Duke’s messenger for Olivia, is increasingly in love with Duke Orsino. Only Viola will attain her chosen love, but all three will be wholly satisfied in the end.
Act II
Scene v
Olivia’s garden
Enter Sir Toby, Sir Andrew and Fabian
Sir Toby: “Come, Signor Fabian.”
Fabian: “If I lose a scruple of this sport let me be boiled to death with melancholy.”
Sir Toby: “Would thou not be glad to have the rascally sheep-biter come by some notable shame?”
Fabian: “I would exult, man.”
Sir Toby: “To anger him, we will fool him black and blue.”
Enter Maria
Maria: “Get ye all three into the box-tree. Malvolio’s coming down this walk. Observe him, for the love of mockery, for I know this letter will make a contemplative idiot of him.
As the men hide Maria drops a letter
Enter Malvolio
Malvolio: “She uses me with a more exalted respect than any one else that follows her.”
Sir Toby: “Here’s an overweening rogue!”
Fabian: “Contemplation makes a rare turkey-cock of him.”
Sir Andrew: “I could so beat the rogue.”
Malvolio: “To be Count Malvolio!”
Sir Toby: “Ah, rogue!”
Sir Andrew: “Pistol him, pistol him.”
Malvolio: “Having been three months married to her, sitting in my state, calling my officers about me, in my branched velvet gown, having come from a day-bed – where I have left Olivia sleeping.”
Sir Toby: “Fire and brimstone!”
Malvolio: “And then to ask for my kinsman Toby -“
Sir Toby: “Bolts and shackles!”
Malvolio: “Toby approaches; curtsies there to me.”
Sir Toby: “Shall this fellow live?”
Malvolio: “I extend my hand to him thus, saying ‘cousin Toby, you must amend your drunkeness.”
Sir Toby: “Out, scab!”
Malvolio: “Besides, you waste the treasure of your time with a foolish knight.”
Sir Andrew: “That’s me, I warrant you.”
Malvolio: “One Sir Andrew.”
Sir Andrew: “I knew ’twas I; for many do call me fool.”
Malvolio: “What employment have we here?”
Malvolio takes up the letter
Malvolio: “By my life, this is my lady’s hand: these be her very Cs, her Us, and her Ts; and thus makes she her great Ps.”
Malvolio: (reads) “‘To the unknown beloved.’ Tis my lady. To whom should this be? (reads) ‘Jove knows I love, but who? No man must know.’ No man must know. If this should be thee, Malvolio. (reads) ‘I may command where I adore. M.O.A.I. doth sway my life.’ M.O.A.I. doth sway my life. But first let me see. I may command where I adore. Why she may command me. I serve her; she is my lady. M.O.A.I. M – Malvolio; M – why, that begins my name.”
Fabian: “Did I not say he would work it out. The cur is excellent at faults.”
Malvolio: “M – A should follow, but O does.”
Sir Toby: “I’ll cudgel him, and make him cry ‘O'”
Malvolio: “M.O.A.I. Every one of these letters are in my name. Soft! Here follows prose. (Reads) ‘If this fall into thy hand, revolve in my stars I am above thee, but be not afraid of greatness. Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them. To inure thyself to what thou art like to be, appear fresh. Be opposite with a kinsman. She thus advises thee that sighs for me. Remember who commended thy yellow stockings, and wished to see thee ever cross-gartered. I say, remember. Go to, thou art made, if thou desires to be so; if not, let me see thee a steward still, the fellow of servants, and not worthy to touch fortune’s fingers. Farewell. She that would alter services with thee, THE FORTUNATE UNHAPPY’. I will be proud, I will read politic authors, I will baffle Sir Toby. Every reason excites to this, that my lady loves me. She did commend my yellow stockings of late, she did praise my leg being cross-gartered; and in this she manifests herself to my love, and drives me to these habits of her liking. I thank my stars I am happy. Here is yet a postscript: (reads) ‘Thou can not choose but know who I am. If thou entertains my love, let it appear in thy smiling.’ I will smile; I will do everything that thou would have me.”
Exit Malvolio
Sir Toby: “I could marry this wench for this device. And ask no other dowry with her but such another jest.”
Enter Maria
Fabian: “Here comes my noble gull-catcher.”
Sir Toby: “Why, thou has put him in such a dream that when the image of it leaves him he must run mad.”
Maria: “Does it work upon him? If you will then see the fruits of the sport, mark his first approach before my lady. He will come to her in yellow stockings, and ’tis a colour she abhors, and cross-gartered, a fashion she detests; and he will smile upon her, which will now be so unsuitable to her disposition, being addicted to a melancholy as she is, that it cannot but turn him into a notable contempt. If you will see it, follow me.”
Analysis
Olivia’s household is planning a practical joke on Malvolio, after he criticized them for their rowdy nocturnal behaviour. Maria has written a letter suggesting that Olivia is in love with him, and he falls for it hook, line and sinker. The letter indicates that Olivia is in love with someone and Malvolio comes to believe that it is he who she is in love with. The letter proceeds to instruct Malvolio to dress in ways that Olivia actually abhors. Maria, Sir Toby, Sir Andrew and Fabian are thrilled that Malvolio has taken the bait. They can’t wait for Malvolio to make a fool of himself. He will indeed be humiliated, which makes many people uncomfortable with this particular jest. Malvolio is the only character who is not happy at the end of the play. Shakespeare’s Puritan pays a significant price for being such a humourless and dour character, and his comeuppance is what Olivia’s household devoutly wishes to witness.
Act III (4 scenes)
Scene I
Olivia’s garden
Enter Viola and the Fool
Fool: “I live by the church.”
Viola: “Art thou a churchman?”
Fool: “No, but I do live by the church; for I do live at my house, and my house doth stand by the church.”
Viola: “They that dally nicely with words may quickly make them wanton. I warrant thou art a merry fellow and cares for nothing.”
Fool: “Not so, sir; I do care for something; but in my conscience, sir, I do not care for you. If that be to care for nothing, sir, I would it would make you invisible.”
Viola: “Art not thou the Lady Olivia’s fool?”
Fool: “No, indeed, sir; the Lady Olivia has no folly; she will keep no fool, sir, till she be married. I am indeed not her fool, but her corrupter of words.”
Viola: “I saw thee late at the Count Orsino’s.”
Fool: “Foolery, sir, does walk about the orb like the sun – it shines everywhere. I would be sorry, sir, but the fool should be as often with your master as with my mistress: I think I saw your wisdom there.”
Viola: “I’ll no more with thee. Hold, there’s expenses for thee.”
Viola gives a coin to the fool
Exit fool
Viola: “This fellow is wise enough to play the fool; and to do that well craves a kind of wit. He must observe their mood on whom he jests, the quality of persons, and the time. This is a practice as full of labour as a wise man’s art: for folly that he wisely shows is fit; but wise men, folly-fallen, quite taint their wit.“
Enter Olivia, Sir Toby, Sir Andrew and Maria
Viola: “My matter hath no voice, lady, but to your own vouchsafed ear.”
Olivia: “Let the garden door be shut, and leave me to my hearing.”
Exit all but Viola and Olivia
Olivia: “Give me your hand, sir. What is your name?”
Viola: “Cesario is your servant’s name, fair princess.”
Olivia: “My servant, sir! You are servant to the Count Orsino, youth.”
Viola: “And he is yours, and his must needs be yours: your servant’s servant is your servant, madam.”
Olivia: “For him, I think not on him; for his thoughts, would they were blanks rather than filled with me!”
Viola: “Madam, I come to whet your gentle thoughts on his behalf.”
Olivia: “O, by your leave, I pray you: I bade you never speak again of him; but, would you undertake another suit, I had rather hear you to solicit that than music from the sphere. The clock upbraids me with the waste of time. I prithee tell me what thou thinks of me.”
Viola: “That you do think that you are not what you are.”
Olivia: “If I think so, I think the same of you.”
Viola: “Then think you right: I am not what I am.”
Olivia: “I would you were as I would have you be!”
Viola: “Would it be better, madam, than I am? I wish it might, for now I am your fool.”
Olivia: “Cesario, by the roses of the spring, by maidenhood, honour, truth and everything, I love thee. Love sought is good, but given unsought is better.“
Viola: “By innocence, I swear, and by my youth, I have one heart, and that no woman has; nor never none shall mistress be of it, save I alone. And so, adieu, good madam; never more will I my master’s tears to you deplore.”
Olivia: “Yet come again.”
Analysis
Viola is delivering yet another love message to Olivia when she encounters the fool. They exchange follies and after he leaves she reflects how wise it is to play the fool well. Viola and Olivia have private conference wherein Olivia blatantly declares she will accept no further messages from Orsino and then pronounces her outright love for Viola (as Cesario). Viola insists that no woman shall ever be mistress of her heart. Olivia invites Viola back, having been moved that perhaps she could learn to love the Duke. Olivia has changed considerably since we first met her in Act I, depressed and isolated. Now she expresses her feelings openly and feels passion once again, even though it is misplaced. The irony remains that although Viola has opened Olivia’s heart to love, she cannot love her herself, principally because she is a woman, still unbeknownst to Olivia or anyone else in Illyria.
Act III
Scene ii
Olivia’s house
Enter Sir Toby, Sir Andrew and Fabian
Sir Andrew: “No, faith, I’ll not stay a jot longer.”
Sir Toby: ” Thy reason, dear venom, give thy reason.”
Sir Andrew: “I saw your niece do more favours to the Count’s servingman than ever she bestowed upon me.”
Sir Toby: “Did she see thee the while, old boy?”
Sir Andrew: “As plain as I see you now.”
Fabian: “She did show favour to the youth in your sight only to exasperate you, to awaken your valour, to put fire in your heart and brimstone in your liver. You should have banged the youth into dumbness.”
Sir Toby: “Challenge the Count’s youth to fight with him. Hurt him in eleven places. My niece shall take note of it.”
Fabian: “There is no way but this, Sir Andrew.”
Sir Toby: “Taunt him.”
Exit Sir Andrew
Sir Toby: “For Andrew, if he were opened and you find so much blood in his liver that will clog the foot of a flea, I’ll eat the rest of the anatomy.”
Fabian: “And his opposite, the youth, bears in his visage no great presage of cruelty.”
Enter Maria
Maria: “Follow me! Malvolio is in yellow stockings.”
Sir Toby: “And cross-gartered?”
Maria: “Most villainously. He does obey every point of the letter. He does smile. You have not seen such a thing as this. I can hardly forbear hurling things at him. I know my lady will strike him; if she do, he’ll smile and take it for a great favour.”
Sir Toby: “Come, bring us, bring us where he is.”
Analysis
Sir Andrew tells Sir Toby he is leaving because Olivia is fawning over Cesario and it no longer seems likely that she will ever consent to marry Sir Andrew. But Sir Toby wants to keep Sir Andrew around since he has been living off of his money, so he convinces Sir Andrew to show off his manliness to Olivia by fighting Viola, as a way of demonstrating his love for her. Sir Andrew agrees to this. Once he leaves, Sir Toby and Fabian reflect that neither Sir Andrew or Viola are much capable of fighting. It seems they have just set up another jest. Maria arrives to say that Malvolio is in yellow stockings and is cross-gartered. He has fallen for their practical joke completely and the household runs off to bear witness.
Act III
Scene iii
A street
Enter Sebastian and Antonio
Antonio: “I could not stay behind you: my desire did spur me forth; and not all love to see you, but jealousy what might befall your travel, being skilless in these parts; which to a stranger, unguided and unfriended, often prove rough and inhospitable.”
Sebastian: “My kind Antonio, I and no other answer make but thanks, and thanks and ever thanks. What’s to do? Shall we go see the reliques of this town?”
Antonio: “Tomorrow, sir; best first go see your lodging.”
Sebastian: “I am not weary, and ’tis long till night; I pray you, let us satisfy our eyes with the memorials and the things of fame that do renown this city.”
Antonio: “I do not without danger walk these streets; once in a sea-fight against the Count I did some service. If I be lapsed in this place, I shall pay dear.”
Sebastian: “Do not then walk too open.”
Antonio: “Here is my purse. At the Elephant is best to lodge.”
Sebastian: “Why I your purse?”
Antonio: “Happily your eye shall light upon some toy you have desire to purchase.”
Sebastian: “I’ll be you purse-bearer.”
Antonio: “To the Elephant.”
Sebastian: “I do remember.”
Analysis
Antonio and Sebastian arrive in Illyria and it turns out Antonio has a history here, for some time ago he fought a sea battle against Duke Orsino and if he is discovered he will be apprehended and held accountable for his deeds. Sebastian wants to explore the town but Antonio can’t be seen and stays behind discreetly. He gives Sebastian his purse so that he can have some money to purchase whatever he might like and pay for his lodging. Antonio has a very strong attraction to Sebastian and is willing to risk his life in Illyria to remain with him.
Act III
Scene iv
Olivia’s garden
Enter Olivia and Maria
Olivia: “I have sent after him; he says he’ll come. How shall I feast him? What bestow of him? For youth is bought more often than begged or borrowed. Where is Malvolio?”
Maria: “He’s coming, madam; but in very strange manner. He is surely possessed, madam.”
Olivia: “Why, what’s the matter? Does he rave?”
Maria: “No, madam, he does nothing but smile. For sure the man is tainted in his wits.”
Olivia: “Go call him hither.”
Exit Maria
Re-enter Maria with Malvolio
Olivia: “How now, Malvolio! Smiles thou?” I sent for thee on a sad occasion. How dost thou, man? What is the matter with thee? Wilt thou go to bed, Malvolio?”
Malvolio: “To bed? Ay, sweetheart, and I’ll come to thee.”
Olivia: “God comfort thee! Why dost thou smiles, and kiss thy hand so often?”
Maria: “Why appear you with this ridiculous boldness before my lady?”
Malvolio: “‘Be not afraid of greatness.’ Twas well writ.”
Olivia: “What means thou by that, Malvolio?”
Malvolio: “‘Some are born great – ‘”
Olivia: “Ha?”
Malvolio: “‘Some achieve greatness – “‘
Olivia: “What say’st thou?”
Malvolio: “‘And some have greatness thrust upon them.'”
Olivia: “Heaven restore thee! Why this is very midsummer madness.”
Enter servant
Servant: “Madam, the young gentleman of the Count Orsino’s is returned; I could hardly entreat him back; he attends your ladyship’s pleasure.”
Olivia: I’ll come to him. Good Maria, let this fellow be looked to. Where’s my cousin Toby? Let some of my people have a special care of him.”
Exit Olivia and Maria
Malvolio: “No worse man than Sir Toby to look after me! This concurs directly with the letter: she sends him on purpose, that I may appear stubborn to him; for she incites me to that in the letter. It is Jove’s doing, and Jove makes me thankful! Nothing that can be can come between me and the full prospect of my hopes. Well, Jove, not I, is the doer of this, and he is to be thanked.”
Re-enter Maria, with Sir Toby and Fabian
Sir Toby: “Which way is he, in the name of sanctity.”
Fabian: Here he is, here he is!”
Sir Toby: “How is it with you, man?”
Malvolio: “Go off; I discard you.”
Maria: “Sir Toby, my lady prays you to have a care of him.”
Malvolio: “Ah, ha! Does she so?”
Sir Toby: “Peace, peace; we must deal gently with him. How do you, Malvolio? What, man, defy the devil; consider he is an enemy of mankind.”
Malvolio: “Do you know what you say?”
Fabian: “No way but gentleness – the fiend is rough, and will not be roughly used.”
Maria: “Get him to say his prayers, good Sir Toby. Get him to pray. No, he will not hear of godliness!”
Malvolio: “Go, hang yourselves all! You are idle shallow things; I am not of your element; you shall know more hereafter.”
Fabian: “If this were played upon a stage now, I could condemn it as an improbable fiction.”
Sir Toby: “Come, we’ll have him in a dark room and bound. My niece is already in the belief that he’s mad. We may carry it thus, for our pleasure and his penance, till our very pastime, tired out of breath, prompt us to have mercy on him.”
Enter Sir Andrew
Sir Andrew: “Here’s the challenge; read it. I warrant there’s vinegar and pepper in it.”
Sir Toby: (reads) “‘Youth, whatsoever thou art, thou art but a scurvy fellow. I will waylay thee going home; where if it be thy chance to kill me, thou kills me like a rogue and a villain. Fare thee well; and God have mercy on one of our souls! Thy sworn enemy, Andrew Aguecheek.’ I’ll give it to him.”
Maria: “He is now in some commerce with my lady, and will by and by depart.”
Sir Toby: “Go, Sir Andrew, as ever thou sees him, draw; and as thou draws, swear horribly; for it comes to pass often that a terrible oath, with a swaggering accent sharply twanged off, gives manhood more approbation than ever proof itself would have earned him. Away.”
Exit Sir Andrew
Sir Toby: “Now will I not deliver this letter. I will deliver his challenge by word of mouth, set upon Sir Andrew a notable report of valour, and drive the gentleman into a most hideous opinion of his rage, skill, fury and impetuosity. This will so fright them both that they will kill one another by the look.”
Re-enter Olivia, with Viola
Fabian: “Here he comes with your niece.”
Exit Sir Toby, Fabian and Maria
Olivia: “I have said too much unto a heart of stone. Here, wear this jewel for me; ’tis my picture. Refuse it not; it hath no tongue to vex you. And I beseech you to come again tomorrow. What shall you ask of me that I’ll deny?”
Viola: “Nothing but this – your true love for my master.”
Olivia: “How with mine honour may I give him that which I have given to you?”
Viola: “I will acquit you.”
Olivia: “Well, come again tomorrow. A fiend like thee might bear my soul to hell.”
Exit Olivia
Re-enter Sir Toby and Fabian
Sir Toby: “Gentleman, God save thee.”
Viola: “And you, sir.”
Sir Toby: “Of what nature the wrongs are thou hast done him, I know not; but thy intercepter, bloody as the hunter, attends thee at the orchard end. Dismount, be yare in thy preparation, for thy assailant is quick, skillful and deadly.”
Viola: “You mistake, sir; I am sure no man has any quarrel with me.”
Sir Toby: “You’ll find it otherwise, I assure you; therefore, if you hold your life at any price, betake you to your guard.”
Viola: “I pray you sir, what is he?”
Sir Toby: “He is a knight, dubbed with unhatched rapier; but he is a devil in private brawl. Souls and bodies hath he divorced three; and his incensement at this moment is so implacable that satisfaction can be none but by pangs of death.”
Viola: “I will return again into the house of the lady. I am no fighter.”
Sir Toby: “Meddle you must. That is certain.”
Viola: “I beseech you to do me thus courteous office as to know of the knight what my offence to him is.”
Sir Toby: “I will do so.”
Exit Sir Toby
Viola: “Pray you, sir, do you know of this matter?”
Fabian: “I know the knight is incensed against you.”
Viola: “I beseech you, what manner of man is he?”
Fabian: “He is indeed, sir, the most skillful, bloody, and fatal opposite that you cold possibly have found in any part of Illyria. I will make your peace with him if I can.”
Viola: “I shall be much bound to you for it.”
Exit Viola
Re-enter Sir Toby with Sir Andrew
Sir Toby: “Why, man, he’s a very devil.”
Sir Andrew: “Pox on it, I’ll not meddle with him.”
Sir Toby: “Ay, but he will not now be pacified.”
Sir Andrew: “Let him let the matter slip, and I’ll give him my horse.”
Re-enter Fabian and Viola
Sir Toby: (to Fabian) “I have persuaded him the youth is a devil.”
Sir Toby: (to Viola) “There’s no remedy, sir; he will fight with you for oath sake. He protests he will not hurt you.”
Viola: (aside) “Pray God defend me.”
Sir Toby: “Come, Sir Andrew, there is no remedy; but he has promised me he won’t hurt you.”
Viola and Sir Andrew draw
Enter Antonio
Viola: “I do assure you, ’tis against my will.”
Antonio: “Put up your sword. If this young gentleman has done offence, I take the fault on me. If you offend him, I for him defy you.”
Sir Toby: “Why, what are you?”
Sir Toby and Antonio draw
Enter officers
Fabian: “O good Sir Toby, hold! Here come the officers.”
Viola: “Pray, sir, put your sword up, if you please.”
Sir Andrew: “Marry, will I, sir.”
1 Officer: “This is the man; do thy office.”
2 Officer: “Antonio, I arrest thee at the suit of Count Orsino.”
1 Officer: “Take him away; he knows I know him well.”
Antonio: “I must obey. My necessity makes me ask you for my purse. It grieves me much more for what I cannot do for you than what befalls myself. You stand amazed.”
2 Officer: “Come, sir, away.”
Antonio: “I must entreat of you some of that money.”
Viola: “What money, sir? For the fair kindness you have shown me here, and part being prompted by your present trouble, out of my lean and low ability I’ll lend you something. My having is not much; I’ll make division of my present with you; hold, there’s half my coffer.”
Antonio: “Will you deny me now? O heavens themselves! Let me speak a little. This youth that you see here I snatched one half out of the jaws of death, relieved him with such sanctity of love, and to his image, did I devotion. But, O, how vile an idol proves this God! Thou has, Sebastian, done good feature shame. None an be called deformed but the unkind.”
1 Officer: “The man grows mad. Away with him.”
Exit Antonio, with officers
Viola: “Prove true, imagination, O, prove true, that I, dear brother, be now taken for you! He named Sebastian. O, if it prove, tempests are kind, and salt waves fresh in love.”
Sir Toby: “A very dishonest, paltry boy. His dishonesty appears in leaving his friend here in necessity and denying him.”
Fabian: “A coward, a most devout coward.”
Sir Andrew: “I’ll after him again and beat him.”
Sir Toby: “Do; cuff him soundly, but never draw thy sword.”
Analysis
Olivia calls for Malvolio who is cross-dressed, according to Maria’s letter. Olivia is shocked. She knows nothing of this jest and figures Malvolio has gone mad. She goes off to see Viola and leaves Malvolio to Maria and Sir Toby, who pretend to assume he has become possessed of the devil and decide to lock him in a dark room.
Sir Andrew writes a letter challenging Viola to a fight. Sir Toby convinces both Sir Andrew and Viola that the other is a fierce killer and neither wants anything to do with the fight. Sir Toby and Fabian enjoy their jest. The two combatants draw their swords to fight just as Antonio arrives, mistaking Viola for Sebastian and taking Viola’s place in the fight against Sir Andrew. But just then the officers arrive to arrest Antonio for being in Illyria after all he had done as a soldier to the Duke’s navy some time ago. He asks Viola for his purse back, continuing to assume that Viola is Sebastian, who he lent his purse to. Viola knows nothing, of course , but Antonio thinks it is Sebastian, who is choosing to betray him in his time of need. The officers are convinced that Antonio is insane and they take him away. But Antonio had called Viola Sebastian, so Viola is hopeful that Sebastian has survived the shipwreck and is alive in Illyria. She runs off to find him.
The mistaken identities really set the pace here in Act III. Olivia is convinced that Malvolio is mad, Sir Toby has convinced Sir Andrew and Viola that they want to slaughter one another. Viola is now mistaken not only for the made up Cesario, but also for her brother Sebastian. The officers think Antonio is insane, Olivia thinks that Viola is a young man, and the Duke thinks his page is a young, if very feminine, man, who he is oddly attracted to. Typical of Shakespeare, just when the audience may sense that things have truly fallen completely apart, and are even drifting closer and closer to tragedy, we approach the resolution, which is inevitable in a comedy. But first, a very short and entertaining Act IV.
Act IV (3 scenes)
Scene i
Before Olivia’s house
Enter Sebastian and the Fool
Fool: “Will you make me believe that I am not sent for you?”
Sebastian: “Go to, go to, thou art a foolish fellow; let me be clear of thee.”
Fool: “No, I do not know you; nor I am not sent to you by my lady, to bid you come speak with her; nor your name is not Master Cesario; nor this is not my nose neither. Nothing that is so is so.”
Sebastian: “I prithee vent thy folly somewhere else. Thou know’st not me.”
Fool: “Vent my folly! He has heard that word of some great man, and now applies it to a fool. I prithee now, ungird thy strangeness, and tell me what I should vent to my lady. Shall I vent to her that thou art coming?”
Sebastian: “I prithee, foolish Greek, depart from me; there’s money for thee; if you tarry longer I shall give worse payment.”
Enter Sir Andrew, Sir Toby and Fabian
Sir Andrew: “Now sir, have I met you again? (Striking Sebastian). There’s for you.”
Sebastian: “Why, there’s for thee, and there, and there. Are all the people mad?”
Sir Toby: “Hold sir.” (holding Sebastian)
Fool: “This will I tell my lady straight.”
Exit Fool
Sir Andrew: “Nay, let him alone. I’ll have an action of battery against him, if there be any law in Illyria; though I struck him first, yet it’s no matter for that.”
Sebastian: “I will be free from thee. If thou dar’st tempt me further, draw thy sword.” (draws)
Sir Toby: “What, what?” (draws)
Enter Olivia
Olivia: “Hold, Toby; on thy life, I charge thee hold. Ungracious wretch, fit for the mountains and the barbarous caves, where manners never were preached! Out of my sight! be not offended, dear Cesario.”
Exit Sir Toby, Sir Andrew and Fabian
Olivia: “I prithee, gentle friend, go with me to my house.”
Sebastian: “I am mad, or else this is a dream. If it be thus to dream, still let me sleep!”
Olivia: “Nay, come, I prithee. Would thou be ruled by me?”
Sebastian: “Madam, I will.”
Olivia: “O, say so, and so be!”
Analysis
The Fool has been sent for Cesario and believes he sees him in Sebastian, who is Cesario’s similar looking brother. The Fool is perplexed and so is Sebastian, who thinks everyone here is mad. Sir Andrew also thinks he sees Cesario and hits him, as they were fighting only minutes earlier. Only this is Sebastian, who is a real scrapper, so Sir Andrew takes a beating. Sir Toby and Sebastian draw swords until Olivia arrives and stops them, her too thinking she sees Cesario. She invites him into her house. She asks ‘Cesario’ if he will be ruled by her and Sebastian answers, ‘Madam, I will.’ So Olivia thinks she has finally won over Cesario, not realizing that she has won over Cesario’s brother, Sebastian. Sebastian is totally perplexed by the events since his arrival. He has never been here before, yet everyone seems to know him. Some want to fight him and others want to love him. ‘Or am I mad, or else this is a dream.’
Act IV
Scene ii
Olivia’s house
Enter Maria and the Fool
Maria: “Nay, I prithee, put on this gown and this beard; make him believe thou art Sir Topas, the curate.”
Fool: “Well, I’ll put it on.”
Enter Sir Toby and Maria
Sir Toby: “Jove bless thee, Master Parson. The knave counterfeits well; a good knave.”
Malvolio: (within) “Who calls there?”
Fool: “Sir Topas, the curate, who comes to visit Malvolio the lunatic.”
Malvolio: “Sir Topas, good Sir Topas, go to my lady.”
Fool: “Out, hyperbolical fiend! How thou vexes this man! Talk’st thou nothing but ladies?”
Malvolio: “Sir Topas, never was man thus wronged. Good Sir Topas, do not think I am mad; they have laid me here in hideous darkness.”
Fool: “Fie, thou dishonest satan! Say’st thou that house is dark?”
Malvolio: “As hell, Sir Topas.”
Fool: “Why, it hath bay windows transparent.”
Malvolio: “I am not mad, Sir Topas. I say to you this house is dark.”
Fool: “Madman, thou errest. I say there is no darkness but ignorance.”
Malvolio: “I say that this house is as dark as ignorance, though ignorance were as dark as hell; and I say there was never man thus abused. I am no more mad than you are; make the trial of it in any constant question.”
Fool: “Fare thee well. Remain thou still in darkness.”
Malvolio: “Sir Topas, Sir Topas!”
Sir Toby: “My most exquisite Sir Topas! I would we were well rid of this knavery. For I am now so far in offence with my niece that I cannot pursue with any safety this sport to the upshot.
Exit Sir Toby and Maria
The fool sings
Malvolio: “Fool! Fool! Fool, I say! Good fool, as ever thou wilt deserve well at my hand, help me to a candle, and pen, ink and paper; as I am a gentleman, I will live to be thankful to thee for it.”
Fool: “Master Malvolio?”
Malvolio: “Ay, good fool.”
Fool: “Alas, sir, how fell you besides your five wits?”
Malvolio: “Fool, there was never man so notoriously abused; I am as well in my wits, fool, as thou art.”
Fool: “But as well? Then you are mad indeed, if you be no better in your wits than a fool.”
Malvolio: “They have here propertied me; keep me in darkness, send ministers to me, asses, and do all they can to face me out of my wits.”
Fool: “Advise you what you say: the minister is here (speaking as Sir Topas) Malvolio, thy wits the heavens restore! Endeavor thyself to sleep, and leave thy vain babble-babble.”
Malvolio: “Sir Topas!”
Fool: “Maintain no words with him, good fellow.”
Malvolio: “Fool, fool, fool, I say! Good fool, help me to some light and some paper. I tell thee I am as well in my wits as any man in Illyria.”
Fool: “Well-a-day that you were, sir!”
Malvolio: “Good fool, some ink, paper, and light; and convey what I will set down to my lady. It shall advantage thee more than ever the bearing of letter did.”
Fool:”I will help you to it. But tell me true, are you not mad indeed, or do you but counterfeit?”
Malvolio: “Believe me, I am not; I tell thee true.”
Fool: “Nay, I’ll never believe a madman till I see his brains. I will fetch you light and paper and ink.”
Malvolio: “Fool, I’ll requite it in the highest degree; I prithee, be gone.”
The fool sings
Analysis
Malvolio has been locked away and they dress up the Fool to act as Sir Topas, a curate, or priest. Malvolio wants out of his dark room and tries to convince his visitor that he is not mad. The fool torments him with contradictory responses and goes back and forth as curate and himself and finally agrees to get Malvolio pen and paper so that he can write to his lady. This prank against Malvolio goes quite far. As stuck up as Malvolio is, we can pity him at this point. Even Sir Toby senses things have gone far enough. It is almost as if Malvolio must be thus humiliated so that the others can revel all they want on this wild and hell bent Twelfth Night occasion.
Act IV
Scene iii
Olivia’s garden
Enter Sebastian
Sebastian: “Though ’tis wonder that enwraps me thus, yet ’tis not madness. Where’s Antonio, then? I could not find him at the Elephant. His counsel now might do me golden service; for though my soul disputes well with my sense that this may be some error, but no madness, yet doth this accident and flood of fortune so far exceed all instance, all discourse, that I am ready to distrust mine eyes and wrangle with my reason, that persuades me to any other trust but that I am mad, or else the lady’s mad; yet if it were so, she could not command her followers, and their dispatch with such a smooth, discreet and stable bearing, as I perceive she does. There is something in it that is deceivable. But her the lady comes.”
Enter Olivia and the priest
Olivia: “If you mean well, now go with me and with this holy man into the chantry by; there, before him plight me the full assurance of your faith. It shall come to note, what time we will our celebration keep. What do you say?”
Sebastian: “I’ll follow this good man, and go with you; and, having sworn truth, ever will be true.”
Olivia: “Then lead the way, good father, and heavens so shine!”
Analysis
Sebastian is trying to come to terms with what is happening to him here in Illyria. A beautiful woman is fawning over him and wants to marry him. He has decided that neither he nor Olivia are mad, although something is surely amiss. He is right of course, but simply has not figured it out yet. He agrees to marry Olivia, who believes she has finally won her Cesario!
Act V
Scene i
Before Olivia’s house
Enter Fool, Duke and Viola
Duke: “I know thee well. How dost thou, my good fellow?”
Fool: “Truly, sir, the better for my foes and the worse for my friends.”
Duke: “Just the contrary.”
Fool: “No, sir.”
Duke: “How can that be?”
Fool: “Marry, sir, they praise me, and make an ass of me. Now my foes tell me plainly I am an ass; so that by my foes, sir, I profit in the knowledge of myself, and by my friends I am abused; why then, the worse for my friends and the better for my foes.”
Duke: “Why, this is excellent.”
Fool: “By my troth, sir, no; though it please you to be one of my friends.”
Duke: “There’s gold.”
Enter Antonio and officers
Viola: “Here comes the man, sir, that did rescue me.”
Duke: “That face of his I do remember well; yet when I saw it last it was besmeared as black as Vulcan in the smoke of war.”
1 Officer: “Osino, this is that Antonio. Here in the streets we apprehended him.”
Viola: “He did me kindness, sir; drew on my side.”
Duke: ‘Notable pirate, thou salt-water thief!”
Antonio: “That most ungrateful boy there by your side from the rude sea’s enraged and foamy mouth did I redeem; a wreck past hope he was. His life I gave him, and did thereto add my love without restraint; for his sake did I expose myself, pure for his love, into the danger of this adverse town; drew to defend him when he was beset; where being apprehended, his false cunning, not meaning to partake with me in danger, taught him to face me out of his acquaintance, and denied me my own purse, which I had recommended to his use not half an hour before.”
Viola: “How can this be?”
Duke: “When came he to this town?”
Antonio: “Today, my lord. No interim, not a minute’s vacancy, both day and night did we keep company.”
Enter Olivia
Duke: “Thy words are madness. Three months this youth hath tended upon me.”
Olivia: “Cesario, do you not keep promise with me?”
Viola: “Madam?”
Olivia: “What do you say, Cesario?”
Viola: “My lord would speak; my duty hushes me.”
Olivia: “If it be aught to the old tune, my lord, it is as fat and fulsome to mine ear as howling after music.”
Duke: “Still so cruel?”
Olivia: “Still so constant, lord.”
Duke: “What, to perverseness? You uncivil lady, to whose ingrate and inauspicious altars my soul the faithfull’st offerings hath breathed out that ever devotion tendered! What shall I do?”
Olivia: “Even what it pleases my lord, that shall become him.”
Duke: “Why should I not kill what I love? A savage jealousy. But hear me this: live you the marble-breasted tyrant still; but this your minion, whom I know you love, and whom, by heaven I swear, I tender dearly, him will I tear out of that cruel eye. Come, boy, with me; my thoughts are ripe in mischief: I’ll sacrifice the lamb that I do love to spite a raven’s heart within a dove.”
Viola: “And I, to do you rest, a thousand deaths would die.”
Olivia: Where goes Cesario?”
Viola: “After him I love.”
Olivia: “Ay me, detested! How am I beguiled?”
Viola: “Who does beguile you? Who does do you wrong?”
Olivia: “Hast thou forgot thyself? Is it so long? Call forth the holy father. Cesario, husband, stay.”
Duke: “Husband?”
Olivia: “Ay, husband, can he deny that?”
Duke: “Her husband, sirrah?”
Viola: “No my lord, not I.”
Enter priest
Olivia: “O, welcome father! Father, I charge thee, by thy reverence, here to unfold what thou dost know hath newly passed between this youth and me.”
Priest: “A contract of eternal bond of love, confirmed by mutual joinder of your hands, attested by the holy close of lips, strengthened by interchangement of your rings; and all the ceremony of this compact sealed in my function, by my testimony.”
Duke: “O thou dissembling cub. Farewell and take her; but direct thy feet where thou and I henceforth may never meet.”
Viola: “My lord, I do protest.”
Olivia: “O, do not swear!”
Enter Sir Andrew
Sir Andrew: “For the love of God, a surgeon!”
Olivia: “What’s the matter?”
Sir Andrew: “He has broken my head and has given Sir Toby a bloody coxcomb too. For the love of God, your help!”
Olivia: “Who has done this, Sir Andrew?”
Sir Andrew: “Cesario. We took him for a coward, but he’s the very devil incarnate.”
Duke: “My gentleman, Cesario?”
Sir Andrew: “Here he is! You broke my head for nothing.”
Viola “Why did you speak to me? I never hurt you.”
Enter Sir Toby and the Fool
Sir Andrew: “Here comes Sir Toby; you shall hear more.”
Sir Toby: “He has hurt me, and there’s the end of it.”
Enter Sebastian
Sebastian: “I am sorry, madam, I have hurt your kinsman; you throw a strange regard upon me, and by that I do perceive it hath offended you. Pardon me, sweet one, even for the vows we made each other but so late ago.”
Duke: “One face, one vote, one habit, and two persons! A natural perspective that is and is not.”
Sebastian: “Antonio, my dear Antonio! How have the hours racked and tortured me since I have lost thee!”
Antonio: “Sebastian are you? How have you made division of yourself? An apple cleft in two is not more twin than these two creatures. Which is Sebastian?”
Olivia: “Most wonderful.”
Sebastian: “Do I stand there? I never had a brother; I had a sister whom the blind waves and surges have devoured. What kin are you to me? What countryman, what name, what parentage?”
Viola: “Sebastian was my father. Such a Sebastian was my brother too; so went he suited to his watery tomb.”
Sebastian: “Were you a woman, I should say, ‘Thrice welcome, drowned Viola!'”
Viola: “My father had a mole on his brow.”
Sebastian: “And so had mine.”
Viola: “I am Viola. I was preserved to serve this noble Count.”
Sebastian: “You are betrothed both to a maid and man.”
Duke: (to Viola) “Boy, thou has said to me a thousand times thou never would love a woman as much as me.”
Viola: “And all those sayings will I overswear.”
Duke: “Give me thy hand; and let me see thee in thy woman’s weeds.”
Viola: “The captain that did bring me first on shore hath my maid’s garments. He is now at Malvolio’s suit.”
Olivia: Fetch Malvolio hither; they say the poor gentleman is much distract.”
Re-enter Fool with a letter and Fabian
Fool: “He has here written a letter to you.”
Olivia: “Open it and read it.”
Fool: “Look then to be well edified when the fool delivers the madman. (reads madly) By the lord, madam!”
Olivia: “How now! Art thou mad?”
Fool: “No, madam, I do but read madness.”
Olivia: “Read in thy right wits. (to Fabian) Read it you, sirrah.”
Fabian: “By the lord, madam, you wrong me, and the world shall know it. Though you have put me into darkness and given your drunken cousin rule over me, yet have I the benefit of my senses. I have your own letter that induced me to the semblance I put on. Think of me as you please. Speak out my injury. The madly used Malvolio.”
Olivia: “Did he write this?”
Fool: “Ay, madam.”
Olivia: “See him delivered, Fabian; bring him hither. (to the Duke) My lord, so please you to think me as well a sister as a wife.”
Duke: “Madam, I am most apt to embrace your offer. (to Viola) Since you called me master for so long, here is my hand; you shall from this time be your master’s mistress.”
Olivia: “A sister! You are she.”
Enter Fabian with Malvolio
Duke: “Is this the madman?”
Olivia: “Ay, my lord. How now, Malvolio?”
Malvolio: “Madam, you have done me wrong, notorious wrong.”
Olivia: “Have I, Malvolio? No.”
Malvolio: “Lady, you have. Pray you peruse that letter. You must not now deny it is your hand. And tell me, why you have given me such clear lights of favour, bade me come smiling and cross-gartered to you, to put on yellow stockings, and to frown upon Sir Toby. Why have you suffered me to be imprisoned, kept in a dark house, visited by the priest, and made the most notorious gull that ever intention played on? Tell me why.”
Olivia: “Alas, Malvolio, this is not my writing. ‘Tis Maria’s hand. This practice hath most shrewdly passed upon thee, but, when we know the grounds and authors of it, thou shalt be both the plaintiff and the judge of thine own cause.”
Fabian: “Good madam, hear me speak. Most freely I confess myself and Toby set this device against Malvolio here. Maria wrote the letter, at Sir Toby’s great importance, in recompense whereof he hath married her.”
Olivia: “Alas, poor fool, how have they baffled thee.”
Fool: “Why, I was one, sir, in this interlude – one Sir Topas.”
Malvolio: “I’ll be revenged on the whole pack of you.”
Exit Malvolio
Olivia: “He hath been most notoriously abused.”
Duke: “Pursue him, and entreat him to a peace; 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.”
Analysis
Act V is action packed and remains one of the more eventful resolution and reconciliation scenes in all of Shakespeare. The officers have arrested Antonio as an enemy of Orsino’s, as they recognized him to be the man who fought so hard against the Duke’s navy some time ago. When the Duke asks Antonio why he has returned to Illyria, Antonio explains to the Duke how he saved and protected Sebastian. He then unleashes his anger at Cesario, who he continues to believe is Sebastian, claiming that Sebastian stole his purse and denied knowing him. Olivia arrives and she too believes that Viola is Sebastian, whom she has just married. Duke Orsino is furious to hear that Cesario has married Olivia and when Cesario denies any such marriage and claims to only love Duke Orsino Olivia is outraged at Cesario. Olivia brings in the priest who confirms that Sebastian and Olivia are married. Duke Orsino hears this and banishes both Cesario and Olivia.
Next, Sir Andrew arrives and claims that both he and Sir Toby have been beaten up by Cesario, who of course denies any such action on his part. Finally, Sebastian enters and makes peace with Antonio, while everyone else stares at the two look alikes. Sebastian and Viola recognize each other and reunite as siblings, Olivia realizes she is married to Sebastian, and the Duke and Viola agree to be married. When the Duke tells Viola to change into her woman’s clothing everyone suddenly realizes that Cesario is a woman. Malvolio arrives and is furious at Olivia for writing the letter which caused him to make such an ass of himself to everyone in the household. Olivia examines the letter and realizes that it is in Maria’s handwriting. Clearly Malvolio has been the victim of a terrible practical joke that clearly went too far. Fabian confesses on behalf of all involved and Malvolio swears he will get revenge on the whole pack of them. The Duke promises to make peace with Malvolio and arranges for the double marriage celebration of he and Viola and Olivia and Sebastian. The fool sings one last sad song and the play ends.
This last scene is nearly four hundred lines long, as there is much unraveling necessary from the various misadventures and mistaken identities developed in previous acts. It is the appearance of Sebastian that most helps to set things right and free Cesario of so many conflicting roles. Antonio no longer blames Cesario for having seemingly betrayed him. It is now Sebastian who is married to Olivia, not Cesario. Sebastian assumes all of the male roles which Cesario has maintained throughout the play. Now Cesario can marry the Duke, once she sheds her male disguise. Twelfth Night is a comedy, so we get a double marriage of the principle characters in the end. Only Malvolio and Antonio leave the stage unsatisfied. Malvolio swears revenge on the ‘whole pack’ of those who humiliated him and Antonio will not successfully woo Sebastian. Finally, the fool sings a very sad song at the end of the play about growing up in a very harsh world, being lashed by the eternal winds and rains of life.
Final Thoughts
Shakespeare’s sources for Twelfth Night include a romantic short story from 1554 collection called Stories. The Malvolio, Sir Toby and Sir Andrew characters are Shakespeare originals. Twelfth Night was likely written in 1601, around the same time as Hamlet and Troilus and Cressida. The first known performance was on 2 February 1602, at the Inns of Court, starring Richard Burbage as Malvolio and Robert Armin as Feste. It has always remained a most popular play and some of the notable Violas have been Peggy Ashcroft, Vivian Leigh, Katherine Hepburn and Judi Dench. Among the male actors we find Laurence Olivier (Malvolio), Ralph Richardson (Sir Toby) and Paul Scofield (Sir Andrew). Twelfth Night is the rare Shakespeare play whose original soundtrack survives. There was an opera of the play produced in 1820, made up of over twenty songs derived from a mix of Shakespeare plays. There have been at least five film versions of Twelfth Night, the latest in 2019. There are several excellent stage productions and three of the five films available free on youtube in addition to ample clips and analysis.
William Shakespeare: Journey Through Genius 