Twelfth Night quotes

A1.1 if music be the food of love , play on, / give me excess of it, that surfeiting / The appetite may sicken and so die.

Orsino
- Orsino is describing flowers + music \= the 2 meanings Viola's name has
- Relates to Orsino's misogynous speech in A2.4 "they lack retention ... that suffer surfeit, cloyment and revolt" (irony in Orsino discussing women's, especially Olivia's changeability in

A1.1 O, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south / That breathes upon a bank of violets

Orsino
- "violets" must be pronounced with 3 syllables in order to fit the iambic pentameter, meaning that Viola sounds embedded in it.
- dramatic comedy: foreshadowing
- relates to 'secret reference' to Viola in A1.3 "He plays o'th' viol-de- / gamboys" Sir Toby belch, when discussing Andrew's wealth (maybe even hinting at Viola's wealth and "estate")

A1.1 So full of shapes is fancy / That it alone is high fantastical

Orsino
- Orsino says "Orsino's mistress and his fancy's queen"
in 3rd person
(lary/unruly nature of love in Twelfth Night celebrations)
- Orsino has realised he's fallen for the farcical love.
- shows that often the richest ranks of society are the most farcical and laughable

A1.1 Will you go hunt, my lord?

The hart.

Curio
- double entendre "H(e)art" of Olivia
or "Hart" \= male deer
- sets up a dark underlying theme of predatory language
- This theme is most prevalent in A2.5 when Malvolio reads 'Olivia's' letter:
- "Now is the woodcock near the gin" A2.5 Fabian
- "You know he brought me out o'favour with my lady about a bear baiting here" A2.5 Fabian
- "Her very phrases! By your leave, wax. Soft - and the impressure of Lucrece" A2.5 Malvolio (Lucrece was raped by sexual predator Tarquin, and killed herself, this is disturbing as Malvolio is almost aspiring to be Tarquin and have a Lucrece)
- "I may command where I adore, / But silence, like a Lucrece knife, / With bloodless stroke my heart doth gore" A2.5 (quote from letter written by Maria, on behalf of Malvolio, so she has associated obsessiveness and predatory language to a man who idealises rape and suicide. Relates to Harold Bloom, Maria is "the one truly malicious character in 'Twelfth Night")

A1.1 Methought she purged the air of pestilence;
That instant I was I turned into a hart

Orsino
- allegory alludes to story of Actaeon who turned Diana naked was turned into a stag by her, then hunted by his own hounds
(this relates to the following line "And my desires, like fell and cruel hounds, / E'er since pursue me")
- lexical field of disease/4 humours, he compares Olivia to one of the sweet smells that cleansed "pestilence" from the "air" in times of plague
(Shakespeare played heavily into doctrine of natural balance of natural and physical world. With symbolism of characters who fall victim to conflicts of loyalty and betrayal)
- EXCESS vs. BALANCE to describe human nature
- "O, you are sick of self-love, Malvolio" Olivia A1.5 \= Malvolio is melancholic (dry+cold)
- "Am I not consanguineous?" Toby A2.3 \= Toby is sanguine (hot/moist)
\= these 2 of the 4 temperaments are completely opposite, which explains the conflict between Malvolio and Sir Toby
- Shakespeare explores the internal physiological workings of the body to explain psychosomatics of behaviour through Galen theory of the 4 humours

A1.1 But like a cloistress ... / With eye-offending brine - all this to season / A dead brother's love

Valentine (explaining Olivia will mourn for 7 years for her dead brother)
- "eye-offending brine" relates to:
- "She is drowned already sir, with salt water, though I seem to drown her remembrance again with more" A2.1 Sebastian
- "Notable pirate, thou salt water thief" A5.1 Orsino
mention of mourning relates to:
- "Why then, methinks 'tis time to smile again" A3.1 Olivia

A1.2 What country, friends, is this?

Viola
- A1.2 first introduces the theme of disguise.
- A1.2 mirrors A2.1
- the inversion of the theatrical presentation of A1.1 and A1.2 (i.e. acting out A1.2 then A1.1) is done, as suggested by Osbourne, to give "a sense of the dramaturgic potency of beginning a play with a tempest rather than a disquisition"
- In terms of Todorov's equilibrium theory, the fact that this scene has a storm symbolising chaos and disequilibrium shows that this comedy begins confusingly. A1.1 begins with disequilibrium in regards to Orsino's excessive courtly love, yet A1.2 is continuing the disequilibrium with a storm-shipwreck. This sets up audiences for an evening of chaos. Arguably, the whole of Twelfth Night is in disequilibrium.
- Therefore, Twelfth Nigh becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, as it does not even fit typical parameters of a dramatic narrative, and it is the prerogative of directors to use own judgement to literally reorganise Shakespeare's structure

A1.2 To a strong mast that lived upon the sea, / Where, like Arion on the dolphin's back, / I saw him hold acquaintance with the waves

Captain
- Arion was a Greek poet and musician who sang with a lyre to charm a dolphin in Ovid's Fasti to escape being robbed and murdered
- Esoteric reference
- This myth stresses the redemptive powers of music
- AriON (last syllable stressed)
- almost as if Captain is trying to make Sebastian's 'drowning' story have an epic /legendary feel

A1.2 Orsino: I have heard my father name him

A1.2 He was a bachelor then

Viola
- here, Shakespeare could be making a point about the assumption of men in Elizabethan society; it appears Viola's first thought concerning Orsino is his marriage status, as if he is less of a man for it
- This is the first time we know Viola's status is high, considering her father socialised with a Duke (Orsino)

A1.2 though that nature with a beauteous wall / Doth oft close in pollution

Viola
- Shakespeare making a very perceptive point about assumptions concerning looks vs disposition.
- if we regard this statement as a comment on Olivia, "pollution" starkly juxtaposes "purged the air of pestilence"

A1.2 Thou shalt present me as an eunuch to him

Viola
- Viola's use of "eunuch" hints at Illyria being a Southern Mediterranean world (more Turkish than Dalmatian)
- The captain's reply promising to be her "mute" furthers this as in eastern harem the Sultan enforced laws encouraging silence from his inner-conclave
- "when my tongue blabs the let mine eyes not see" A1.2 Captain (in Turksish Harems the guards were supposed to guard but not look)
- connotations of literal castration and social castration, the term "eunuch" is never mentioned again, she is only referred to as a "boy"

A1.3 What a plague means my niece to take the death of her brother thus

Sir Toby Belch
- A1.3 IS THE INTRODUCTION OF THE SUBPLOT / BAWDY HUMOUR / INNUENDO
- vastly inappropriate response to Olivia's grief
- "plague" relates to:
- "tis a gentleman here. [belches] A plague / o'these pickle herring!" A1.5 Sir Toby Belch (discussing how Viola, as the Duke's envoy Cesario, is at the gates of Olivia's abode)
- "Plague on't, an I thought he had been valiant" A3.4 Sir Andrew Aguecheek

A1.3 but you must confine yourself within the modest limits of order
\[Maria]
Confine? I'll confine myself no finer than I am
\[Sir Toby]

- Shakespeare exploring the irony of Maria telling her fellow subplot characters to confine themselves to "limits of order", when arguably Maria causes the most chaos in act 3, scene 4 with Malvolio mistaking Olivia for the one who wrote the letter (when it was actually Maria's prank)

A1.3 He's as tall a man as any's in Illyria

Why, he has three thousand ducats a year

Toby Belch
- trying to justify to Maria the importance of Andrew Aguecheek's presence
- The fact that he mentions his height first (not an impressive feature really) shows he is concealing the reason by the second reason "three thousand ducats a year"
- suggesting that Sir Andrew Aguecheek is only present because he's nicely rich
- This relates to A3.2 when toby says "I have been dear to him, lad, some two thousand strong, or so", essentially meaning \= he must like me, since he's let me spend two thousand of his ducats.

A1.3 He plays o'th' viol-de- / gamboys, and speaks three or four languages word for word

Sir Toby Belch (discussing why Sir Andrew is so wealthy, earning 3,000 ducats a year)
- "viol-de-gamboys" is a play on 'viola de gamba' (a stringed instrument)
- this is possibly a double entendre / sexual allusion because men held it between their legs, helped by the addition of "boys" to 'gamba'
- Also, possibly a secret allusion to Viola, just as in A1.1 when Orsino says: "upon a bank of violets", love and lust is full of coincidences and riddled with chance and fate

A1.3 [to Maria] Bless you, fair shrew.

Sir Andrew
- Andrew's presumably innocent use of term of endearment "shrew", shows the ingorance/lack of social intelligence of Sir Andrew, as "shrew" colloquially meant bad-tempered woman.
- Andrew doesn't realise that Maria is actually more masculine and forward than all of the subplot's men (apart from the love struck Malvolio "some have greatness thrust upon them", A3.4, is often performed with a pelvic thrust, and the physicality of Maria bringing Sir Andrew' hand to her breast later in this scene)

A1.3 Accost, Sir Andrew, accost.
\[Sir Toby]
A1.3 Good Mistress Accost
\[Sir Andrew]

- "accost" means to confront boldly or to solicit for sexual purpose. Therefore, Sir Andrew is always entangled in sexual promiscuity without ever realising. (Link to "shrew" revision card to depict Andrew as a fool)
- Andrew has mistaken the suggestion from Toby to flirt or "accost" with Maria as "accost" being her actual name

A1.3 Now, sir, thought is free. I pray / you, bring your hand to th'buttery-bar, and let it drink [Brings his hand to her breast]

It's dry, Sir.

Maria
- "It's dry" is in reference to her sense of humour being dry and the complex relation "dry" with the lexical field of "buttery-bar" and sexual innuendo concerning liquid is juxtaposition and farce
- "dry" is often used to describe those who are infertile, so Maria is undermining Andrew's masculinity

A1.3 Porquoi, my dear knight?
\[Sir Toby]
A1.3 What is 'porquoi'?
\[Sir Andrew]

- Shakespeare is mocking the rich (Andrew earns 3,000 ducats a year)
- links to "He ... speaks three or four languages word for word" A1.3 Sir Toby (follows the "viol-de-gamboys"), Sir Andrew is the epitome of a natural fool

A1.3 it hangs like flax on a distaff, and I / hope to see a housewife take thee between her legs and / spin it off

Sir Toby (insulting Andrew)
- "housewife" also meant prostitute/hussy
- long thin strands of flax fibre was used to produce linen, often yellow or 'flaxen'
- In Dekker's Blurt, "flax(en)" haired men were said to be 'Chicken heartes' like Sir Andrew, and curly hair was seen as a sign of a good lover, and flat hair \= poor lovers
- Toby depicts Andrew like the effeminate Pardoner in the General Prologue to Canterbury Tales "But smothe it heeng as dooth a strike of flex"
- Another meaning is that a symptom of syphilis was hair loss (bawdy/black humour)
- There's also a hint at impotence with "hangs" (feature of dramatic comedy: Superiority Theory, Thomas Hobbes said: "Laughter is a kind of sudden glory", therefore perhaps Toby was intending to boost his own self esteem, as a notorious drunk)
- "distaff" was a forked rod on which fibre was wound for spinning, thus a symbol of female labour//femininity \= Andrew is womanly, and therefore inferior (link to Elizabethan society and position of women)
- In sir Andrew's case this "distaff" image is ambiguous representing both the phallus and effeminacy

A1.4 He hath known you but three days, and already you are no stranger

Valentine
- This scene moves the main plot forwards greatly
- Orsino has pined for Olivia for years, yet it appears he has a closer connection with his envoy Cesario, Shakespeare showing Orsino's capriciousness / changeability (relate to his misogynous speech in A2.4 "woman's heart ... they lack retention", and he later states in speech that his love is "as hungry as the sea", meaning that his love is bountiful/unlimited, where actually its ambiguity suggests he is also "hungry" for any kind of love, no matter the source)
- This is the first time audiences hear about the close relationship between Orsino and Cesario, as Shakespeare underlines the perverse nature of a Duke sharing a close connection with an envoy, while still adhering to strict parameters of courtly love, sending the person he actually has a closer connection with to contact his 'love interest' Olivia.
- Subversive humour/irony at its peak

A1.4 Thou knowst no less than all: I have unclasped / to thee the book even of my secret soul

Orsino
- This has a homoerotic charge, intense closeness signified by "no less than all"
- the metaphor of "book(s)" as a continuing theme is introduced here:
1. "unclasped" alludes to elaborate clasps often fastened to covers of valuable books i.e. bibles, Orsino's conceit shown, he even sees his "soul" as a book of episodic/legendary value
2. Relates to A1.5 "Now sir, what is your text?" (Olivia asking Cesario which passage from the scriptures he will read on behalf of Orsino) therefore, Shakespeare is presenting Orsino's soul not as an original "book", but more rather a carbon copy of a real text of value, Olivia can see through his hubris
3. To Orsino, his "book" metaphor is one to represent his honesty, however when Maria describes Malvolio's lack of Puritanism as "an affectioned ass that cons state without book" as an idiom to suggest Malvolio is the equivalent of an 'actor conning his part' - books linked to dishonesty to religion instead of honesty as Orsino
4. Olivia also links books to Orsino's dishonest/multifaceted nature rather than honesty in A1.5 "In what chapter of his bosom? ... o, I have read it, it is heresy"

A1.4 Be uncivil and leap all civil bounds / Rather than make unprofited return

Orsino
- Orsino is calling Cesario to overrule social norms
- This is a social commentary on courtly love, and links to the lexical field of predatory language "Hart" and "woodcock", as this quote represents women as objects to be won or achieved.

A1.4 Diana's lip / Is not more smooth and rubious

Thy small pipe

Orsino
- lexical field of gender norms / boundaries
- Links to Shakespeare's Sonnet 130: "Coral is far more red than her lips' red", which links to the lexical field of gender, and expectations vs. reality (however, where Shakespeare in the sonnet is suggesting his mistress is not feminine enough as a woman, Orsino is stating that his 'male' envoy is almost too feminine as a man)
- Sonnet 130 was also a criticism of courtly love
- "Thy small pipe" is a double entendre; "small pipe" could refer to 'Cesario's' voice being "shrill", or alluding to the sex of the boy actor playing the role of "an eunuch"

A1.4 I'll do my best / To woo your lady. [ASIDE] Yet a barful strife:
Whoe'er I woo, myself would be his wife

Viola (as Cesario)
- 1st TIME VIOLA CONFESSES LOVE FOR ORSINO
- fricative alliteration of "w" sound, creates a whimsical rhythm/timbre, true romance?
- the "barful strife" refers to an internal struggle of impediments (I.e. the fact that she is known to Orsino as a man)
- This also means that she must convince another woman to love the man she loves. The exchange of words in this scene exemplifies dramatic irony since the reader now knows a love road that connects Duke Orsino, Viola, and Olivia has formed while Orsino is clueless
- but there is also a selfish element; she created the "barful strife" as she injected herself into this love triangle
- alliteration of "w" links to A5.1 Antonio's speech "while one would wink, denied me mine own purse / Which I had recommended to his use"

A1.5 Let her hang me. He that is well hanged in this world needs to fear no colour

Feste (after Maria reprimands Feste for truanting from court of Orsino, stressing Feste is the link between the worlds of Olivia and Orsino - is Feste therefore the intermediary between convention: ORSINO'S PALACE, and chaos: OLIVIA'S PALACE?)
(this also means that detached from particular loyalties, he can be trusted to speak truth not only to the other characters but also to the audience)
- this is *Feste's first line*, and immediately uses subversive/bawdy humour to undermine authority, perahps Shakespeare is mocking the peculiar role of a jester and their almost limbo-like position in society
- This scene is riddled with farce/bawdy humour, as this is where the subplot's characters revel in carnivalesque ridiculing, perhaps reminiscent of the insult-ridden songs that used to be sung at Italian weddings)
- links to the later quote in this scene from Feste "Many a good hanging prevents a bad marriage"
- a sexual quibble is also present in "well hanged" \= well hung/dead is an allusion to he who is well endowed and needs to fear nothing
- Feste is looking at life rather bluntly and fatalistically/nihilism

A1.5 If Sir Toby would leave drinking, thou wert as witty as a piece / of Eve's flesh as any in Ilyria

Feste (describing Maria's two main good qualities: intelligence + body)
- Intense foreshadowing, it's almost as if Feste has supreme knowledge of the outcome in A5.1, when we learn Toby and Maria married

A1.5 Better a witty fool than a foolish wit
\[Feste]
A1.5 Take the fool away
\[Olivia]
A1.5 Do not you hear, fellows? Take away the lady.
\[Feste]

- Feste's antimetaboles pervade this play, which is a perfect literary feature for his character trope as fool, because antimetaboles by definition invert expectations, much like Feste does throughout this play, acting as an agent of questioning reality/convention
- "Take the fool away" is used by Feste to manipulate his lady
- This also signifies a nod to the theme of endings. The fool is being asked to leave, just as this is the last of Shakespeare's comedies \= sense of finality which is unprecedented in a comedy

A1.5 cucullus no facit monachum

Feste (replying to Olivia's "take away you")
- this Latin translates to 'the hood does not make the monk'
- meaning that his fool's attire does not make him a fool, it is his epigrams and foolish wit. Perhaps Feste's character sees through the superficial boundaries concerning clothing/gender/roles in the Elizabethan era
- this could also refer to the monk-like hood covering the entire head that was positioned as a cape, covering the shoulders and part of the chest.
(This hood was decorated with animal body parts, such as donkey's ears or the neck and head of a rooster. The animal theme was continued in the crest, which was worn as well)
- Perhaps Feste is also acting as an agent of foreshadowing as he later uses a disguise as Sir Topaz the curate in A4.2 "Well I'll put it on, and I will dissemble myself in't" to deceive the incarcerated Malvolio that he is mad)
- reference to the Sir Topaz scene where Malvolio is imprisoned, Feste also says "misprision" in the same scene

A1.5 What think you of this fool, Malvolio
\[Olivia]
A1.5 Infirmity that decays the wise, doth ever make the better fool
\[Malvolio]

- Here, Malvolio puts an end to the fun, through criticising Feste's age, suggesting it is his senile nature ("infirmity") that makes him even more foolish
- A typical example of Malvolio's Puritanism ruining the revelry of the subplot, later referring to him as:"a barren rascal" that has "no more brain than a stone", Olivia replies with "o, you are sick of self love Malvolio, and taste / with a distempered appetite"

A1.5 Fetch him off, I pray you, he speaks nothing but madman.

Olivia (telling Maria to prevent the drunk Toby Belch from answering the Cesario at the gates, because he's too drunk)
- This shows Olivia beginning to feel self conscious about how she presents herself/her household to Orsino's envoy Cesario

A1.5 Not old enough for a man, nor young enough for a boy, as a squash is before 'tis a peascod

or a codling when 'tis almost an apple

Malvolio
- Malvolio often mocks age of the other characters
- "peascod" and "squash" is suspected by Kokeritz as a pun on codpiece
- "codling" means unripe apple, which was slang for scrotum and/or testicles
- There is intense irony in that a) Malvolio, the Puritan is making a complex innuendo without realising and b) that Cesario is actually Viola who does not have any "codling(s)"

A1.5 Make me a willow cabin at your gate
And call upon my soul within the house,
Write loyal cantons of contemnèd love

Viola (as Cesario)
- 'Cesario' delivers this speech to Olivia after Orsino has sent her to carry his messages of love to Olivia.
- However, 'Cesario' sets aside the prepared messages and instead tells Olivia what she would do if she were in love with her
- THIS MOMENT IS KEY AS THIS IS THE INCITING ACTION; IT'S THE MOMENT OLIVIA FALLS IN LOVE WITH WHO SHE THINKS IS CESARIO
- 'Cesario' insists that she'd 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.

A1.5 I swear - I am not that I play.

Viola
- \= I am not equated solely with the part of Orsino's emissary (she's there for other reasons? Lesbian sexual charge?)
- 1ST OF SEVERAL HINTS BY VIOLA THAT SHE IS ASSUMING A DISGUISE

A1.5 I am to hull here a little longer. - Some mollification for your giant sweet lady

Viola
- In the scholarly article 'Bury Your Gays' it is suggested that Shakespeare using "sweet" in his texts he was "invoking a queer social code that existed in Elizabethan England real queer people would have used "sweet" to describe themselves.
- This relates to "I swear - I am not that I play", and the air of possibility this gives their meeting at Olivia's palace

A1.5 Make me a willow cabin at your gate

Viola as Cesario (to Olivia)
- willow takes a long time to grow (wants their relationship, Olivia's and Orsino's, to be long and cared for)
- the willow tree was also a symbol of sorrowful love
- An allusion to the 'saddest song in Shakespeare' in Othello called 'The Willow Song' A4.3, in which Desdamona prepares for bed the night before her murder and sings about Willow trees. Supposedly sung first by her mother's servant who loved a mad man, MUCH LIKE DESDAMONA who fears Othello will desert her.
- Iambic pentamter - like a sonnet
- "make" "gate" assonance
- imperative "make" shows Viola's directness cutting through Orsino's poetic lover trope, a non-active form of affection and love (courtly love)
- This sounds like a proclamation of love, not a message from an envoy, her soliloquy is replete with allusions to love, music and nature "sing them loud" "call upon my soul" "reverberate hills"
- ALL THIS CONTRASTS WITH VIOLA'S SPEECH IN A2.2.30 "WOMEN'S WAXEN HEARTS"+

A1.5 What is your parentage?

Olivia
- Olivia's incoherency in response to Viola's proclamation of love as Cesario is referred to later by Viola in A2.2
"for she did speak in starts, distractedly", "she loves me sure"
OLIVIA HAS OFFICIALLY FALLEN FOR THE DISGUISED OLIVIA
- Olivia later requests in this scene for Malvolio "what ho" and he comically appears immediately, begging him to "run after that peevish messenger". This comic appearance continues the theme of carnivalesque as our expectations are inverted
- Then, Olivia calls on the god "Fate, show thy force", which is fitting considering the next scene (A2.1) is a passion-filled one with Sebastian and Antonio having an empassioned debate.

(A2.1 facts)

- In Lyndsey Posner's 'Twelfth Night' for RSC, she emphasised Antonio and Sebastian's 'erotic' lives by the two male actors enacting this scene while dressing beside and unmade bed
- A2.1 follows on from Viola and Olivia's interaction, and A2.1 shows Sebastian and Antonio's interactions. Comparing the siblings' interactions with regards to love and loss, as Sebastian opens up about losing his twin sister Viola

A2.1 Will you stay no longer ...?

Antonio
- Throughout Twelfth Night, Antonio is depicted as a man who is constantly left by Sebastian, thus asking questions constantly. His last line in the play A5.1 is "Which is Sebastian?"; he is constantly ignored and his passions irrelevant to Sebastian and Orsino for he was a traitor after a sea battle with Orsino's men.

A2.1 My stars shine darkly / over me, the malignancy of my fate might perhaps / distemper yours

Sebastian
- Lexical field of astrology "stars", "malignancy"(\=evil influence) and "Fate" suggests that this coupling should be together, yet there are barriers between them, whether emotional, societal or fateful we don't know
- Also, Sebastian's negative imagery "malignancy" "darkly" "distemper" "evil" "bad" suggests Sebastian is ashamed of their relationship and wants to terminate it

A2.1 my name is Sebastian, which I called Roderigo. My father was that Sebastian of Messaline

Sebastian
- Shows both Viola and her brother's innate capacity to lie about their identity

A2.1 if you will not murder me for my love, let me be your servant

Antonio
- translates as: 'if you do not want me to die of a broken heart in losing you ... make me your servant"
- this intense declaration of infatuation is similar to the "make me a willow cabin" speech in the prior scene (A1.5)
- Viola also speaks of "contemned" love, which sets up the theme here of gender non-conforming values of girl-girl Olivia-Viola that are continued between boy-boy Antonio-Seb

A2.2 she returns this ring to you, sir [shows ring]
you might have saved me my pains to have taken it away yourself

Malvolio to Viola (as Cesario)
Olivia has feigned a story, i.e. Cesario dropping a ring upon leaving, so as to find an excuse for him to come again

A2.2 you peevishly threw it to her, and her will is it should be so returned [throws down ring]

Malvolio to Viola (as Cesario)
- Malvolio is clearly contemptuous towards Cesario, perhaps as he has never seen Olivia concerned with another 'man' in this manner and feels threatened?

A2.2 She loves me sure. The cunning of her passion
Invites me in this churlish messenger

Viola (as Cesario) monologue
- One of Viola's few soliloquies (others are: A3.1, 3.4)
- Viola switches back to blank verse
- realises the misunderstanding

A2.2 I am the man. If it be so

Viola (as Cesario) monologue
- hinting at her disguise

A2.2 Disguise, I see thou art a wickedness

Viola (as Cesario) monologue
- using apostrophes to address 'disguise' as if it were a person itself
- this is therefore ironic, as the concept of seeing/addressing a disguise is impossible - UNLESS YOU ARE THE DISGUISED

A2.2 In women's waxen hearts

Viola (as Cesario) monologue
- marvelling at the ease with which she wooed/deceived Olivia
- scathing of women (similar to Orsino's misogyny "they lack retention" a2.4)
- This is also explored in Hamlet when he cries bitterly "Frailty, thy name is woman" (Twelfth Night and Hamlet written at around the same time)
- Hamlet sees his mother as an archetypal woman.
- So when Gertrude commits incest, her actions destroy Hamlet's faith in women (thus his feelings toward Ophelia become ambivalent)
- Shows how sex/love easily cause tension and misery even in family situations

A2.2 O time thou must untangle this ... It is too hard a knot for me t'untie

Viola (as Cesario) monologue
- Viola's lie have caused her to be wrapped up in subterfuge
- She is 'in knots'
- could relate to the Greek mythology 'Gordion Knot' tied by King Gordius if Phyrgia
- it was virtually impossible to undo until Alexander the Great cut it with his sword

What are the parallels between A1.3 and A2.3?

- Both scenes are filled with revelry of Toby and Andrew, and are both interrupted by Malvolio (the symbol of Puritanism/rule/order)
- Malvolio's interruptions become the impetus for Maria's forging of a letter

A2.3 To be up after midnight and to go to bed then is early

Toby Belch
- Uses the theme of Hedonism (a philosophy arguing that pleasure seeking and avoidance of suffering are the only components of well-being)
- uses constant antithetical lexis in order to distort the words to mean something that benefits Toby
- almost as if he is a "corruptor of words" just as Feste but for farcical reasons and for his own ends

A2.3 Does not our life consist of the four elements?

Toby Belch
- Toby is referring to the four humours phlegm, yellow bile, black bile and blood
- this was a key theory behind ancient medicine and health. It focused on balance in life
- this is deeply ironic as it is often mentioned of Toby's alcoholism
- Toby is alluding to his \= sanguine humour
and Andrew's \= lean towards melancholy
and the complications of this

A2.3 [to Feste] Come on, there is sixpence for you. Let's have a song

Sir Toby
- the Fool likes the clink of coins: because he needs the money / simply enjoys it is (changes depending on production)
- With almost every appearance, and with every performance, he is paid and does
his best with: Orsino and his folk
does less well with: Andrew/Toby
does worst with: Olivia who doesn't pay/tip Feste on his first appearance; she is his primary employer, and he is just doing his job
- Toby is not rich, he is truly offering Andrew's money

A2.3 What is love? 'Tis not hereafter
Present mirth hath present laughter.
What's to come is still unsure.

Feste
- sings a song coaxed on by Toby and Andrew
- this song is bleak and focuses on the transience of love and laughter
- foreboding aura

A2.3 Do ye make an alehouse of my lady's house ... is there no respect of place, persons nor time in you?

Malvolio (interrupting the revelry of Toby, Andrew, Feste)
- Starkly juxtaposes Toby Belch's singing "O' the twelfth day of December"
- Malvolio is only a steward yet gives himself high responsibility
- Shakespeare could be commenting on Puritans elevating themselves beyond others for piety
- Maybe Malvolio is hoping that through devotion to Olivia he may gain some romantic return

A2.3 [To Malvolio] Art any more than a steward? Dost thou think because thou art virtuous there shall be no more cakes and ale

Sir Toby
- taunts Malvolio
- succinctly summarises many of Twelfth Night's tensions
- Twelfth Nigh reveals more than any other British comedy of the same era the shifting economic, social and political landscapes of his time
- "cakes and ale" is a bastardisation of bread/wine holy communion, this would anger a Puritan like Malvolio

A2.3 For Monsieur Malvolio, let me alone with him ... gull him into a nayword

Maria
- Maria is angered at Malvolio suggesting she is only a waiting-gentlewoman, just as he is only a steward
- Maria is already conniving against Malvolio; she wants to trick Malvolio into believing a falsehood
- THE IMPETUS/BEGINNING OF THE LETTER PLOT

A2.3 with excellencies that 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

Maria
- She is PLANNING A REVENGE PLOT TO DECEIVE MALVOLIO
- almost as if Malvolio's jabs were the straw that broke the camel's back
- Malvolio's "vice" is that he is "sick of self love", and Maria hopes to use this to her advantage

A2.3 I'd beat him like a dog (TOBY)

the devil a Puritan he is (MARIA)

an affectioned ass that cons state without book (MARIA)

- These are quite horrific takes on religion
- "cons state without book" refers to an idiom for an actor conning his part (as if Malvolio is faking piety?)
- they want to hurt Malvolio for his religion and the way he imparts it upon people
- extreme to match the extremity of Puritanism?
- Links to the idea of a morality play

A2.3 I will drop in his way some obscure epistles of love

Maria
- OUTLINING HER DECEITFUL PLOT
- her and Toby both refer to the plural of 'epistles', suggesting they intend to send more than one love letter from the outset
- Toby says "I smell a device", as if they use euphemism to conceal the fact that this will damage Malvolio and his reputation severely

A2.3 Good night, Penthesilea

Toby (to Maria)
- Penthesilea was Queen of the Amazons
- Opposition to Achilles in the Trojan wars
- This is a nod to Maria's combative spirit and strength of character.
- Furthers the idea of a strong female power in Twelfth Night

How does A2.4's opening mirror A1.1?

- Orsino begins the scene stating "Give me some music" and almost entirely mirrors the same structure/themes of his opening soliloquy
- He still focuses on the theme of love, but this time with Viola (as Cesario)

A2.4 Give me some music. Now good morrow, friends.
Now good Cesario, but that piece of song,
That old and antic song we heard last night

Orsino
- A stylistic 'echo' of A1.1's "If music be the food of love, play on ... That strain again, it had a dying fall. Oh, it came o'er my ear like the sweet sound"
- this scene contains the most extended play on Cesario's androgyny
- with Viola's veiled confession of love to him
- Orsino fails to understand it
- He doesn't reference "violets" this time because Viola is right there with him

A2.4 thine eye hath stayed upon some favour that it loves. Hath it not, boy?

Orsino
- prompts a friendly talk with his servant Cesario about who it is that he (she) loves
- little does he know that Cesario (viola) actually loves him

A2.4 What kind of woman is't? (ORSINO)

Of your complexion (VIOLA, CESARIO)

what years...? (ORSINO)

About your years, my lord (VIOLA, CESARIO)

too old, by heaven (ORSINO )

- Cesario (Viola) is overtly telling him that she loves him
- Shows the double standards for men and for women, Orsino says that Cesario's love is "too old", yet simultaneously if he is "old", why does he later pray on viola who is often referred to as looking boyish and very young "peascod"/"codling"

A2.4 our fancies are more giddy and unfirm

Orsino
- directly opposing his statement "they lack retention" when discussing women's affections later in the very same scene
- "fancies" relates to "fancy's queen" in A5.1

A2.4 For women are as roses, whose fair flower being once displayed doth fall that very hour

Orsino
- this and other derogatory comments about women have lead this part to be called Orsino's Misogynistic speech
- Relates to the sonnet 130 that discusses unrealistic beauty expectations of women, which Orsino is perpetuating "I have seen roses damask'd, red and white, But no such roses see I in her cheeks"

A2.4 Now the melancholy god protect thee

changeable taffeta

thy mind is a very opal

Feste (to Orsino)
- 'melancholy god' \= Saturn, Roman god, identified with the planet ruling over the melancholy humour (Feste is insulting Orsino's current bad mood)
- 'taffeta' \= associated with mood changes under influence of love
- 'opal' \= perspectival iridescence links to inconstancy

A2.4 they lack retention. Alas, their love may be called appetite

Orsino
- Completely hypocritical of his former statement in this scene "our fancies are more giddy and fun", Shakespeare suggesting that really men and women are quite similar
- this also links to A2,2 when Viola says "in women's waxen hearts"
- We all play into the foolish game of love, no one is exempt
- Orsino proceeds to compare his appetite for love "as hungry as the sea", which is equally a predator-like way of seeing love

A2.4 My father had a daughter loved a man
As it might be, perhaps, were I a woman,
I should your lordship

Viola (as Cesario to Orsino, comforting him)
- Overtly suggesting to Orsino that she COULD love him if 'he' were a woman
- Viola then goes on to speak of a "damask rose" which is mentioned in sonnet 130 about a woman who does not appear very womanly.

What is brewing by Act 2, scene 5?

Fabian, Sir Toby, Sir Andrew and Maria hiding behind bushes awaiting Malvolio coming across the letter that Maria feigned

A2.5 wouldst thou not be glad to have the niggardly, rascally sheep-biter an come by some notable shame

Sir Toby (to Fabian)
\= 'don't you want to see the dastardly Malvolio be humiliated?'
- "sheep-biter" is associated by Nashe with Puritanism
- perhaps Toby calls him a "sheep-biter" because, Malvolio attacks their fun.
- The insult may also suggest that Malvolio is a "whoremonger" who seeks out prostitutes.

A2.5 he brought me out o'favour with my lady about a bear-baiting

Fabian
- shows that Malvolio is hated for his propensity to disrupt others' fun
- but he has done it to such an extent that soon he will become their source of fun
- "bear-baiting" is interesting as Malvolio in A5.1 exclaims "I'll be revenged on the whole pack of you!" and "pack" certainly has predatory connotations

A2.5 here comes the little villain

Sir Toby
- To Maria, almost flirtatiously
- links to A2.3 when Toby calls Maria "Penthesilea" for plotting revenge on Malvolio for undermining her status in Olivia's house

A2.5 here comes the trout that must be caught with tickling

Maria
- catching trout by tickling their gills is easy
- Maria has changed the metaphor from bears to fish (bears eat fish, subversion)
- suggests they're doing this to reverse power constructs.

A2.5 to be count Malvolio

Malvolio
- immediately considering an elevated version of himself at the prospect of love from Olivia (from letter)

A2.5 having come from a day-bed where I have left Olivia sleeping

Malvolio
- this begins Malvolio's descension from a symbol of purity
- toby whispers from the box-hedge "Fire and brimstone!" which is basically 'hell' which is an idiomatic expression referring to God's wrath
- In the Bible, it often appears in reference to the fate of the unfaithful (Malvolio is unfaithful to his religion? Abandoning it for lechery and depravity?)

A2.5 'you must amend your drunkenness'

Malvolio (pretending to converse with Toby from a position of fake authority after finding the letter)
- the irony of suggesting he wants to love Olivia
- but the only thing he wants is to have authority to tell the members of the subplot what to do.

A2.5 foolish knight

Malvolio's description of Sir Andrew

A2.5 Now is the woodcock near the gin

Fabian (calling Malvolio a fool and the gin \= the letter)
- woodcock \= stupid bird
- the irony of alcohol appealing to a puritan character
- this also links to A4.2 darkroom scene

A2.5 By my life, this is my lady's hand these be her very C's, her U's and her T's and thus makes she her great P's

Malvolio
- very rude joke
- we are exposed to the part of Olivia that he is most concerned with (i.e. her c-u-_-t)
- but he does this unwittingly, so he himself is equally as a fool as Andrew, who he calls a "foolish knight"
- Andrew even asks the others in the bushes "her c's, her u's, her t's. Why that?"
- "P's" is an allusion to urine

A2.5 Lucrece ... 'tis my lady

wax. soft

Malvolio
- Malvolio compares the object of his affection to a suicidal rape victim from Shakespeare's 'The Rape of Lucrece'
- Malvolio even mentions Lucrece before he reads the letter that Maria has written, when he starts reading we see that Maria, too, has written "Lucrece"
- shows his perverted/misplaced morals as a Puritan
- aka he takes issue with alcohol and debauchery, but not rape and exploitation of power dynamics

- "wax" could relate to "women's waxen hearts" in A2.2

A2.5 *I am above thee, but be not afraid of greatness. Some are born great, some achieve greatness and some have greatness thrust upon them*

Malvolio (reading Maria's feigned letter)
- "thrust" has a sexual allusion often performed with a pelvic thrust
- this relates to A5.1 "be that thou knowst thou art, and then thou art as great as thou fear's", so clearly Maria is as cunning as everyone depicts her, she is able to predict both Malvolio's mannerisms and Olivia's

A2.5 she did commend my yellow stockings of late

Malvolio
- yellow worn by v important people (Sumptuary laws)
- yellow associated with envy/treachery because Judas wore yellow
- continues theme of Malvolio being deceptive/disingenuous type (i.e. "an affectioned ass that cons state without book" and "Fire and brimstone!")