Twelfth Night

"Dost thou think, because thou art virtuous,

there shall be no more cakes and ale?"

Read | Questions | Resources | Links | Performance | Papers | Back


Read

  • the play
  • Prof. Don King's on Shakespeare's mature comedies are a helpful brief introduction.
  • Northrop Frye's essay "The Argument of Comedy" (be prepared to discuss the essay in class), available in these sources on reserve in the library:

  • There is a hypertext version of the play thanks to Robert Stockton.

    You may find helpful

  • a former student's commentary on Frye's essay.
  • a former student's reaction paper "The Foolish Wise Man in Twelfth Night" (think about how it contributes to your understanding of the role of the fool in the play)

    Questions

    (1) What is the meaning of the play's title, literally? How is this allusion appropriate to the play's themes? How is the subtitle appropriate also?

    (2) Consider the implications of the names "Feste" and "Malvolio." If you need help, look up our modern-day analogues "festival" and "malevolent."

    (3) Consider, too, the significance of disguises in this play, especially in relation to the theme of friendship and love. What is the outcome of the wearing of disguises--is it the same as in other plays?

    (4) Does Viola's line of reasoning in her discussion with Olivia remind you of any themes in Shakespeare's Sonnets?

    (5) How many suitors in love do we have in this play? Which are the "conventional" lovers like those we have seen in other plays?

    (6) Consider the parallel plot situations that Shakespeare sets up between Viola, who thinks she has lost her brother by drowning, and Olivia, who mourns her own brother's death. How do their differing reactions to their bereavements tell us something about their characters?

    (7) Consider the purpose of the subplot. Here, as in most of Shakespeare's other plays, it provides a comment upon the action of the main plot. What is its relationship to the main plot?

    (8) Why is the trick played upon Malvolio so ironically appropriate? How does he allow himself to become trapped by his friends and companions?

    (9) What does the darkness in Malvolio's "dungeon" symbolize?

    (10) Is the timing of the unmasking of disguise important in this play? Does it take place only after some necessary preliminaries have been completed?

    (11) Time has an important role in this play, especially in the working out of the plot. Is time a beneficent or a malignant force? What is the proper attitude toward the passing of time, and how is this attitude exemplified by patience?

    (12) Consider the role of the fool in this play. What is his function? Is he wise or mad? Are there others in the play who are more truly "madmen"? How do wisdom and folly exchange places during the course of the play?

    (13) How many songs appear in this play? What is their importance? Consider both their message and what different people's preferences in music tell us about them.

    (14) One of the themes of the play is a debate between arguments for merriment vs. sobriety. Which side does Shakespeare seem to advocate in this debate? With which sides do the various characters in the play align themselves?

    (15) Consider the end of the play and what it suggests about the "triumph" of festivity over sobriety at the end of the plot. Why does the play end without depicting the final reconciliation with Malvolio? What does the final song suggest in its theme? Which characters at the end of the play suggest that there may be limitations to the reign of levity?

    Here are even more study questions from Prof. J. M. Massi!

    For a megapage of resources on TWELFTH NIGHT, see the University of Basel's Shakespeare in Europe page on the play.

    Resources

    C. L. Barber, "Testing Courtesy and Humanity in Twelfth Night," in his Shakespeare's Festive Comedy (Princeton: Princeton Univ. Press, 1972) [RES: PR 2981 .B3].

    David M. Bergeron, "Come Hell or High Water: Shakespearean Romantic Comedy," in Shakespearean Comedy , ed. Maurice Charney (New York, 1980), pp. 111-20 [RES: PR 2981 .S49].

    William C. Carroll, "The Ending of Twelfth Night and the Tradition of Metamorphosis" in Shakespearean Comedy, ed. Maurice Charney [RES: PR 2981 .S49].

    Nancy Hayles, "Sexual Disguise in As You Like It and Twelfth Night," Shakespeare Survey, 32 (1979), 63-72 [Ref: PR 2888 .C3].

    Harold Jenkins, "Shakespeare's Twelfth Night," from Shakespeare: The Comedies, ed. Kenneth Muir [RES: xeroxed copy of article].

    M. E. Lamb, "Ovid's Metamorphoses and Shakespeare's Twelfth Night," in Shakespearean Comedy, ed. Maurice Charney [RES: PR 2981 .S49].

    Mullenix, Elizabeth Reitz, Twelfth Night (Illinois Shakespeare Festival)

    Lockett, Joseph L. "An Improbable Fiction": Shakespeare's Twelfth Night in Sources and Performance

    Godshalk, W. L. ""Twelfth Night: All or Nothing, What You Will, It's All One - Or Is It?" (University of Cincinnati)

    Links

    Performances

  • The recent Twelfth Night film by Peter Hall

  • Shaltz, Justin. Review of Twelfth Night performance at the Illinois Shakespeare Festival, 1996.

  • The BBC Twelfth Night: Relationships Revealed

    Papers

    It would be easy to do a subplot paper on this play--the two plots have a delightful "upstairs-downstairs" relationship that crystallizes the theme.