Text Title – The Twelfth Night

Author/Director – William Shakespeare

Text Type – Play

Date Read – Term 1 Holidays

‘The Twelfth Night’ is a comedic play believed to have been written in 1601 by William Shakespeare. It tells the story of a love triangle between the protagonist, Viola, the antagonist, Olivia and the Duke of Illyria, Orsino. It is interesting that although this play was written 400 years ago, it didn’t take me long to notice prejudiced themes and ideas that are relevant today. The English language has evolved, but as humans, it seems we still experience many of the same things. Viola dressed as a male page, using the disguise, possibly in order to gain better employment and craft an alter-ego. The fact that Viola is hiding behind a false facade makes me question whether any of us actually show our authentic selves to the world. I sit here questioning whether I am true to myself or even true to the world. As much as I hope I am, I don’t truly know the answer as I am still young and learning about myself and how I relate to the world. I purchased the Twelfth Night in Istanbul, which interestingly is a place where I develop my own facade when in the touristic areas. I have learnt to pass myself off as a fluent local in order to avoid unwanted attention from local men looking for a girlfriend. Traditionally, young turkish village men have developed the belief that western women are easy targets based on what they see in many western music videos. I know this comes across as prejudiced, but it comes from the distinct social classes and varying levels of education in Turkey. This is an example of a time it is necessary to develop a persona in order to protect ourselves. Just as Viola masked herself in order to escape the inequality of men and women, and inevitable sexism, many people in today’s world mask themselves behind makeup, social media and even wealth. Why would we do this? I wonder if it is to hide our own fears and insecurities, or to gain a higher social status. Perhaps it is a combination of all these aspects of day to day life. I even question whether people consciously think about this, or if it is just a defence mechanism to protect ourselves from the harsh judgement of society.

Shakespeare’s title, The Twelfth Night is taken from the name of a Christian feast, celebrated on the 6th of January, the Twelfth Night of Christmas. It celebrates Epiphany which is the “manifestation of Christ to the gentiles in the persons of the Magi”, the Magi being “wise men” who “paid homage” to baby Jesus. Often, this celebration results in a temporary break in rules, with people mixing across the social classes who would not normally associate socially. Shakespeare likely titled the play so because his audience would most likely connect more easily with the idea of mixed social classes associating with one another. Interestingly, in Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre performances, the audience would have been seated according to their social class, the upper class being given priority treatment. The idea of the separate social class seating structure while viewing characters mixing across social classes intrigues me. In many of Shakespare’s other pieces of work I have read, iambic pentameter was a common element in the dialogue of more noble characters, therefore illustrating that social classes did not associate in social settings such as the ones in the play of the Twelfth Night. In Twelfth Night celebrations, it is popular to hide both a pea and a bean inside a cake. The man to discover the bean would be named the Lord/King of Misrule, and the lady to discover the pea would be named the Lady/Queen of Misrule. Often the Lord/King of Misrule would be of a lower social class who was leading the drinking and activities of the like. In Christian religion, the Twelfth Night is a time of year where it was socially acceptable for servants to associate with their master. Sometimes servants would dress up as their masters and masters as their servants. The title the Twelfth Night may also refer to the theme the plot revolves around: Viola disguising as a page boy. The play highlights the potential dangers about dressing up/cross-dressing, such as Olivia falling in love with Viola thinking she was a male. Although the play itself does not refer to the Twelfth Night, it exploits the lack of rules and dressing up of characters throughout the play, with Feste the Fools song at the end showing reality coming back and life going on as normal with the social rights and wrongs of the time being put back in place. Personally, I am not religious and know little about Christanity and their celebrations, but the title of the play, and the fact that I could not understand why the title was chosen by just reading the play caused me to research the topic further. It was interesting for me to gain knowledge of historical and cultural rituals of which I knew very little about. It also gave me further insight into the inner working of the society of the time, and the harsh classism which shockingly, is still present in today’s society. I have seen information posts on my social media feeds promoting ideas such as ‘billionaires should not exist’ and introducing the ideas that ‘billionaires hoard wealth,’ without helping those homeless, starving or dying of curable diseases. This comes across to many as selfish, and shows that the human race as a whole is greedy, and those with wealth often consider themselves above others. This highlights that, as much as society appears to have progressed past one individual being less than another due to their social class or wealth, class prejudice is still present across all of society.

The theme of prejudice emerges in the text in the form of both gender prejudice and prejudice between social classes, the former being the idea which interested me the most. Of all the Shakespearian plays I have read, the Twelfth Night exhibits more gender and sexual diversity, which is very topical today. To begin with, Viola takes it upon herself to dress as a male. Although the reasoning behind this is unclear, it may be that Orsino appears to run a male-oriented staff. Dressing as a male would allow Viola to earn money to support herself. Why is it that even today men find employment more easily and tend to earn more than women? What are we basing these values on? It seems that the contribution of males to the workforce is given more value. Recently, I was forwarded an article written by a New Zealand doctor who said more than 50% of the time when consulting with clients, eventually they will ask when they are going to see the doctor. They seem reluctant to accept that she is the doctor, not the nurse and she feels the only reason this question is asked is because they expect their doctor to be a male. I think that Shakespeare was deliberately trying to encourage dialogue around homosexuality. Although he did not use diverse terms as we do now, he used humour to introduce a taboo subject.

Viola’s alter-ego facilitated the development of friendship and intimacy between her and the Duke. Cesario, Viola’s alter-ego, became close friends with the Duke and they had many conversations about love and personal relationships. In turn, this showed that he had a great deal of trust in her. This led me to believe that the Duke’s feelings toward Cesario may have been even more than just plain friendship. The love triangle in the play was extremely confusing for me, and made me wonder if situations like this actually happen in people’s lives nowadays. This comes across as a highly unlikely scenario, and therefore adds to the humour of the play. The fact that he married Viola after it was told she was not a male may mean that the attraction was always there, and feelings could finally be expressed without fear of judgement. He was relatively unfazed by the revelation, and seemed more or less happy to change this friendship to a romantic relationship. I also find this scenario highly unlikely, but funny all the same. Not many of us would marry after just a few days of acquaintance. But it also makes the theory of Orsino’s attraction to Cesario more believable, as he had known her male self longer. The attraction may also have been due to Cesario’s feminine features even when she is disguised as a male, as seen in the quote “all is semblative of a woman’s part.” This makes me wonder what Shakspeare was trying to convey. Is the idea that as humans we are attracted primarily based on chemistry or personality or more likely a combination.

“The Twelfth Night” by William Shakespeare is a play filled with prejudice, not only around gender and sexuality, but around society and class. It’s interesting that even today, in the 21st century, there are still similarities to the 17th century. It shows just how important these issues have been in society for hundreds of years, and although society has progressed, it is not yet enough, and unless something is done, these issues will stay present in society.