The Comedy Of Happiness In William Shakespeare's Twelfth Night

People tend to judge others based on many aspects. Sometimes they may try to force people to act upon certain rules that define their place in society. They often try to meet expectations that society has made for them based on gender and social status. William Shakespeare reinforces these ideas in his play Twelfth Night, which introduces many meaningful messages about situations that still occur in society today. He clearly develops important themes worthy of analysis. A few of these strong themes are about stereotypes and society’s expectations and rules, which he proves to be irrelevant most of the time. Many situations in the play falsify commonly held stereotypes about gender and social status by showing how they are sometimes invalid. He also shows how these stereotypes can affect the way people behave towards and judge others.

In a Twelfth Night by William Shakespeare there are many themes portrayed but the most prevalent was the topic of madness. The play Twelfth Night shows us that madness is merely a perception. This will be proved by three main proofs as seen in the play. These proofs are; Sebastian’s view of Olivia and himself, the household’s view of Malvolio, and Orsino’s descent into “madness”. Various paraphernalia from the play such as quotes and examples from the play will be used to demonstrate the perceived changes of madness towards these characters.

The differences in styles of language truly brings alive the plays' various characters, from the lowliest drawer to the noblest knight. The playwright's audience would have been composed of a similarly diverse spectrum of society, from the groundlings at the foot of the stage, to the members of the court in attendance, and these disparate members of the audience might very well have come away from the plays with different interpretations of

It is commonly said that “all’s well that ends well.” In the case of the comedies of William Shakespeare, this is almost universally true. With specific regard to A Midsummer Night’s Dream, the machinations of Oberon are able to bring together Lysander and Hermia, as well as Helena and Demetrius, in a way that provides for the happiest of conclusions. As readers of the play, however, this is also a conclusion that we can anticipate from the first scene. The comedies trace formulaic patterns in which even the most unbelievable circumstances can be resolved by the play’s end, and the performance can end with marriage

Most of the major characters in Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night experience some form of love or marriage. Whether it’s unrequited like with Antonio and Malvolio, or it is something seemingly unattainable like with Duke Orsino. Regardless, it is clear that love is prevalent as one of the central themes Shakespeare seems to emphasize in Twelfth Night. With that, we see him communicate different interpretations and feelings regarding the subject. He does this with the medium of melodramatic characters. In this essay, I will elaborate on the opinions of love that Shakespeare communicates through one of the leading characters:

Twelfth Night was thought to be written in 1600-1. The play – known for adhering to a genre of romantic comedy by utilising pathos combined with humour – is listed under comedies in the First Folio of 1623 with another of Shakespeare’s works As You Like It. Twelfth Night adheres to Frye’s theory to some extent. The old world, one of repression, is conveyed through the puritanical beliefs of Malvolio; the green world is conveyed through the theories of disguise and confusion; and a new world is established through the restoration of order and the marriages in Act 5. However, the continuous adherence to the old world through Malvolio and a lack of clear structure when transgressing the worlds limits the extent of Frye’s theory. The flexible structure is perhaps more indicative of Berger’s ‘second’ world theory. My aim is to explore the limitations of the green world within the play Twelfth Night.

Although Twelfth Night is renowned for its comical nature and cross-dressing, on closer examination it appears that Shakespeare has used this comedy to have a greater effect on the audience than pure humour, supporting Berry’s statement. However, before attesting that Berry is entirely correct, we must evaluate three things: the way in which Shakespeare makes the audience feel ashamed, whether this shame is felt by both contemporary audiences and Elizabethan/Jacobean audiences, and whether shame is, as Berry writes “the ultimate effect”.

One of the strengths of good theater is its ability to mirror the problems and conditions shaping its time. In The Merchant of Venice, William Shakespeare reflects two important aspects of Elizabethan society: the corrupting influence of prosperity and the increasingly vengeful nature of Venetian justice. To address the former issue, Shakespeare downplays the importance of wealth by associating its involvement in romance with superficial and insubstantial advantages. He characterizes prosperity as a deceiving agent, citing its ability to introduce shallowness into a relationship. Shakespeare reasons that genuine romance depends on sacrifice and emotion, not wealth. The problem with justice is equally striking. In the play, justice is

There is a certain degree of expectation with the genre of comedy that despite whatever difficulties appear within the play, by the end these will be resolved and the play will have a traditional happy-ending with a marriage or a celebration in the final scene. The “Twelfth Night” is no exception to this rule. Despite problems of confused identities and sexualities, the play ends with marriage for the major characters because they “have learned enough about their own foolishness to accept it wisely, and their reward, as it should be, is marriage.”(Schwartz 5140). There is a resolution of harmony to a certain extent and an endorsement of romantic love yet despite the happiness evident in the last scene, there are many elements in the play

Yet the atmosphere of the play may render Malvolio’s aspirations less unreasonable than they initially seem. The feast of Twelfth Night, from which the play takes its name, was a time when social hierarchies were turned upside down. That same spirit is alive in Illyria: indeed, Malvolio’s antagonist, Maria, is able to increase her social standing by marrying Sir Toby. But it seems that Maria’s success may be due to her willingness to accept and promote the anarchy that Sir Toby and the others embrace. This Twelfth Night spirit, then, seems to pass by Malvolio, who doesn’t wholeheartedly embrace the upending of order and decorum but rather wants to blur class lines for himself alone.

In the play Twelfth Night, Shakespeare uses dramatic irony to develop the comedic effect in the characters relationships. The use of dramatic irony produces most of the comedic effect by revealing situations and relationships to the audience, but not the cast. Developing the plot with this literary device provides comedic and ironic situations while engaging the audience.

The rise of tension between characters is another characteristic of comedic plays. After Oberon sees the way that Helena has been treated by Demetrius, he orders Puck to apply the juice to the eyes of Demetrius. Puck accidentally applies the juice to Lysander’s eye, which causes him to fall in love with Helena. After the mistake had been caught, Oberon sends Puck to watch Helena and Oberon applies the juice to Demetrius’ eyes. This causes both men to fall for Helena and now the battle is for Helena and not Hermia. Helena is convinced that this is a joke or prank because neither of the two men loved her before. Now because of Puck’s mistakes the four decide to find a

“The course of true love never did run smooth,” comments Lysander of love’s complications in an exchange with Hermia (Shakespeare I.i.136). Although the play A Midsummer Night’s Dream certainly deals with the difficulty of romance, it is not considered a true love story like Romeo and Juliet. Shakespeare, as he unfolds the story, intentionally distances the audience from the emotions of the characters so he can caricature the anguish and burdens endured by the lovers. Through his masterful use of figurative language, Shakespeare examines the theme of the capricious and irrational nature of love.

At least six or seven years pass after the writing of Midsummer Night’s Dream before we find Shakespeare engaged on Hamlet, the second of the great plays with an important Supernatural element, and, in the opinion of many, the greatest tragedy ever penned. What a profound change has come over his attitude towards the Unseen! No longer does he handle it in . . . [a] cheerful,

Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night is a play with themes that parallel the folly of the festival it is named after. The main storyline of the plot plays on this a lot by mixing up the stereotypes around gender that were very present at the time. However, a sub-plot involving secondary characters defines this theme even more. It takes the idea even further by relating servants’ attempts to blur the lines between social classes. Twelfth Night’s Maria and Malvolio both have great aspirations to rise above their social class. However, Maria succeeds where Malvolio fails because of her capability to make use of the satiric ambiance of her mistress’s household to achieve her goals.