William Shakespeare's Twelfth Night as a Feminist Play Essay

Shakespeare's Twelfth Night examines patterns of love and courtship through a twisting of gender roles. The play centers on the lead female role and protagonist, Viola, who

Orsino's love, however, is a courtly love. He claims to be in love with Olivia but seems rather to be in love with the idea of love and the behavior of a lover. Orsino is a Petrachan lover who chooses an object that will not return his love. Because he is not ready for commitment, he courts Olivia in a formal way. By sending his messengers to her house instead of going himself, he does not have to speak to her directly. Early in the play, Viola realises that Orsino's love for Olivia is denied and that she would also reject all men for a period of seven years. Viola believes that Orsino might not be rejected if he visited Olivia himself and says to him: "I think not so, my lord," but Orsino, not wanting to see Olivia himself and wanting to keep up the role of the disappointed lover, insists that Cesario woo her.

All throughout Illyria, there is romance, passion, royalty, and an immense amount of gender stereotypes. William Shakespeare imagines the kingdom of Illyria to have very traditional norms for both women and men in his play Twelfth Night. In Scene 2 of Act 1, Viola, recently rescued from a shipwreck, hears about a duke named Orsino and instantly comes up with a plan to get closer to him. Her plan is to disguise herself as a boy who she will name Cesario and become one of Orsino's’ attendants. Right off the bat, we begin to see gender stereotypes. Why must Viola become a man in order to work for the duke? Elizabethan society “molded women into the form of the dutiful wife and mother” (Elizabethan Women). Viola could not have served duke Orsino as a woman because as a woman she was expected to work at home and be either a “dutiful wife [or a] mother”. Scene two prepares the audience for the idea of gender throughout the rest of the play. Shakespeare's Twelfth Night is very traditional play due to its ideas of gender stereotypes in Elizabethan society.

Twelfth Night is a very feminist play once readers have been reading it. The story’s protagonist is a woman, Viola. Viola displays herself as a rational, strong, witting woman, who has to disguise herself as a man to be able to become a faithful attendant of Orsino. With Viola doing this it creates a big sexual mess as Viola falls in love with Orsino but cannot tell him since he still thinks she is a man. While Olivia, who is the object of Orsino’s affection, falls for Cesario, the disguise for Viola. Once Viola’s true identity is revealed Orsino declares his love for Viola which suggest that he may really just loved the masculinity she possessed. Orsino says to Viola, even after seeing her true identity, “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” (Shakespeare, Twelfth Night 5.1.2599-26001). After everything has been reveled Orsino still calls Viola by her disguise name…her boy name, Cesario. The readers can only wonder is Orsino truly loved Viola for her or if he was in love with the male persona she gave.

Through out Shakespeare’s entire Twelfths Night Act there were various roles of mistaken identities. “Shakespeare often uses mistaken identity to create confusion and tangled, love triangles. This keeps his plays fresh and serves to add humor to the entertainment.” (D, Jill) Viola is one of the main characters of the Twelfths Night Act we can easily reduce the amorality or her decision to dress like a young man. Her character is the center the entire plot. She seems to be the only character to truly be authentic. She also seems to be truly in love. Viola also plays the character of Cesario. At times she has problems keeping her identity being that she is in disguise. For Orsino and Olivia, Orsino starts out by professing his love for Olivia.

Much of the first half of the Twelfth Night is about disguised identities and general misconceptions about who is actually who. The play opens on a note of melancholy and death, Orsino grieving because Olivia refuses to love him and Viola and Olivia mourning the deaths of their brothers. It is following a shipwreck that Viola disguises herself as a male, ensuring that confusion will be part of the plot. The idea of masquerading as a member of the opposite sex is a familiar device and the “complications, artificial as they may appear, are an essential part of the play’s complete development.” (Travers 308) It is interesting to note that unlike other comedies such as “The Tempest”, Shakespeare does not create an older generation who prevent the young lovers from being together; instead it is the perplexity about gender and that keeps them apart. Sebastian, Viola’s identical twin, is the solution to all of the problems, though his appearance does add to it for a short while. Viola, dressed as Cesario, is mistaken for Sebastian by Antonio, and is asked for the money that he gave to Sebastian. However, this type of confusion adds to the comic nature of the plot as the audience is aware of the concealed identities. Order eventually comes from the chaos, disguises are shed and identities are revealed. The appearance of Sebastian ensures that the marriage will be possible for the main characters; Viola is free to marry Orsino and Olivia marries Sebastian, although she

Sexual identity and gender norms were very clearly defined in Elizabethan times and are still very clearly defined in todays world and society. Women are presented as being more in touch with their emotions, being more dramatic and being less qualified to lead or be in charge of their own destiny, whereas men are often portrayed as being more rugged, hands on and very qualified to do all things simply because they are men. Emancipation is a relatively new term, even though, when Shakespeare was writing his play his country was governed by a female monarch. In twelfth Night Shakespeare explores gender norms, sexual identity and women’s abilities to be their own person, have their own opinions through Viola. This arguably creates a very feminist

In fact it can also be said that the two are similar in the sense that they are apparently both homosexuals. Even after Cesario had revealed himself to be Viola, Orsino will still call Viola Cesario and treats him as before until s/he changes her clothing, additionally, Viola will also continue to call Orsino her master to fit the role. Can it be said that the true desire of Orsino is to have Cesario as a man but due to the convention he is unable to, nevertheless, in his situation he may be able to pretend otherwise. However, with Olivia’s ending it can be seen that the so called relationship or “love” between her and Sebastian is in fact a folly of love. The play uses both Sebastian and Olivia- especially Olivia to make the play end as it did.

Shakespeare's story Twelfth Night has an underlying theme of love and a twisting path of gender roles. The gender roles create confusion for both the characters in the play and also the readers due to the fact that one of the main characters is a female but willingly chooses to pretend to be a man throughout this play. The confusion is created due to a  disguise in comedy which then creates a space in which  boundaries are tested. Viola does not feel comfortable in her own skin and dressed as a male to find herself. I feel that Twelfth Night addresses that there is a sense of confusion with the characters being who they truly are and understanding themselves as a whole.

In total, William Shakespeare has written 137 sonnets and 34 plays. One of those plays is Twelfth Night. In Twelfth Night there are numerous characters that make the story exciting and memorable. The protagonist in the story, Viola, is a character that contributes to making the story and plot unforgettable. Viola is a strong hearted girl who is compassionate and inquisitive. Throughout the story, Viola demonstrates several character traits that help the audience understand what kind of person she is. Shakespeare used Viola in the story to enhance the plot with detail and made the audience feel connected to the story.

Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night, starts off very dramatic and with a feeling of sadness and love lost or out of reach. Orsino has fallen for a woman called Olivia, whose brother has died. At the same time Viola’s loses her brother as well tragically in a shipwreck. Following immediately after this she decides to dress as a man, to gain her livelihood working for Orsino. Here we go from the Romantic mood of the story, to the slightly ludicrous but amusing idea of cross dressing or gender bending. Which is a major plot instrument throughout the entire story, an instrument that crates both hilarity and a great amount of drama.

Viola, one of the main protagonists, experiences suffering when she falls in love with Orsino, whom she cannot pursue or express her true feelings for. After a shipwreck, Viola finds herself stranded in the country of Illyria. In order to work for the Duke Orsino, she disguises herself as a man named Cesario, which makes romance with the duke impossible. After spending three days with him, she falls in love. Not only does she have to repress her feelings toward Orsino, but to add to her pain, Orsino assigns her to spend her time trying to persuade Lady Olivia to marry him. Viola says to the audience, “whoe’er I woo, myself would be his wife” (1.4.42), because she wishes to marry Orsino.

The play Twelfth Night encapsulates what it meant to be a man and women throughout

     Shakespeare's Twelfth Night examines patterns of love and courtship through a twisting of gender roles. In Act 3, scene 1, Olivia displays the confusion created for both characters and audience as she takes on the traditionally male role of wooer in an attempt to win the disguised Viola, or Cesario. Olivia praises Cesario's beauty and then addresses him with the belief that his "scorn" (3.1.134) only reveals his hidden love. However, Olivia's mistaken interpretation of Cesario's manner is only the surface problem presented by her speech. The reality of Cesario's gender, the active role Olivia takes in pursuing him/her, and the duality of word meanings in this passage threaten to turn the

Viola sacrificed who she was and expressing her love to Orsino so that she could create her voice in the world and be accepted in a dominate male society. Act one, scene two, lines 53 and 54, Viola says, “Conceal me what I am, and be my aid for such disguise as haply shall become.” She portrays her courage when she decides to disguise herself as a young man. She does not have to mask her inner bravery while dressed as a man, because it’s acceptable for a male to be openly courageous constantly, while Desdemona showed moments of her strength which I will discuss. Viola becomes “Cesario” and Olivia becomes infatuated with him because he is unlike any other man she has encountered. Act one, scene five, lines 296-298, Olivia speaks to herself after Cesario has exited, “Methinks I feel this youth’s perfections with an invisible and subtle stealth to creep in at mine eyes. Well, let it be.” Cesario acts as a close female friend would, because he is actually a female. He listens, cares, and makes Olivia a priority. I believe that this is Shakespeare’s way of convincing or proving to 1600’s men in the audience that if they show compassion and understanding toward women, young ladies will fall in love with them easier.