Twelfth Night, Shakespeare Act III Scene 1

                04.10.2021

Twelfth Night, W. Shakespeare : Act III Scene 1[pic 1]

                In 1599, Shakespeare wrote As you like it, where I can read the following lines "All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players" spoken by Jacques, in Act II scene 7. Shakespeare had explored the theme of life as a staged drama through his plays. He used his art, the theater, to warn the audience about the untruthfulness of reality. Human beings are compared to actors who put themselves into the skins of characters. Twelfth Night is also a comedy, written by Shakespeare and published in 1602. It recounts the story of two twins who have lost contact after a shipwreck. Viola and Sebastian landed in Illyria, from where Orsino is the Duke. Mistaken identities, revelries, love triangles and some deep, philosophical reflections intertwine in the play. Indeed, in the Act III scene 1, Feste and Viola, who is disguised like a man called Cesario, have a great talk alternating between more light-hearted moments and philosophical themes. Cesario had already met Orsino, his master who gave him a mission : to woo Lady Olivia for him. It is the first time that Cesario will meet Feste, the jester of the play, and have a discussion with him. Feste is a very clever character, I may present him as the wisest character of Twelfth Night. The theme of doubles is omnipresent throughout the acts, doubles cause a replica and an original, which mean that one is fake. Through the debate on language and discourse, I identified a more global meaning about humankind and its misleading reality. To what extent does the character of Feste symbolize Shakespeare's dramatic vision on humankind, through a comical and insignificant scene at first sight ? My first part will focus on the contrasts through the excerpt, between reality and illusion, from the physical manipulations like the characters' disguises and masks to a world of spurious words. Then I will question the dramatic aspect of this scene through the ambiguous but central role of Feste in the play. In my opinion, the excerpt is very symbolic for one aspect of the Shakespearean argument, it underlines the malleability of humans.

        The scene opens with a misunderstanding about where Feste lives, which creates a comic situation. Feste shows how quick and easy it is to misunderstand something because words are vicious. To emphasize the comical aspect of this first scene, there is a religious allusion in the line 2 to 7 : "No, sir, I live by the church". Imagining Feste as a priest highlights his nature of reveler, this sentence may be seen as tongue-in-cheek statement. It is impossible to trust words. They are personified multiple times : "words are very rascals" (l.20) or "that word might make my sister wanton" (ll. 18-19) This personification gives texture, materiality to words which makes it easy to found an imagery of manipulation. If words are alive hence it is simple to twist their meanings. So, words which are the representation of reality are untruthful, they are aiming to trick people and to lose them. This information given by Feste is punctuated by comic notes : "I would therefore my sister had had no name, sir". I see that remark like a hyperbole, he exaggerates. This is an ironic and ridicule moment, because the fact that his sister does not have a name, does not prevent her to be misunderstood. Words, here, are evil, mean, but instead it is the person who pronounces them who have these defaults. In a sense words are facts, descriptions, this is the way people interpret them that is dangerous. Viola here represents the audience by questioning Feste : "Why, man ?" Or "Thy reason, man ?", I felt surprised by his statement too. Words are unreliable or people are ? As we saw in this excerpt, words translated reality, characters are masqueraders and imposters. Indeed, Viola is disguised, she is lying and the character of Feste remains a certain mystery.

        The theme of masks is omnipresent in this excerpt. I mean masks as another identity towards the real one. Masks are for becoming someone else : Viola and Feste symbolized the use of masks. Indeed, Feste has many personalities, he acts as a wise man contrary to his role of jester. Maybe if the other characters remark his cleverness, he won't work anymore because it is his folly that entertains. It is the same for Viola who wants to hide her identity to have more freedom in the society and to find a job easily. Masks are for imagery. Viola and Feste seems particularly identical but Feste keeps his own mask during the scene even if some cracks make his true personality known, but I will develop that later on. He is the one who reveals the other's identity with irony. Hence, the scene brings the importance of the body out. It becomes a text, which needs to be understood. It is an indirect way of communication, Viola's beardless body betrays her : "Now Jove in his commodity of hair send thee a beard". It is a comic s one at first sight, Fest's remark shows how ridicule the disguise is. By using irony, Feste reveals the trick along the side. He blurs the boundaries between genders and sexuality. The mask of Cesario is a way to show that genders are fluid, there is not a strict frontier between male and female. The reality is more complex than it seems to be, the illusion of the appearances is a trick. Feste does a comparison between husbands and fools "the husband's the bigger" : it shows that even inside a loving relationship, people, essentially men, are fools which may mean that women are obedient. Genders don masks, but with the example of Viola who plays a man, but is a woman, at the audience is troubled. Is she a fool or not ? The theme of masks does challenge the perceptions and understanding of the world.

        Then, Feste is the character who makes the link between the real-life audience and the illusions of the stage, of the play. There is a real dependence on his audience. The scene is an allusion to plays, actors who need their audience to live and audience needs actors to be entertained. The personification of the coins shows Feste's angling desire after money, because he is an artist, he is performing. This is a "mise en abime" of actor's performance and Viola's performance as Cesario. Everything is a question of appearance. He emphasized the fact that everyone is playing a role. From another point of views, facts and people have very different meanings. I saw another allusion to theater in Feste's comment on the dangerous interpretations of words "A sentence is but a Chevrel glove to a good wit" (ll.11-12). The play is untitled What You will, Shakespeare is here warning the audience about the dangerousness of excess of interpretation. This obstinacy of complete knowledge leads to ridiculous behaviors, like Feste's refusal of calling his sister by a name. Words exist by themselves, but they need mouths to be heard, words represent reality, people are thinking life through words hence they are giving a misinterpretation to themselves. There is a contrast between what people say and what people understand, it is a key point for plays. Misunderstands are important in the comical rhetoric. There is necessary to acquire the distance to have a global view, plays are meant for that. However, tragedies are giving moral but Twelfth Night is comedy, so it is not a common comedy. Feste is the character that shows it.

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