Twelfth Night Script Analysis

Synopsis

Twelfth Night is a popular Elizabethan romantic comedy written in 1601 by William Shakespeare. The play begins with Duke Orsino of Illyria talking to his servants about his undying love for the Lady Olivia, despite her disinterest in taking a lover due to her still being in mourning over the death of her brother. Next to enter is Viola, a high born young woman who is the protagonist of the story. Viola’s introduction is made while she converses with a captain and his crew after washing ashore from a shipwreck. In the aforementioned shipwrecked, Viola is led to believe that her brother, Sebastian, died at sea and that she must find her own way in this new land of Illyria. Later, Viola is told of both the Lady Oliva and Duke Orsino and decides to disguise herself as a man by the name of Cesario to work for Orsino, since Olivia has become reclusive since her brother’s death.

While under the employ of Orsino and the false identity of Cesario, Viola begins to run messages on behalf of the duke to Olivia so that he may profess his love to her. Unfortunately for Viola and Orsino, Olivia begins falling in love with “Cesario”. Unfortunate for Orsino since the lady of his dreams is now in love with his courier, and unfortunate for Viola since Cesario is a character she is playing in order to work for Orsino. All of this is then made even more complicated with the earlier established fact that Viola has fallen for the duke who believes her to be a male commoner working as a servant. Soon after this, the audience learns that Sebastian, Viola’s brother, has survived the shipwreck thanks to Antonio, a former enemy of Orsino, who brings him to Illyria regardless due to his loyalty to Sebastian.

Then there are also the characters responsible for the play’s comic subplot: Toby Belch, Sir Andrew, Feste, Fabien, and Maria. Over the span of the play, they conspire to find a way to get revenge on Oliva’s constantly overbearing and obsessive steward: Malvolio. Eventually landing on a scheme to convince Malvolio that Olivia has fallen in love for him in an attempt to get him to dress in cross-gartered yellow stockings, make a fool of himself, and is locked up at Olivia’s request as she believes he is raving nonsense despite Malvolio being sure this behavior was requested by her. 

When Sebastian finally enters the scene with the other characters in Olivia’s company, he is attacked by Sir Andrew and Toby mistaking him as his sister’s persona, Cesario. Olivia, too, is mistaken by his appearance and asks Sebastian to marry her, which he accepts and the two are wed in secret. Meanwhile, Viola learns Sebastian may have lived as Antonia is arrested for his past with Orsino and Feste disguises himself as a priest in order to further belittle Malvolio in his imprisonment and tell him that the priest has found him to be insane, but they allow him to write a letter to Olivia. 

Finally, all the subplots converge and culminate in the climax where everyone is forced in the same room as one another and the ruse falls apart. Olivia mistakes Cesario for her new husband which enrages Orsino and confuses and embarasses Viola. Then her brother appears and the love triangle is finally unraveled as the lost siblings find each other again at last. When Orsino discovers Cesario is actually Viola, he is immediately smitten with her and asks her to marry him on the spot. Malvolio is finally let free and the ruse is revealed to him before he becomes enraged and swears his revenge on everyone in the room, but Olivia sends her servants to calm him. All wraps up happily for everyone, save Malvolio, and the play ends as Feste sings joyously. 

Themes and Structure

            Twelfth Night's story is mostly bound up in its theme of identity. The entire main plot is propelled by the very simple setup of "This person is not who the other(s) believes them to be". This theme of identity is important as it puts up restraints for many of the characters and opens doors for many others. For instance, Orsino immediately falls in love with Viola at the end despite the only thing changing about her being her outward identity. Meanwhile, the play's comedy is also bound in this same way. The most obvious example being Malvolio believing he the fake letter was from Olivia and addressed to him, thus he makes an absolute fool of himself. Even later, another comedic scene hinges on the fact that Malvolio is being deceived again by Feste as the priest. This play's story is split between three plots that all revolve around mistaken identities, and the three slowly converge until the climax where each story is resolved and all of the "true" identities are made known to all parties.