English 1121PA: Twelfth Night, Or, What You Will (1602): “For [because] the rain it raineth everyday.”

How do we read a play?... Especially in this age of high-tech wizardry? 1) Slowly, carefully, and without distraction focus on: 1) Dialogue: intense, but somehow natural, speech 2) Character: identity and, especially, motivation. 3) Action: “stage business” 4) Plot: often tangled! Especially when love is involved. 5) Theme: sometimes quite elusive. And if you are reading, you will have only the words spoken by the actors, and a bit of stage direction, to, almost literally, paint a picture for you. (But know that you don’t need to “get” all the words, all the time. (And sometimes, characters (like Duke Orsino) are full of hot air... ) )

Opening lines from Shakespeare’s Henry V: O for a Muse of fire, that would ascend The brightest heaven of invention; A kingdom for a stage, princes to act And monarchs to behold the swelling scene! Then should the warlike Harry, like himself, Assume the port of Mars, and at his heels, Leashed in like hounds should famine, sword, and fire Crouch for employment. But pardon, gentles all, These flat unraised spirits that hath dared On this unworthy scaffold to bring forth So great an object. Can this cockpit Hold the vasty fields of France? Or may we cram Within this wooden O the very casques [helmets] That did affright the air at Agincourt?

O, pardon! Since a crooked figure may Attest in little place a million; And let us, ciphers to this great accompt, (story) On your imaginary forces work. Suppose within the girdle of these walls Are now confined two mighty monarchies, Whose high-upreared and abutting fronts The perilous narrow ocean parts asunder. Piece out our imperfection with your thoughts: Into a thousand parts divide one man And make imaginary puissance. [battalions] Think, when we talk of horses, that you seem them Printing their proud hoofs i’th’ receiving earth;

For ‘tis your thoughts that now must deck our kings, Carry them here and there, jumping o’er times, Turning th’ accomplishment of many years Into an hourglass---for the which supply, [in aid of which] Admit me chorus to this history, Who, Prologue-like, your humble patience pray, Gently to hear, kindly to judge, our play.

And look for patterns: especially parallels and doubling. And reversals. Olivia and Orsino are very similar, for example: Olivia’s theatrical mourning for her brother / father. She is in love with mourning. Orsino’s theatrical obsession with Olivia. He is in love with the idea of being in love. Both fall in love with Viola. Viola and Sebastian also very similar: Are actually identical twins, but are very much alike in character, too. And their love is clearly mutual and deep. And their mourning, while in error, is very real to both of them whilst they are experiencing it.

Other doublings (and reversals): Malvolio and Feste: both servants to Olivia. Both men are very close to her (Malvolio as her butler; Feste as her “licensed fool”) and both are in love with her. (?) While loathing each other. Sir Andrew Aguecheek and Feste: both are “fools”: Aguecheek by nature. Feste by employment. (Where Aguecheek is truly a hapless twit, Feste is a wise man.)

A few questions about Nunn’s adaptation : Which character does Trevor Nunn seem most interested in? What confirms this interest? Does this emphasis distort the play? Or illuminate it?