Twelfth Night

"This fellow is wise enough to play the fool… This is a practice As full of labour as a wise man's art…" (pg. 64)

Shakespeare's comedies always seem to enjoy a more ambiguous reputation than his tragedies. Whereas, once the peculiarities of language are overcome, dramatic schemes and actions like those in Macbeth, Hamlet and King Lear can be readily identified and appreciated by modern audiences, it is often much harder to parse the worth of one of the Bard's comedies. That they do have worth – The Merchant of Venice and The Taming of the Shrew are ingenious satires, and A Midsummer Night's Dream is metaphysical drunkenness – is why so many readers and lovers of the theatre make the effort to meet them halfway, or sometimes more than halfway.

This is why I happily dismissed my doubts about Twelfth Night and why, even though this play doesn't have the deeper worth of those other Shakespeare comedies I mentioned above, I cannot fault it. The clue to Twelfth Night's essence is in its title, which has no bearing on the content of the play: 'Twelfth Night' is a day of festivities, a date in early January to mark the end of the Christmas period. To this end, Shakespeare's light romp of mistaken identities, bawdy language and plenty of sing-song, was meant as just a piece of fluff for Queen Elizabeth's court. The equivalent of one of our Boxing Day TV repeats as we pig out on Quality Street.

Despite this light remit, Shakespeare can't help but be erudite, dexterous and interesting. For all its mistaken identities and merry pranking, it is one of the easiest Shakespearean comedies to follow. It's tidy and it's never dull and it's one of Shakespeare's more quotable plays. Its success in doing all this well means this piece of fluff has survived, through the skill of its author, for much longer than would otherwise be expected. After all, while some, like Hamlet and Macbeth, are born great, and others like The Merchant of Venice and King Lear achieve greatness, some, by virtue of sharing such company, have greatness thrust upon them. Twelfth Night is one of the latter. ( )

I haven't read all that many of Shakespeare's comedies, and this is not one I found particularly humorous. I am glad to have read it, but it won't make my list of favorite reads this year or favorite Shakespearean plays. I'm sure this would be quite fun to see staged so I will try to catch it on stage if I ever can. I have a book I plan to read later this year about women in Shakespeare so I am eager to see what it may say about Viola. ( )

A case of mistaken identity is always a good time. I'm embarking on the Shakespeare 2020 challenge, and starting off with a comedy is always a great idea, in my book.

This year, I'll be looking for spaces to integrate queer, womanist identities, and the characters of Antonio, Malvolio, Clown, and Maria provide plenty of fodder for consideration.

Questions I have: is Maria a villain or an opportunistic agent? And is this bad?
Is Malvolio a bad guy or misunderstood?
Are the Duke (and possibly Viola) queer? ( )

The Plain Text Shakespeare small pocket sized edition.

I'm rarely let down by an Arden edition, but this one is almost the exception. No, that's being too cruel, but...

As always, the quality of the text, the depth of the notes, the discussion of editorial issues, and the bibliography are immaculate. You couldn't ask for a greater scholarly resource and overall "cheat sheet" to one of the Bard's works. At the same time, the introduction is a rare letdown for this series. Overall, the Ardens inhabit an awkward gray area between scholarly pursuits - reading in to every line, letter, and semi-colon - and general accessibility. Inevitably when examining a work at this level of detail, academia will rear its ugly head. At the same time, the Arden editors have wisely made each introduction an overall analysis, leaving the more scholarly notes for the bibliography. After all, this kind of opaque discussion is more the purview of scholarly articles and papers rather than published editions of the play. The massive bibliographies are vital, and they lead those of us with scholarly minds down that path. Unfortunately, this work is dry and hermeneutic from page one. (This might seem like a silly complaint, but when these introductions clock in at 150 dense pages, it's important they work well.)

So, I can't complain about the high standard of the text, but unfortunately I'll be seeking out alternative "Twelfth Night" editions for an overview. ( )