Skip to main content

What is a quotation showing the theme of appearance vs. reality in Shakespeare's Twelfth Night?

In Viola’s soliloquy when Malvolio gives her the ring, she reflects on the concept of appearance versus reality.  There are a lot of deceptions and confusions going on here.  Viola realizes that Olivia has fallen in love with her male character, Cesario.  She is kind of surprised at this, and a little impressed.  It means that she has done well disguising herself as a man, but has failed at her task of wooing Olivia for her boss, Orsino.  That’s fine for her because she is secretly in love with him.


Viola feels bad about Olivia being in love with her, when she is actually a woman.  Olivia’s reality is so far different from the real reality, and it is all because of the appearance that Viola is perpetrating.



She loves me, sure; the cunning of her passion
Invites me in this churlish messenger.
None of my lord's ring! why, he sent her none.
I am the man: if it be so, as 'tis,
Poor lady, she were better love a dream.
Disguise, I see, thou art a wickedness,
Wherein the pregnant enemy does much. (Act 2, Scene 2)



Viola feels bad that Olivia, who vowed to never fall in love with anyone because she was in mourning, has fallen in love with a woman.  Olivia pretended to return the ring back to Cesario, when really Viola wasn’t given a ring.  It was Olivia's ring.  It is a deception intended to get Cesario to come back, so that Olivia can talk to him.  


With this speech, Viola realizes that her deception has caused far-reaching consequences. It has now extended beyond Orsino, and she has broken Olivia's heart.  She never meant for any of this to happen and is not sure what to do, thus her last line is:



O time! thou must untangle this, not I;
It is too hard a knot for me to untie!


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Is there a word/phrase for "unperformant"?

As a software engineer, I need to sometimes describe a piece of code as something that lacks performance or was not written with performance in mind. Example: This kind of coding style leads to unmaintainable and unperformant code. Based on my Google searches, this isn't a real word. What is the correct way to describe this? EDIT My usage of "performance" here is in regard to speed and efficiency. For example, the better the performance of code the faster the application runs. My question and example target the negative definition, which is in reference to preventing inefficient coding practices. Answer This kind of coding style leads to unmaintainable and unperformant code. In my opinion, reads more easily as: This coding style leads to unmaintainable and poorly performing code. The key to well-written documentation and reports lies in ease of understanding. Adding poorly understood words such as performant decreases that ease. In addressing the use of such a poorly ...
Post a Comment
Read more

A man has a garden measuring 84 meters by 56 meters. He divides it into the minimum number of square plots. What is the length of the square plots?

We wish to divide this man's garden into the minimum number of square plots possible. A square has all four sides with the same length.Our garden is a rectangle, so the answer is clearly not 1 square plot. If we choose the wrong length for our squares, we may end up with missing holes or we may not be able to fit our squares inside the garden. So we have 84 meters in one direction and 56 meters in the other direction. When we start dividing the garden in square plots, we are "filling" those lengths in their respective directions. At each direction, there must be an integer number of squares (otherwise, we get holes or we leave the garden), so that all the square plots fill up the garden nicely. Thus, our job here is to find the greatest common divisor of 84 and 56. For this, we prime factor both of them: `56 = 2*2*2*7` `84 = 2*2*3*7` We can see that the prime factors and multiplicities in common are `2*2*7 = 28` . This is the desired length of the square plots. If you wi...
Post a Comment
Read more

What warning does Chuchundra issue to Rikki?

Chuchundra, the sniveling, fearful muskrat who creeps around walls because he is too terrified to go into the center of a room, meets Rikki in the middle of the night. He insults Rikki by begging him not to kill him. He then insults him by suggesting that Nag might mistake Chuchundra for Rikki. He says, "Those who kill snakes get killed by snakes."  He issues this warning to Rikki not to help keep Rikki safe but as a way of explaining why Rikki's presence gives him, Chuchundra, more reason to fear.  Chuchundra starts to tell Rikki what Chua the rat told him--but breaks it off when he realizes he might be overheard by Nag. He says, "Nag is everywhere, Rikki-Tikki." Rikki threatens to bite Chuchundra to get him to talk. Even then, Chuchundra won't overtly reveal any information. But he does say, "Can't you hear, Rikki-Tikki?" This is enough of a clue for the clever mongoose. He listens carefully and can just make out the "faintest scratch-s...
Post a Comment
Read more