Hedge-crickets sing; and now with a treble soft
The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.
Only, Keats finds reassurance in the fact that swallows will return, but Shakespeare is concerned with the cessation of life which looms over the whole play. Here the recognition is of the transience of life, unlike in Cymbeline where the rediscovery of Perdita symbolises the rediscovery of one’s soul. Significantly, Twelfth Night is the last of the romantic comedies. After this Shakespeare moves on to the tragedies and the problem plays – this is the last play where joy is not alloyed with problems of evil and anti-life.
Everything that is subject to time is valueless, this was the medieval conception. Thus during the middle ages all human activity was directed towards God. Man was given little importance. Then with Renaissance came yet undiscovered knowledge. The new astronomical discoveries allowed man to explore the universe independent of the scriptures. With this was born man’s pride in being man in the mortal universe. And thus man became conscious of the beauty and transience of life. This removed the concept of life everlasting from the framework of eternity. This introduced the prominence of mortality. The dance of death was now more feared than ever. New questions about human existence took form. Comedy seeks to find answers, a meaning of life; yet Shakespeare presents a frail shadowy background to