Twelfth Night Research Paper
Do you believe in love at first sight? To define this phenomenon, it is the sudden solid feeling that a person is meant to be with you as a partner for life upon your initial sighting of them. While this may be claimed by many couples, love is most often cultivated in moments where a person finds - and may be surprised by - themselves acting and/or changing oneself drastically in favor of the other party. Whether it be a change of appearance or the disobeyment of rules, this sultry, insidious creature has the power to alter a life path. In this study, Shakespeare’s moments of sudden love will be examined in both art and science.
Shakespeare has depicted the unyielding pain of longing for or losing love, and its unpredictable nature through his writing. Let us take his masterpiece of Twelfth Night where Olivia is sought after by Duke Orsino who is in pains for her love. But alas, Olivia has vowed to sworn off men as loving tribute to her dead brother and Orsino sends Viola to profess his love to Olivia. Enter the unpredictability of this emotion of love …show more content…
to intervene in disruption of the planned ending.
In Viola’s pursuit of expressing Orsino’s love, “he” conversely woos her in speaking of her beauty: “Tis beauty truly blent, whose red and white
Nature’s own sweet and cunning hand laid on” (Act 1, Scene 5, Page 12).
Her decision to unveil her face shows that her emotions in the moment about this “man” have justified a disintegration of her own celibate promise. This is solidified in ending the scene as Olivia questions her own euphoric feeling and describes it as having “invisible, subtle stealth” (indicating that it love came to her fast and without warning).
“Even so quickly may one catch the plague?
Methinks I feel this youth’s perfections
With an invisible and subtle stealth
To creep in at mine eyes.” (Act 1, Scene 5)
Maria also falls into the throngs of love with Sir Toby Belch. We see her moment of action towards love when Malvolio comes to quiet the drunks at night. Malvolio represents the highly mannered, and the socially respected. As Sir Toby orders Maria to get another bottle of wine, Maria faces the choice between assisting Malvolio or allowing the boisterous activity of the men.
Sir Toby
“Thou'rt i' the right. Go, sir, rub your chain with crumbs. A stoup of wine, Maria!
Malvolio
Mistress Mary, if you prized my lady's favour at any thing more than contempt, you would not give means for this uncivil rule: she shall know of it, by this hand.
Maria
Go shake your ears.”
Maria chooses her allegiance to Sir Toby in realization of love and as the play continues we see her plant the cruel love letter to deceive Malvolio further showing her siding with Sir Toby in his dislike for Malvolio.
While Shakespeare most likely crafted the Tale of The Twelfth Night for entertainment, the antics and extensive effects of love can be explained by science.
An anthropologist and human behavior researcher, Helen E. Fisher, has studied the 3 stages of developing a relationship. Stage 1 is Lust - which is driven by our sex hormones called testosterone and estrogen - is a survival stage to stimulate the need for sexual activity for nature to reproduce. Attraction is brought about at Stage 2 where a variety of environmental factors make you gravitate towards a certain mate but then 3 neurotransmitters affect the brain to show the symptoms that romantic comedies often showcase. Dopamine is the first culprit which creates a flood of the reward response in the brain. For example it has been proven that the intake of cocaine activates the dopamine pleasure receptor which may be why love is associated with it being a
drug.
Fisher summarizes: “Hence Dopamine is a likely agent for the exhilaration, heightened energy, sleeplessness, and reduced appetite associated with passionate attraction in humans.” (Lust, Attraction, and Attachment in Mammalian Reproduction, Page 33)
Similarly, adrenaline (also known as Norepinephrine) is a member of the catecholamine chemicals. The increase of this chemical is linked to elevated heart rate, sweating, anxiety along with the many features of the increase of dopamine. Adrenaline best shows the moments where someone may change their normal attitude or attractions rapidly in response to an attraction to a mate? “In most mammalian species attraction may occur as a spontaneous brief chatecholaminergically induced, excitatory reaction to a conspecific that initiates sexual physiology and behavior,” (Lust, Attraction, and Attachment in Mammalian Reproduction, Page 35) Helen writes.
Serotonin is the 3rd neurotransmitter proven to be released in stage 2. Converse to the high levels of catecholamine chemicals, low levels of serotonin make your brain enter states of insomnia increasing the frequency of thoughts of your prospective mate.
In the last stage of the theory, Attachment, is cultivated by Oxytocin and Vasopressin. These hormones bring out the want to be physically close to your partner, separation anxiety, and maternal/protective instincts. In these 3 stages we put a qualitative data to the phenomenon that we generalize as love.
Love radiates throughout all aspects of our life. We constantly search, crave, study it, and hold on to it desperately when we find it. It is in the small moments when you realize you love something or someone that it becomes a consuming part of your mind because in the world of competition and capitalism, love is where you can find a smile every day.
Shakespeare has depicted the unyielding pain of longing for or losing love, and its unpredictable nature through his writing. Let us take his masterpiece of Twelfth Night where Olivia is sought after by Duke Orsino who is in pains for her love. But alas, Olivia has vowed to sworn off men as loving tribute to her dead brother and Orsino sends Viola to profess his love to Olivia. Enter the unpredictability of this emotion of love …show more content…
to intervene in disruption of the planned ending.
In Viola’s pursuit of expressing Orsino’s love, “he” conversely woos her in speaking of her beauty: “Tis beauty truly blent, whose red and white
Nature’s own sweet and cunning hand laid on” (Act 1, Scene 5, Page 12).
Her decision to unveil her face shows that her emotions in the moment about this “man” have justified a disintegration of her own celibate promise. This is solidified in ending the scene as Olivia questions her own euphoric feeling and describes it as having “invisible, subtle stealth” (indicating that it love came to her fast and without warning).
“Even so quickly may one catch the plague?
Methinks I feel this youth’s perfections
With an invisible and subtle stealth
To creep in at mine eyes.” (Act 1, Scene 5)
Maria also falls into the throngs of love with Sir Toby Belch. We see her moment of action towards love when Malvolio comes to quiet the drunks at night. Malvolio represents the highly mannered, and the socially respected. As Sir Toby orders Maria to get another bottle of wine, Maria faces the choice between assisting Malvolio or allowing the boisterous activity of the men.
Sir Toby
“Thou'rt i' the right. Go, sir, rub your chain with crumbs. A stoup of wine, Maria!
Malvolio
Mistress Mary, if you prized my lady's favour at any thing more than contempt, you would not give means for this uncivil rule: she shall know of it, by this hand.
Maria
Go shake your ears.”
Maria chooses her allegiance to Sir Toby in realization of love and as the play continues we see her plant the cruel love letter to deceive Malvolio further showing her siding with Sir Toby in his dislike for Malvolio.
While Shakespeare most likely crafted the Tale of The Twelfth Night for entertainment, the antics and extensive effects of love can be explained by science.
An anthropologist and human behavior researcher, Helen E. Fisher, has studied the 3 stages of developing a relationship. Stage 1 is Lust - which is driven by our sex hormones called testosterone and estrogen - is a survival stage to stimulate the need for sexual activity for nature to reproduce. Attraction is brought about at Stage 2 where a variety of environmental factors make you gravitate towards a certain mate but then 3 neurotransmitters affect the brain to show the symptoms that romantic comedies often showcase. Dopamine is the first culprit which creates a flood of the reward response in the brain. For example it has been proven that the intake of cocaine activates the dopamine pleasure receptor which may be why love is associated with it being a
drug.
Fisher summarizes: “Hence Dopamine is a likely agent for the exhilaration, heightened energy, sleeplessness, and reduced appetite associated with passionate attraction in humans.” (Lust, Attraction, and Attachment in Mammalian Reproduction, Page 33)
Similarly, adrenaline (also known as Norepinephrine) is a member of the catecholamine chemicals. The increase of this chemical is linked to elevated heart rate, sweating, anxiety along with the many features of the increase of dopamine. Adrenaline best shows the moments where someone may change their normal attitude or attractions rapidly in response to an attraction to a mate? “In most mammalian species attraction may occur as a spontaneous brief chatecholaminergically induced, excitatory reaction to a conspecific that initiates sexual physiology and behavior,” (Lust, Attraction, and Attachment in Mammalian Reproduction, Page 35) Helen writes.
Serotonin is the 3rd neurotransmitter proven to be released in stage 2. Converse to the high levels of catecholamine chemicals, low levels of serotonin make your brain enter states of insomnia increasing the frequency of thoughts of your prospective mate.
In the last stage of the theory, Attachment, is cultivated by Oxytocin and Vasopressin. These hormones bring out the want to be physically close to your partner, separation anxiety, and maternal/protective instincts. In these 3 stages we put a qualitative data to the phenomenon that we generalize as love.
Love radiates throughout all aspects of our life. We constantly search, crave, study it, and hold on to it desperately when we find it. It is in the small moments when you realize you love something or someone that it becomes a consuming part of your mind because in the world of competition and capitalism, love is where you can find a smile every day.