On the Twelfth Day of Christmas your true love tells you that they are actually a girl pretending to be a boy! That is not exactly how the song goes‚ but Twelfth Night by William Shakespeare explores this very current concept. Shakespeare’s early plays were written in the conventional style of the day‚ with elaborate metaphors and rhetorical phrases that did not always align naturally with the story’s plot or characters. However‚ William Shakespeare was very innovative‚ adapting this traditional
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Disguise is the source of theatrical appeal in Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night. Discuss the validity of this statement. Michael Pennington describes Twelfth Night as a typical Romantic Comedy with a sublime sense of inconcsequentiality amidst the lyrical nature that plagues its environment. Therefore it is none other than that of a romantic comedy‚ and by definition‚ seeks the usage of a most humourous yet vital factor that shapes the events that are to occur; Disguise. Disguise indeed gives rise
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The treatment of Malvolio in the first two acts of ‘Twelfth Night’ is cruel rather than comical. To what extent do you agree? In Shakespeare’s ‘Twelfth Night’‚ Malvolio is a character that could be approached in numerous ways. Depending on how the character is developed and acts throughout the play‚ the audience have varying reactions to his personal storyline; there is often opposing opinions as to whether the treatment of Malvolio is cruel‚ or comical. In the first scenes in which we meet Malvolio
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Twelfth Night – Exploring the names of the Characters I am going to explore the two names of: * Olivia * Feste Olivia When I first saw the name ‘Olivia’‚ I automatically thought of anagrams. Olivia is almost a perfect anagram of ‘Viola’! Although Olivia and Viola possess a number of qualities which are not just different‚ but in complete opposition with one another other‚ they do in fact have a great deal in common. The names Shakespeare has given the two characters is perhaps a reflection
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Looking back at history‚ documents show the tension between Puritans and Shakespeare. The play Twelfth Night is perfect evidence that shows how Shakespeare disagreed with the Puritans beliefs .Shakespeare decides to use the character Malvolio to represent the puritans at that time period. Shakespeare uses the character of Malvolio to ridicule the puritans and portrays the puritans as ambitious‚ selfish and bitter. The Puritans gained their power after they renounced the Anglican Church‚ this was
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Deception and disguise are two key themes in Shakespeare’s ’Twelfth Night’. As in most comedies‚ Twelfth Night celebrates different forms of disguise and deception in order to make the play more entertaining. It also develops a strong connection between the main plot (with Viola‚ Orsino‚ Olivia‚ and the others) and the sub-plot (involving Sir Andrew‚ Sir Toby‚ Malvolio‚ and Maria). Disguise and deception appear in many different ways throughout the story. One of the most overt examples of disguise
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Topic 8: The comic journey of twelfth night is usually from the darkness of ignorance to the light of self knowledge. Discuss this journey in Twelfth Night. The play‚ Twelfth Night‚ was written as a comedy‚ however‚ one can clearly see that it served many purposes such as criticizing the society of the time and as a result posed difficult questions on a society which in itself was ignorant on many issues in the society. Many characters undergo a change from ignorance to being enlightened by self
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Discuss Shakespeare’s exploration of Saturnalian Vs Puritan in The Twelfth Knight. Within the twelfth Knight Malvolio is considered a puritan; he is a stiff character who wants nothing more than to spoil other people’s fun. The idea of the puritan ties in nicely with the plays major theme‚ the search for happiness. The puritans in Shakespeare’s day were members of the English National Church who emphasised the authority of the bible. Puritans would try and make festive seasons and holidays solemn
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William Shakespeare’s play Twelfth Night features many love relationships. These relationships can be difficult to follow. At the beginning of the play‚ Olivia the beautiful heiress‚ has sworn off men for seven years because of the recent deaths of her brother and father. However‚ when a new attractive male‚ Cesario comes to Illyria Olivia quickly shifts her thoughts on men. Desperate to find a man to tell her what to do‚ Olivia quickly falls into infatuation. This infatuation is evident because
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This line appears in Shakespeare’s tragedy "Hamlet" in Act I Scene 2 line 65 and is spoken as an ‘Aside’ by Hamlet when the new king‚ Claudius addresses him as "But now‚ my cousin Hamlet‚ and my son—" in line 64. Claudius calls Hamlet his ’cousin’ and ’son’ because after Old King Hamlet‚ Hamlet’s father‚ died his brother‚ Claudius took his throne and married his brother’s widowed wife‚ Gertrude‚ making him not only Hamlet’s guardian but also his step-father. In terms of the actual words‚ with “kin”
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