Twelfth Night Fact Sheet
Genre: Romantic comedy—
Shakespeare's last in this genre
Date of composition: circa 1600, just
after the move to the Globe, about the
same time as Hamlet
Sources: Several Renaissance Italian
comedies known as Gl'Ingannati
or Gl'Inganni [to deceive or trick]
are comparable to Shakespeare's
main plot confusions, and the
preface to one includes a Malevolti.
Shakespeare also likely knew the
adapted tale of "Apollonius and
Silla," comparable to the main plot
but which includes a pregnancy and
abandonment that he excludes.
Length: With slightly over 2400 lines, it
is the fourth shortest comedy in the
canon. The play is 61% prose and
39% verse—only Merry Wives and
Much Ado have a higher percentage
of prose.
Setting: Illyria, though sometimes called
a fantasy realm, was on the eastern
shore of the Adriatic Sea in the area of
the former Yugoslavia.
Longest roles in the play: Sir Toby, Viola,
and Feste
Words and Imagery:
• courtly love imagery: disease: Orsino
in 1.1 is lovesick, and when Olivia in
1.5 realizes she loves Cesario, she
asks "even so quickly may one catch
the plague?"
the hunt: In 1.1 Orsino uses the
common Petrarchan image of hunting
the hart, that is, the [beloved's] heart.
flowers: usually used to describe the
beloved's beauty, Orsino in 1.1 leaves
to seek a "bed of violets"; he will
eventually marry Viola. His imagery is
far more conventionally Petrarchan
than Viola's more individual and
heartfelt imagery for love.
Plot:
In Illyria, Duke Orsino loves the
Countess Olivia, who has pledged to
mourn the recent deaths of her father and
brother for seven years. On the shore of
Illyria appears Viola, survivor of a shipwreck
which claimed her twin brother. Needing a
refuge, she disguises herself as a boy to
become a page, Cesario, at Orsino's court.
She promptly falls in love with him—only
to have him send her to woo Olivia for
him. Olivia hears her impassioned plea for
Orsino and immediately falls in love with
the young page.
Also wooing Olivia is Sir Andrew
Aguecheek under the inebriated guidance
of Olivia's kinsman, Sir Toby Belch, who is
bilking him of money. When their partying is
chastized by the steward Malvolio, they and
the gentlewoman Maria conceive a practical
joke to convince Malvolio that Olivia loves
him, which is actually his secret fantasy.
He falls for their fake letter and obeys it,
appearing to Olivia smiling and wearing
yellow stockings. Maria says he's mad and
Olivia, beset by her own love mania, leaves
them to deal with him. They do—by locking
Malvolio up as a madman.
Then Sebastian, Viola's undrowned
twin brother, appears in Illyria and is
mistaken for Cesario by the brawling Sir
Andrew and Sir Toby and later by Olivia,
to whom he becomes betrothed. When
Orsino and Cesario appear at Olivia's
house, revelations and reunions abound.
Things to watch for in production:
• the twinning
• the mood of Illyria (for instance, which
song seems to be the "theme song"—
the carpe diem "O mistress mine," one
of the drinking songs, or the last song,
"When that I was and a little tiny boy"
with its refrain of "The rain it raineth
every day"?)
• the tone of the subplot—innocent fun or
a bit more malicious?
by William Shakespeare
Twelfth Night
Olivia in mourning (above)
and (below) Maria chastizes Sir
Toby for his late night indulgence
(both by Sir John Gilbert)
"I am sure care's an
enemy to life."
—Sir Toby, 1.3
