Duke Orsino's Unsuccessfulness In Twelfth Night

Duke Orsino’s Unsuccessfulness in the Twenty-first Century

In today’s society, one’s personality plays a very important part of their reputation and respect they receive from others. In Shakespeare’s play Twelfth Night, the character’s status and respect has nothing to do with their personality, but more with their family background. This is demonstrated in many of the characters, especially Duke Orsino, who uses his social status to get what he desires most, which is love. Duke Orsino’s difficult and self-indulgent character would not benefit him to have a successful life in today’s society. Considering Duke Orsino’s lack of control over his emotions, his stubbornness, and his self-indulgence, his character would prevent him from being successful in recent times.

Duke Orsino’s lack of control over his emotions is not beneficial to him in becoming

It is first demonstrated in Act 1 when Duke Orsino is introduced. He talks about his uncontrollable obsession with love. He exclaims, “ If music be the food of love, play on/ Give me excess of it, that, surfeiting” (1.1.1-2). Here, Duke Orsino is comparing love to food. He is listening to love songs, considering them to make him love the feeling of love more. So, by saying “ give me excess of it”, he indicates he wants to love. This displays the fact that when he has feelings about someone, his feelings are extreme, to the extent where he needs love as much as he needs food to survive. In the last scene, when Duke Orsino finds out about Olivia having feelings for Cesario, also known as Viola, he gets extremely mad. He threatens Viola, saying, “ But this your minion, whom I know you love/ and whom, by heaven I swear, I tender dearly/ Him will I tear out of that cruel eye” (5.1.121-123). Here, Duke Orsino is telling Olivia that he knows she loves Cesario, and because of it, he will torture Viola. Even though Viola is very