The Twelfth Night Research Paper

Love in The Twelfth Night The comedy play “The Twelfth Night”, written by William Shakespeare, dramatically narrated an ironic love story. In the play, love is the everlasting theme throughout all the events. Every character in the play experienced love either directly or indirectly. For example, Orsino falls in love with Olivia, while Viola falls in love with Orsino, and most interestingly, Olivia falls in love with Cesario, who is disguised by Viola. Although there were also hate, revenge and ignorance happening throughout the play, those minor themes are all either build-ups or consequences of illustrating the complicated “love” between the characters. Throughout the play, Shakespeare has demonstrated an interesting and ironic love relationship between the characters, through the relationships around Viola, around Olivia and last but not least, the relationships around Orsino.

In Act 1 Scene 1, in which she first appears, there is the famous quote that lays the foundation for her upcoming plot: “If music be the food of love, play on. Give me excess of it that, surfeiting. The appetite may sicken and so die.” Viola indeed suffered and sacrificed a lot for her pursuit of love. While struggling in the pain of losing her brother, she disguises in the image of her brother and becomes the servant of Orsino. Those were done by Viola only because she deeply loves Orsino. Her love for Orsino is so deep that it can be reasonably described as “lovesick”. A quote in Act II Scene 4 proves her mindlessness and purity for love: “She pined in