• Why do you think Orsino uses images of tyranny and sacrifice when he is talking about love? What is his view on love? He also uses antithesis and a rhyming couplet to complete his longer speech. What do you think the effect of this might be on those listening to him?
• Why do you think Viola responds to Olivia’s question ‘Where goes Cesario?’ in rhyming couplets? What might be the effect of this?
• How many examples of shared lines can you find in the extract? What do these suggest about the relationships between the characters? What do the rhyming couplets across these shared lines reveal about how the characters feel?
• What do you think is the effect of Olivia ending this exchange in blank verse rather than rhyming couplets?

• Soliloquies are often used by characters to reveal the truth about how they feel to the audience. Look at Olivia’s soliloquy at the end of Act 1 Scene 5 and Viola’s soliloquy at the end of Act 2 Scene 2 and compare with Malvolio’s soliloquy towards the end of Act 2 Scene 5.
• Love is the central theme of Twelfth Night and many different aspects of love are explored throughout the play. Look at the key scenes section to explore different aspects of love in some of those moments in the play, and how it is spoken about.
• Feste sings two love songs during the play: one in Act 2 Scene 3 for Sir Toby and Sir Andrew, and the other in Act 2 Scene 4 for Orsino. How does each song speak about love?

What can we learn about Viola from this soliloquy? Ask yourself:

• What do the full stops and commas reveal about Viola’s thought process? She makes several statements about Olivia throughout the speech, using different punctuation. Can you track what these are? At what point in the speech does she realise what is happening and how does the punctuation help you to realise this?
• There are several rhetorical questions in this speech, what purpose do they serve? What do they show about Viola’s state of mind?
• Viola uses rhyming couplets in two instances. What is the effect of these in the speech? Why does she use them at these particular moments?

• Take a close look at Act 2 Scene 4 and Act 3 Scene 1 in the key scenes section, where Viola talks in verse about love to both Orsino and Olivia. Try and compare the way in which she talks to both characters and the images and language she uses to describe love.
• Look at Viola’s two main scenes with Olivia, Act 1 Scene 5 and Act 3 Scene 1 and notice when their dialogue changes from prose to verse. Consider what this shift of style might suggest about the characters at these moments.
• Look at Viola’s witty exchange with Feste at the beginning of Act 3 Scene 1. What does this exchange suggest about her skills with language? To what extent do you think she might be describing herself as well as Feste in her soliloquy when Feste leaves?
• Keep a record of when Viola uses verse and when she uses prose and consider why this might be in each case and what this might suggest about her.

• Hunting with hounds or hawks was a popular activity in Shakespeare’s time and often how people got their meat. Images of hunting would have been more readily understood by audiences in Shakespeare’s time than our own. When Curio suggests a hunting trip to Orsino in Act 1 Scene 1, Orsino describes himself as a ‘hart’ or deer, pursued by his desires for Olivia ‘like fell and cruel hounds’. In Act 3 Scene 1, Viola compares Feste’s skill as a professional fool to a ‘haggard’ or untrained hawk.
• Orsino in particular uses hunting imagery to talk about love and courtship and his pursuit of Olivia, suggesting that chasing someone to gain their affection is just as much of a sport or game.
• How many examples of hunting imagery can you find in the play and what do they reveal about the character who uses them?

• The words 'fool', 'fools or foolish appear 80 times in Twelfth Night. ‘Fool’ is often used to address Feste as a professional fool, but there is also a lot of ambiguity in the text around the idea that a professional fool is not foolish but instead has to be clever and witty. The imagery of fools in Twelfth Night is used to explore which characters are foolish and which have their wits about them. For example, Maria describes Sir Andrew as a ‘foolish knight’ (1:3), and Olivia tells Malvolio ‘Alas poor fool, how have they baffled thee’ (5:1)
• Take a closer look at Act 1 Scene 5 to explore how imagery of fools is used when Feste first appears.

• In many cultures, being in love is sometimes compared to an illness. When Olivia realises she has fallen in love with Cesario, she asks ‘Even so quickly may one catch the plague?’ (1:5). Viola also describes how her father’s daughter suffered ‘a green and yellow melancholy’ (2:4) when talking to Orsino. Sometimes, however, the object of love is seen as curing infection. For example, Orsino says when he first saw Olivia ‘Methought she purged the air of pestilence’ (1:1).
• How many examples of infection imagery can you find in the play, particularly in reference to love and feelings? Why do you think the characters use this imagery?

• Although Viola is the only character in the play who is literally in disguise, many characters are disguising the truth by deceiving others and often themselves.
• Maria deceives Malvolio by writing the letter as though it comes from Olivia, as seen in Act 2 Scene 5. Sir Toby, Fabian and Sir Andrew are all part of this deception, watching it unfold for their own enjoyment. However, Malvolio is also deceiving himself when he believes that Olivia is interested in him as anything more than her steward. He is very quick to credit the letter, which is why the deception works so well. Viola deceives Olivia into believing she is a young man called ‘Cesario’, but Olivia is also deceiving herself in believing that Cesario loves her, but is too proud to admit it.
• Consider who is deceiving whom in Twelfth Night and what reasons they may have for their deceptions.

• The characters in Twelfth Night often refer to a power beyond themselves controlling their lives. When Olivia realises she has fallen in love with Cesario, she feels this is her fate saying ‘Fate, show thy force, ourselves we do not owe. / What is decreed must be and be this so’ (1:5). When Viola realises that Olivia has fallen in love with Cesario she talks, not of fate but of how time ‘must untangle this, not I, / It is too hard a knot for me t’untie’ (2:3).
• The blasphemy laws in Shakespeare’s time meant the Christian God was not allowed to be mentioned on stage, so instead of thanking God, Malvolio thanks Jove, alongside his horoscope, for what he sees as his good luck saying ‘Jove and my stars be praised’ (2:5).
• Of course, all the characters are being controlled by a power beyond themselves because they are written by an author, but a good writer suggests that his character could make other choices. Follow one character, look at when they mention fate, fortune and other outside influences and consider what other choices they could have made for themselves at those moments.

• Social position and status are very important in the world of Twelfth Night. Sir Toby is insulted that Malvolio, a servant, tells him off for his behaviour in Act 2, asking ‘Art any more than a steward?’ Malvolio himself dreams of achieving a higher social status through marrying Olivia at which time he could tell others ‘I know my place, as I would they should do theirs.’ (2:5)
• Social status is connected to wealth as well as titles. Viola tells Olivia, while dressed as the servant boy ‘Cesario’, very clearly ‘I am no fee’d post, lady. Keep your purse’ (1:5) whereas Feste gladly accepts ‘sixpence’ from Sir Toby and Sir Andrew to sing in Act 2 Scene 3. This difference in attitude may well be because Viola has come from a different social class, where Feste is used to taking money for his services. How else might this sudden change in her status affect Viola’s behaviour while dressed as ‘Cesario’?
• Can you map the social status of the characters, putting them in order of social importance? Do any of their positions alter as the play progresses?