28.11.14

- worked on monologue from twelfth night, exploring how we can understand it
- themes of the play

  Today we started to look at the themes and relationships of Twelfth Night. We have already watched the movie version, so everyone had an idea of what the play is about, but today's class was to go into little bit more detail.

LOVE & DUALITY

• The plays main theme is love, more specifically, exchanging different kinds of love

In this graph I've shown all of the different kinds of love connections happening in the play

• Orsino, Sir Andrew and Malvolio are all in love with Olivia. Olivia is in the middle of this love drama, but she herself technically only has feelings for one person, Cesario or Viola in disguise. After the reveal that Viola is a woman, Olivia is automatically in love Sebastian, who she had a brief relations when she thought he was Cesario. 
• Viola has quite simple love relationships, she of course loves her brother, but also falls in love with Orsino, who is chasing Olivia's heart. In the end Orsino and Viola do find each other
• Orsino has a very 'free love' kind of attitude, and he seems to have the affections of many, which I think is the reason why Olivia wants nothing to do with him. And perhaps this challenges only makes him want her more. In the play, you can see Orsino, developing emotions towards Cesario, a man, and doesn't seem to have a problem with it. In the end he falls in love with Viola
• Sebastian is seen first with Antonio, who saved him from the seas. Antonio clearly has love towards Sebastian, but Sebastian doesn't seem to have such strong emotions towards him. As Olivia think Sebastian is Cesario and has a loving moment with him, Sebastian seems to fall head over heels in love with her immediately. 
• The relationship between Maria and Sir Toby Belch is a bit more complicated, since there is chemistry, but it isn't obviously love. Even if the movie has adapted it so, it could be adapted differently. 
• Shakespeare has been thought to be bisexual or gay, since in a lot of his plays there is love between men and a lot of women disguising as men.

During a discussion about duality, we realized that Feste is kind of a third force. He has no money, but at the same time he has everything, He is very much a mystical character in a way, since it seems he is free from lust and knows all and tells the truth. He has insight to the characters and happening more than others, but still seems to be there only to have fun himself. He very much lives in the moment.