MovieChat Forums > Twelfth Night (1980) Discussion > please help make it all clear?

please help make it all clear?


I've had a lot of trouble understanding anything more than the basic story line of Twelfth Night. I've just had a look at all the topics on the board, but I don't think a understand enough about the book to repliy to any of them. Could someone some please give me abit more understanding of the play?

reply

You find with many pieces of writing that people can interpret things differently, and can often read more into it than you'd think. As long as you have a basic understanding of the story line that is the most important thing. You should find the more you read through it the more you will get to understand. The language used takes longer for us to understand than it would usually as we are not used to it.

reply

Hullo.
Basically I think Shakespeare's Twelfth Night is set around 4 characters. The lookalike twins, Viola and Sebastian, who are shipwrecked and both believe the other is dead. The other two characters are Orsino and Olivia. Orsino is in love with Olivia but she does not return his love.
When Viola goes looking for work she must dress up as a man, and calls herself Cesario. She goes and works for Orsino. Her first errand is to tell Olivia of Orisino's love for her. However when Olivia meets who she thinks is Cesario she falls in love with him.
Mean while Cesario/Viola is falling in love with Orsino.
Then Sebastian comes back. Olivia sees him thinking he is Cesario and lets him know she loves him. Sebastian starts loving her back and they get married... I think.
Everyone comes together then. They realize that it's all a misunderstanding. Sebastian and Viola are happy because now they are both alive and Orsino and Viola are in love and Olivia and Sebastian are in love.
In between that there are many interesting characters to help things happen, give the story more depth and make it more interesting.
The perfect example of a character like this is Feste the Jester. As well as him there are many servants and houseguests at Olivia's house.
That's just about it. Bye.

reply

Im a bit like you but I will try and help where I can. Twelfth Night is basically about Orsino, who is rich and has a house and Olivia who is also quite like Orsino. Its a play about love, passion, hatred and revenge and focuses on many aspects to do with life back then. Viola plays two characters, Viola and Cesario. She thinks her brother was killed in the Shipwreck and its not until later that she realises he is still alive. She wants to serve Orsino but because she is a woman, and they cannot do the work he is after, she dresses up as a man, Cesario, and goes to Illyria to serve Orsino. Olivia falls in love with this character and does not realise that Cesario is actually a girl, too. Viola finds herself in a lot of mess when she realises this. Meanwhile, Orsino is still in love with Olivia but later on discovers he never really did love her. Sir Toby Belch and Sir Andrew Ague Cheek always play jokes and it seems like Sir Toby is always drunk. When they discover that Malvolio was in love with Olivia, they work with Maria who is Olivia's servant and write a letter to him in revenge. Malvolio falls for it then everyone thinks he has gone mad so he is sent to serve in imprisonment. Feste the clown tries to make everyone happier but it doesnt always work and doesn't turn out the way he always wants. When Sebastian, Viola's twin broter returns Maria thinks it is Cesario and marry's him. Then a fight happened between Sir Andrew and Viola and the truth comes out that she is a woman. Then due to this, Orsino and Viola were in love with each other so they got married and the story ends. hope this helps!

reply

Other people have worked out the plot but for me the way to understand the language was to find a word that I understood and then work from there. It doesn't always help but sometimes if you know a couple or even one of the words it can help you to figure out the rest of the sentence.

reply

I believe that it is important that you understand the story line, so you have at least a little understanding. If you still don't understand the book you could try watching the movie or get some of your friends to help you understand it better. Other than the story line i don't think there is anything under lying it.

reply