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Courtly Love In Twelfth Night

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The Antithetic Ways of Love Love appears to materialize whenever, however, and to whomever it pleases, not often leading its victim to consider its many forms. Courtly love, established in the medieval days, and romantic love, a more popular present-day form of love, both play a role in society and in William Shakespeare’s influential play, Twelfth Night. Additionally, Noël Bonneuil’s article, “Arrival of Courtly Love: Moving in the Emotional Space,” as well as Camille Slight’s, “The Principle of Recompense in 'Twelfth Night',” help illustrate the role of courtly and romantic love in both Twelfth Night and in modern times. Introduced amid the medieval times, courtly love became very popular due to the excitement and energy it brought as well …show more content…

Despite the fact that many couples in the medieval times practiced courtly love, some found romantic and traditional love more appealing. Noël Bonneuil makes use of the Bandwagon fallacy and falsely states, “The emotional and social tumult introduced by courtly love presents people with reasons to live, combats to devote a life to: it allows the aristocratic group to define its identity,” (Bonneuil 261). Bonneuil groups all aristocrats together, stating they all depend on the law of courtly love to determine their existence. However, the most prominent romantic love couple, the Duke and Viola, prove this statement misleading. Professing his love for Viola, Orsino says, “We will not part from hence. Cesario, come, for so you shall be while you are a man. But when in other habits you are seen, Orsino’s mistress, and his fancy’s queen,” (V.i.408-411). Ultimately, the Duke truly feels content through the mutual affection between him and his romantic love, Viola. In the unusually altered beginning of Twelfth Night Viola disguises herself as Cesario, whom with which Olivia promptly falls in love with. In her article, “The Principle of Recompense in ‘Twelfth Night’” author Camille Slights writes, “As Cesario she clearly tells Olivia that she can never love her but, even so, she accepts Olivia's gifts, sparing her the pain and humiliation of having these symbols of love rejected,” (Slights 544). Slights illustrates various ideas within this sentence, one showing Olivia’s persistence in winning over Cesario with gifts and inextinguishable love. Furthermore, Olivia’s love for Cesario clearly proves itself as romantic love as she abandons her grieving promise contrived from the death of her brother and father. Unlike courtly love, romantic love proves steadfast and often ends pleasantly for all people, including the couples in Twelfth

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In his play, Twelfth Night, William Shakespeare has his characters participate in the practice of deception and dishonesty of others - after all, the foundation of Shakespeare’s play resides within a lie. One of the major deceptions in the play is executed by the Illyrian countess, Olivia, as she repeatedly claims to need solitude to mourn her brother’s death in order to avoid Duke Orsino and his obsession towards her. This deception contributes to the meaning of the work as a whole by adding the thematic message, deception and dishonesty is sometimes the better option when it comes to love.     From the beginning of the play, Olivia is introduced as the grieving countess that has recently lost a brother.

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Romantic love focuses on the innocent and pure aspects of Romeo and Juliet as well as Friar Laurence. Anti-romantic love contrasts this love by focusing the more lustful and realistic nature of love which is expressed by Mercutio and the Nurse. The result is that the audience tries to answer the question of what love is. Friar Laurence is one of the characters who represents the ideals of romantic love. Although he believes the love Romeo and Juliet share, is young and changeable, he still believes love is spiritual and transformative power.

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The question of why Olivia, after dramatically declaring her affections for Cesario, would so quickly jump to Sebastian after finding Viola’s true identity, is likely answered by the societal norms of the Elizabethan era. Cesario and Viola are two halves of one whole; by loving Cesario, Olivia loves Viola too. Upon meeting “him,” Olivia says “Thy tongue, thy face, thy limbs, actions and spirit/ Do give thee five-fold blazon” (1.5.297-298). She is attracted not just to Cesario’s mannerisms, but to Viola’s beauty, which shines through her male bravado. The “actions and spirit” which Olivia refers to are Viola’s ability to converse with Olivia woman-to-woman, unbeknownst to the countess.

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A valiant knight who rides his noble steed while a damsel dreams for the one who will rescue her. This plot which continually inspired modern works started during the medieval era and was known as the courtly love. Many historians have analyzed how the courtly love ideal was formed. From the several factors that could have influenced the creation of this ideal, this essay presents how courtly love was a product of the sociological aspects but not the religious aspects of medieval culture. The different sociological factors surrounding medieval society helped form the idea of courtly love.

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In the story it shows a love triangle between Orsino, Cesario (Viola), and Olivia. Cesario falls in love with Orsino, Viola is in love with Cesario, and Orsino is still in love with Olivia. The characters in the story all show happiness and joy throughout because it’s a story that ends in love unlike Romeo and Juliet where it ends in a tragedy. As said in Twelfth Night, “Its central plot concerns a love triangle between the Illyrian nobleman Orsino, his beloved but unattainable Olivia, and the shipwrecked Viola.” (Lee

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However, love vanquishes vanity. Illyria 's Duke Orsino and Countess Olivia are vain, that is, empty, till epiphanies prepare them to love someone beyond themselves. In this manner, epiphanies resolve Twelfth Night characters ' barriers to the altar, enabling them to recognize, experience, and respond to outwardly directed love.

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Despite popular opinion, love at first sight does not exist. The idea of “love” is widely misinterpreted as a mere attraction between two individuals. However, many do not understand that love goes much further than this, and what follows is a common misconception between love and lust. Shakespeare in his 17th century play Twelfth Night delves deeper into this idea of love. He presents the character Duke Orsino who appear to be infatuated and love-sick for the Countess Olivia, a woman with which he knows little about.

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The first instance which supports the notion that a lapse of communication is responsible for the unsuccessful nature of heterosexual relationships is the case of Duke Orsino and Countess Olivia’s relationship. Both start the play preoccupied with their own concerns, Orsino is worried about finding love, specifically with Olivia, meanwhile she is busy mourning the death of her brother by refusing to marry anyone for seven years. However, it is Orsino’s obsession with seeking love and how he goes about pursuing Olivia that best exemplifies the problematic nature of a male and female’s relationship. Orsino opened the play by saying of love, “Give me excess of it, that, surfeiting, / The appetite may sicken and so die” (1.1.1-3), essentially saying that he so badly craves the feeling being in love gives him, that he would like in so great a quantity that it would end his life.

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In Twelfth Night, Viola and Olivia are the central characters to the play’s plot. Each are young women that take approaches to dealing with the people around them, which are mainly men. There is much trickery that goes on in Twelfth Night, but the ending is for the most part happy. Viola marries Orsino and Olivia marries Sebastian, but the events leading up to this are more or less chaotic. Ultimately, I argue that while Olivia uses her higher social status in order to maintain control of herself and others, Viola resorts to trickery in order to bring about her desires.

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