Tuesday, April 26, 2011

Anthony Mahfood

April 25,2011

Understanding Literature

Dr Ellis

Happy Ending

In the play Twelfth Night William Shakespeare love betrayal and comedy came together to create an entertaining play. The love triangle in this play is very complex and seemingly never ending. The betrayal is one of the main reasons that the love triangle is so confusing because it adds twists to the relationships of the characters as would happen in real life. To add to the love triangle much humor is sewn into the story with very intense dialogue.

The love triangle consists of Orsino, Olivia and Viola. Orsino is in love with Olivia and she has no interest in being with him. Orsino always send his servants with gifts and messages to give to Olivia but she never seems to be interested and turns them away. One day when Viola is dress up as Cesario, Orsino sends Viola to tell Olivia how much Orsino loves her but that plan backfires when Olivia falls in love with Cesario. When Viola goes back to tell Orsino that Olivia still does love him we find out that Viola is in love with Orsino. In the end Viola and Orsino get married and Olivia marries Violas twin brother Sebastian. This was a very happy ending and put the book together.

The ending of this play reminded me of when I was leaving my community service because when I went to my first day I thought to myself what am I getting my self into. There were young children running around out of control. I wanted to get out of there it was all chaos and felt powerless. What surprised me the most is how close I became to the student I was mentoring and how much they trusted me and could listen to me. Everything came together at the end of the community service just as it did in the end of the play.

In the play there was maybe moment of betrayal especially in the beginning because Sebastian lied to Antonio and Viola lied to everyone. This betrayal causes most of the drama in the love scene. This series of lies makes me realize that although on the outside this story and my life seem so distant and different the problems and situations are very similar to my own. Another scene where there is betrayal is when Maria plays the prank on Malvolio and makes Malvolio believe that Olivia is in love with him. Malvolio starts to dress very weird and act happy. This made people believe that he was going crazy and they locked him in the closet. Even while he was in the close they still played pranks on him.

Overall the main thing I am trying to say is I found it easier to relate to this story than one would imagine. Shakespeare may have been alive hundreds of years ago but the main themes and problems that occur during the story are still prevalent in our daily lives.

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