Malvolio’s scolding is most stern:
My masters, are you mad? Or what are you? Have you no wit, manners, nor honesty, but to gabble like tinkers at this time of night? Do ye make an alehouse of my lady’s house, that ye squeak out your coziers’ catches without any mitigation or remorse of your voice? Is there no respect of place, persons, nor time in you?
(78-83)
The reference to tinkers indicates the loud noise that the three fools are making. A tinker was a maker, repairer, or seller of metal household utensils. Sir Toby and Sir Andrew, most likely, have been banging on the pots and pans as if they were drums to keep time with the music. A cozier (alternative spelling of cosier) was an inept tailor who would botch his work. Malvolio is using the term generally to mean guildsmen or illiterate craftsmen The word catches refers to short songs or comic songs. Malvolio thus implies that the songs that Sir Toby and Feste are singing are the songs of the common rabble and do not belong in the house of a countess. Being drunk, Sir Toby and Sir Andrew would bray their lyrics in an off-key manner. Their singing is definitely not refined or pleasant. Malvolio is also telling them to lower their voices. He is really telling them to be quiet.
On the one hand, Malvolio’s point is a valid one. Sir Toby and the others are guests in the house of the Countess, and they are acting in a most disrespectful way. But symbolically, Malvolio is the counterpart to Sir Toby. Where Sir Toby, as the King of Fools, represents fun and good cheer and gaiety, Malvolio represents somberness and sobriety and seriousness. There is no joyfulness in Malvolio: he is the spirit of grimness.
More to the point, during the Renaissance Malvolio may be overlooking the distinction between classes. Sir Toby is an aristocrat, Malvolio is a commoner. Although Malvolio, as steward to the countess, has the duty to deliver her messages, he does not have the right to deliver them in such a rude and scornful manner. Thus, Sir Toby, even though he is drunk, has a right to criticize Malvolio:
Art any more than a steward? (102-03)
Sir Toby is telling Malvolio that he is a commoner, and as such he should know his place. Malvolio realizes that he cannot control Sir Toby and the rest. So the steward exits with the weak threat that he shall inform the Countess Olivia about their behavior.
Because Malvolio also criticized and threatened Maria, she wants to get revenge against him (lines 120-22). Maria wants to play a trick on Malvolio that will embarrass and humiliate him.
Maria informs Sir Toby and Sir Andrew that Malvolio is a Puritan (line 125). A Puritan was a Christian who wanted to purify or simplify his religious faith. They believed that their churches should be plain and simple without expensive ornamentation of any kind. They were severe and strict in their beliefs. Like the Christians of the Middle Ages, they believed that their sole purpose on earth was to prepare themselves for the afterlife – for life in heaven. So, the Puritans wore plain and simple clothes – black, white, or gray – and did not believe that mankind should waste their time with art or fun. They believed in work and prayer and little else. Among other things, the Puritans were against the theater. Puritans did not go to the theater because they believed that dramatic plays were frivolous and sacrilegious. Obviously, playwrights and actors were not fond of the Puritans; and Puritans were often made into comic characters on the stage. In fact, most of the people in England were not fond of the sanctimonious and proud Puritans either; and so theater audiences were always ready to criticize and laugh at Puritan characters on stage.
Even if Malvolio were not a Puritan, he is a sour individual who wishes to suppress all fun and merriment. He is an anti-comic force. Thus, Renaissance audiences would readily agree that Malvolio should be humiliated.
Maria’s scheme involves writing a love letter. Maria knows that Malvolio is secretly in love with the Countess Olivia. Maria also knows how to forge or imitate the writing style of Olivia. So, Maria plans to write a somewhat obscure or cryptic letter that suggests or hints that Olivia loves Malvolio. Sir Andrew and Sir Toby will drop the letter in the garden at a spot where Malvolio will be sure to find it. And then Malvolio will believe what he reads in the letter and make a fool out of himself.
The revenge scheme against Malvolio becomes, then, a subplot of the play.
After Maria leaves the room, Sir Toby advises Sir Andrew to “send for more money” (161-62). Being poor, Sir Toby relies on Sir Andrew to help him buy wine and other alcoholic beverages. Thus, Sir Toby does not want Sir Andrew to leave. Sir Toby then is taking advantage of Sir Andrew and is using him for his own selfish purposes. In a sense, he is similar to Iago in the tragedy of Othello. Iago took advantage of a man named Roderigo. Iago told Roderigo that he would help him win the love of the lady Desdemona, but that he needed money to achieve this goal. However, Iago never spent the money on gifts for the lady. He kept Roderigo’s money for himself. Sir Toby, however, is not quite as despicable as is Iago. Where Iago realizes that Roderigo will never win the love of Desdemona, Sir Toby (perhaps because he is so drunk) actually thinks there is a chance for Sir Andrew to obtain the Countess Olivia as his wife. In fact, Sir Toby strongly desires for this match to happen so that he can continue to freeload off of the bounty of the Countess. Sir Toby wishes to live off of the wealth of the countess. Sir Toby simply wishes to keep his cup full.
Back in the palace the Duke is still melancholy and emotionally distraught because of his unrequited love. As he listens to some music with his new young page, the Duke asks Cesario (Viola) if he has ever been in love. Cesario responds that he does love a woman and admits that this woman is about the same age as the Duke (at line 27). Of course, this person that Cesario is referring to is exactly the same age as the Duke, for Viola is subtly referring to the Duke himself.
Of course, Duke Orsino has no idea about this; and, so he warns the young Cesario to love a woman who is younger than himself. The Duke explains that the affections (“fancies” in line 32) of men “are more giddy and unfirm” than those of women. He is implying that men are more fickle than women, that men lose interest in women as the women get older:
For women are as roses, whose fair flower Being once displayed, doth fall that very hour. (37-38)
With this simile Orsino is declaring that the beauty of women does not last for very long. Like a flower that has reached full bloom, the beauty is short-lived. The flower shortly afterwards withers and its petals start to fall. Women’s beauty also fades as they get older, and fickle men lose interest in them.
Some critics refer to lines such as these as proof that Shakespeare no longer loved his wife. William Shakespeare married Anne Hathaway in 1582 because she was pregnant with his child. Shakespeare was only eighteen years of age at that time, but Anne Hathaway was seven or eight years older. However, the cautious reader should be aware that Shakespeare is writing a work of fiction; and not every line should be interpreted as an autobiographical certainty. Shakespeare continued to have additional children with his wife. Moreover, he provided them with an expensive house and attended to all of their needs. There is no actual proof that Shakespeare did not love his wife throughout his natural life.
Feste enters at this time, and the Duke asks him to sing a song that he (the Duke) is particularly fond of. Feste then sings a sad song about unrequited love in which the sad lover thinks about his own lonely and dismal death. The Duke finds the song pleasing, and he rewards Feste with a handful of coins.
As Feste exits, he comments that he hopes the Duke will find some relief from his melancholy and sadness. Feste then, in a metaphor, describes the Duke’s mind as an “opal” (74). The opal is a good choice. On the one hand, it is a translucent or semi- transparent gemstone. Feste is declaring that he can obviously see the melancholy that consumes the Duke. On the other hand, an opal can also be cloudy or murky. The Duke’s thoughts are also clouded by his passions for Olivia. Feste then adds a philosophical quip about constancy:
I would have men of such constancy put to sea, that their business might be everything, and their intent everywhere, for that’s it that always makes a good voyage of nothing. (74-76)
Feste is suggesting that constancy in love – remaining true in a situation of unrequited love – is “a good voyage of nothing.” In other words, remaining true to a woman who does not return that love produces nothing of value. Nothing good comes out of it. A sailor who is out at sea must attend to the shifting currents and the changing winds. Trying to maintain a single course without paying attention to the winds and currents could mean disaster. Feste is suggesting that Duke Orsino is like that. The Duke is maintaining a steady course and is ignoring the winds and currents of life. The Duke is heading toward disaster. Thus, Feste hopes that the Duke will change his mind and his behavior.
After Feste and the other attendants exit, Duke Orsino and Cesario have a discussion or debate about the differences between men and women in matters of love. The debate begins when Orsino requests Cesario to return to the estate of the Countess Olivia and attempt again to deliver his messages of love. The Duke wants the Countess to know that he is not attracted to her wealth and property but rather that he is attracted to her own natural qualities.
However, Cesario suggests that the Countess Olivia may not be able to feel any love for the Duke (at line 85). The Duke then responds that he cannot accept such a response. So then Cesario puts forward the notion that what if there existed a woman who was in love with the Duke. Cesario adds that the Duke should suppose that this woman’s love was as great as that which the Duke has for the Countess, but also that the Duke did not love her. Cesario asks whether that woman should accept the Duke’s refusal of her. Of course, this woman is not just an imaginary or theoretical construct. The woman is really Viola (disguised as Cesario). Viola is wondering how the Duke would respond if she revealed her true identity and revealed her love to him.
But the Duke thinks such a woman is just imaginary, and he responds with a generalization regarding the ability of women to love:
There is no woman’s sides
Can bide the beating of so strong a passion As love doth give my heart. (91-93)
The Duke, who is speaking emotionally rather than rationally, is claiming that women do not love as intensely as do men. Literally, he is claiming that his heart is so beating passionately in his love for Olivia that a woman’s body (“sides”) would not be strong enough to contain such a heart. The Duke even compares the love of women to appetite or hunger. He is suggesting that a woman’s love is easily satisfied. He is suggesting that their love is not as deep and as complex as that of a man’s love. The Duke emphasizes his distinction with metaphors to the palate and liver (lines 95-96). True love, according to some Renaissance sages, comes from the liver (just as some people suggest with the heart in the modern age). The palate, the mouth, represents only superficial desire and is easily satisfied. The Duke also claims that women are not as constant or as faithful as men, and he concludes with the simile that his love is “as hungry as the sea” (98). The sea can continuously swallow objects from land without ever being full. The Duke is declaring that his love will never be as easily satisfied as a woman’s love can be.
Viola (as Cesario) argues the point. Keeping her identity hidden, Viola relates that her “father had a daughter” who “loved a man” (106). Of course, Viola is referring to herself, and the “man” refers to the Duke. However, the Duke assumes that Cesario is talking about a sister and some other man. Cesario then relates how his father’s daughter pined and sorrowed because of her unrequited love:
She never told her love,
But let concealment, like a worm in the bud, Feed on her damask cheek. (109-11)
The simile of unrequited love being like a worm is an excellent image. The worm destroys the beauty of the rose before it ripens and reaches full bloom. The word damask indicates the rose, which was often used to describe the beauty of a woman during the Renaissance (her white skin and red cheeks like that of white and red roses). The bud represents the beauty of the young woman. Before the young woman blossoms into a beautifully mature woman, her feelings of unrequited love have caused her to pine and mourn and grow pale and weak. Her feelings have destroyed her beauty.
Viola then proceeds to describe her “father’s daughter” in a state of melancholy and utter sadness sitting like a statue representing patience (112-13). The word patience describes Viola’s role in the play. She sits passively waiting for fate or some other force to come to her rescue. Viola then expresses her main point:
We men may say more, swear more, but indeed Our shows are more than our will; for still we prove Much in our vows, but little in our love. (115-17)
Simply put, actions speak louder than words! In this passage, the word shows means actions, the word will means desires, and the word still means always. Viola is declaring that men may say more, swear more, and vow more than do women; however, their actions do not live up to their words. No matter how much a man may say about the greatness of his love, his actions always prove that his love is neither so strong nor so constant. A woman will spend her lifetime in mourning for a lost love, a man will not.
The Duke is moved by Cesario’s words and asks if his sister died from her grief. However, Cesario (Viola) must answer “I know not” (120). The story is not over yet. The conclusion of this tale of “the father’s daughter” is still unfinished.
The fifth scene takes place in the garden of Countess Olivia. Sir Toby and Sir Andrew are joined by another servant named Fabian, who also wishes to play a trick on Malvolio. Maria enters and places the love letter which she herself had written in a spot on the ground where Malvolio will surely be able to spot it. After Maria exits, the three men hide just before Malvolio comes into the garden.
The haughty and proud Malvolio is daydreaming. He is imagining himself as the husband of the Countess Olivia. He imagines ordering the servants to perform his every whim. In his imagination, Malvolio orders the servants to bring Sir Toby before him; and he also imagines Sir Toby bowing down before him (at line 55). Of course, Malvolio does not realize that Sir Toby himself is hiding nearby and can hear his every word. Sir Toby, of course, becomes angry when he hears Malvolio’s comments about himself. Malvolio continues to imagine himself reprimanding or scolding Sir Toby about his drunken behavior and about his having a “foolish knight” (meaning Sir Andrew: line 69) as his constant companion.
Malvolio then sees Maria’s letter, picks it up, and reads it. In this false love letter, in which Maria has duplicated the handwriting of the Countess, Maria has written the following:
M.O.A.I. doth sway my life. (97)
Although the four letters do not really mean anything, the arrogant Malvolio assumes that the “M” stands for Malvolio and that the other letters are some kind of code because the Countess Olivia does not want to reveal the name of the man who sways her or influences her feelings.
Maria also considers the difference in class and status and tricks Malvolio into thinking that these distinctions are not important:
In my stars I am above thee, but be not afraid of greatness. Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them. (125-27)
The word stars refers to fate or destiny. In reading this, Malvolio believes that the Countess thinks that he is as great as any aristocrat. Malvolio already believes that he is a great person who just has not had the opportunity to reveal his abilities but that Olivia will “thrust” greatness upon him by marrying him. As a side note, the reader should recognize that the “some are born great” passage is a famous line that is often quoted out of context – usually without the irony that appears in the play. The lines are ironic because Malvolio is not great; he is just proud and pompous.
In addition to convincing Malvolio that he is a great man and that the Countess wants to marry him,