I've been paging through Bruce Smith's Twelfth Night: Texts and Contexts, which is - tragically! - not in the library. It is, however, partially excerpted on Google Books, and it makes a great virtual page-through. Highlights are additional excerpts from Manningham's diary and a lot of primary sources on clothing laws: not for cross-dressing, but to regulate social class. I've linked to the clothing section (the sumptuary laws particularly single out "excess in apparel," which I find an interesting phrase).
It's a neat collection, but one of Smith's suggestions bothered me: the idea that both Viola and Sebastian "marry up" in their respective pairings with the Orsino and Olivia. He argued that the first audience of this play was made up of "gentlemen" but not Dukes, and that they would have seen the twins' ascension as an embodiment of their own hopes of social mobility. I'm not sure I agree - I'd always assumed that the twins were also children of some lord or other, and since Sebastian declares 'I know you've heard of' his father in Messaline, I think it's fair to assume the twins aren't social climbers. On the other hand, they're almost certainly stepping up in income, especially since a lot of their wealth has presumably just gone down with the shipwreck.
If Viola/Sebastian are the acceptable side of social aspirations, then Malvolio is (more obviously) the reverse, but it's interesting to compare "Cesario's" thwarted attraction to "his" master with Malvolio's desire for his mistress. What's the crucial ingredient that makes Viola the resourceful heroine and Malvolio the cruelly unfortunate fool? Is it because he's a servant? Too prideful? A hypocrite? A Puritan? Even Phebe gets her (appropriate) sweetheart in the end, but Malvolio not only doesn't get a sweetheart; he doesn't get a happy ending.
On an unrelated note, there's a joke recorded in Manningham's diary that's too good not to share:
"Upon a time when Burbage played Richard III there was a citizen grew so far in liking with him that before she went from the play she appointed him to come that night unto her by the name of "Richard III." Shakespeare, overhearing their conclusion, went before, was entertained, and at his game ere Burbage came. Then message being brought that "Richard III" was at the door, Shakespeare caused return to be made that "William the Conquerer" was before "Richard III."
1 comment:
If you're interested in the sumptuary laws, a great additional source on clothing, class, and gender in early modern England is Ann Rosalind Jones and Peter Stallybrass's *Renaissance Clothing and the Materials of Memory* (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2000). There are chapters on the boy-actor-as-woman and on vagrant actors wearing the cast-off clothes of courtiers. It's available in Frost (GT135 .J66 2000).
Post a Comment