Does Malvolio deserve his fate?

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Georgia Smith 11V                                                                 October 2001

Does Malvolio deserve his fate?

  Malvolio’s character and the misfortunes he encounters though out Twelfth Night provide a lot of the play’s comedy scenes. His haughty and pretentious demeanour makes him easy to dislike, yet the treatment he receives is at times a little undeserved and leads to the issue of whether or not Malvolio deserves his fate.

 In Act 1 of Twelfth Night the audience is immediately presented with Malvolio as a pompous and arrogant man who is ‘sick of self-love.’ He is shown as selfish and disillusioned with self-importance when unwilling to carry out menial tasks like delivering a ring; ‘you might have saved me pains’ even though it is part of his job.  Blindly, he simultaneously criticises Feste’s lack of funniness and Olivia for laughing at it; ‘your ladyship takes delight in such a barren rascal,’ he arrogantly lectures his superiors showing that he thinks he is above them.

 This negative representation of Malvolio is continued into Act 2 where the audience gets a glimpse of Malvolio as a puritanical killjoy. Before Malvolio even enters to bring an end to Sir Toby’s fun, Maria comments on her surprise that Olivia hasn’t already ‘called up her steward Malvolio’ to do so. This shows how other characters also think Malvolio is a curmudgeon.  Our contempt for Malvolio increases further when he enters and begins to tell the knights off, even though they are his social superiors. He accuses them of being ‘mad’ of acting like ‘tinkers’ who have ‘no wit, manners, nor honesty’. His remarks indicate that he believes they are acting like commoners and that he would never stoop to such a level, he believes he is above them. He is rude to them and also to Maria, who is his social equal, although he clearly doesn’t think so; ‘if you prized my lady’s favour…you would not give means for this uncivil rule.’

 Malvolio’s relationships with the other characters in the play are on the whole not very good. He does not respect them and they dislike and ridicule him. Sir Toby, Sir Andrew, Feste and Maria do not share Malvolio’s patronising, high opinion of himself and they mimic him by singing at him and reminding him that he is no more ‘than a steward.’ The audience’s dislike for Malvolio is deepened when he leaves threatening to tell Olivia of their behaviour ‘by his hand,’ because of course, nobody likes a telltale. Later, Maria directly calls Malvolio a ‘puritan’ this word is used to describe him as a religious killjoy who wishes to inflict his strong, opinionated views on everybody else. Maria also calls Malvolio an ‘affectioned ass’ showing that he is so deluded with such a high opinion of himself he believes everybody else should share it. This directly relates to Malvolio being vain about his committed Christian values and portrays him as an outsider among more fun loving people.

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 The language and imagery used to present Malvolio in the early stages of the play enforce a negative image of a rude, pompous and irritating man but he never actually does anything harmful or nasty. He genuinely respects his ‘ladyship’ Olivia and is a loyal servant shown by his dismay at Sir Toby’s behaviour, ‘Is there no respect for place, persons, nor time in you?’ His loyalty shows he understands the value of trust. He is clearly learned and articulate in speech, ‘mitigation in voice’ and he is an efficient steward who, after all, is only doing his job.   ...

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