We may laugh at Malvolio but to what extent does he deserve our sympathy?
In twelfth night, a comedy full of mistaken identities and love triangles, a harmless trick is played on the Lady Olivia’s steward Malvolio by some of the other servants and occupants of the house, to try and teach him a well deserved lesson, however the trick darkens and becomes nastier as the play progresses, so to what extent does Malvolio deserve our sympathy and does his arrogant character justify to what Sir Toby and the others did to him?
Even before we meet Malvolio we can imagine the type of character he is just by looking at his name, which for one sounds stiff and gives us an image of a pompous being, also “Mal” is French for bad and a lot of bad characteristics such as “Malicious”, “Malign” and “Malevolent” which means wishing evil on others, start with “Mal” so unlike “Feste” whose name sounds like “festive” and gives us a pleasant first impression of the jester, Malvolio’s name gives us a bad image of him before we even meet him and I think Shakespeare did this intentionally to create a negative imagine in our minds of Malvolio.
When we first meet Malvolio in Act 1 scene 5 he certainly lives up to his name, coming across as arrogant and sarcastic being. We don’t warm to him and feel an instant dislike towards him. When Feste tries to cheer Olivia up, she turns to Malvolio and she asks, “What you think of this fool Malvolio? Doth he not mend?” and he coldly replies, “Yes, and shall do till the pangs of death shake him.” This is a cruel and envious dig at Feste, whom thinks is beneath him and also seems to be jealous of Feste’s easy and relaxing relationship with Olivia. Malvolio also “marvels” that Olivia “takes a delight in such a barren rascal.” This is mocking both Feste and Olivia and we get the impression that Malvolio is humourless “sick of self love”. When he goes to return the ring to Viola (Cesario) that Olivia had falsely told Malvolio had been given to her he is most annoyed and upset that he had to run after a “peevish messenger”, a job that Malvolio feels is beneath him. He treats Viola with no respect, looking down upon her and saying the she “could have saved me (Malvolio’s) pains” instead of “peevishly” throwing the ring to Olivia. When Malvolio gives the ring back he throws it to the floor and refers to Viola “stooping” for it which would mean she would almost have to bow to Malvolio in order to retrieve it. Despite seeing Malvolio as a cold and bitter character so far he has proven that he is extremely loyal and trustworthy, for example he goes to “dismiss” Viola at Olivia’s wish without protest or question and we see that Olivia’s obviously relies on and trusts Malvolio and that he is always “at your (Olivia’s service.” In the play so far we have seen Malvolio’s arrogant character, thinking that he is above most of the other characters, but we also know of his loyalty as Olivia’s steward, we as an audience would feel happy to see Malvolio being taught a lesson and being brought down to his true level. We would be pleased to be given the opportunity to laugh at him being made a fool out of but that’s as far as we’d want it to go, just a fun, harmless prank.
