A link is established between Olivia and Viola. Both have suffered the loss of Father and Brother, (although the audience is aware of Sebastien’s survival, Viola is not) and both must bear the burden of grief that this dictates. Also, both women are forced to disguise their true feelings for another character. Viola is secretly in love with Orsino, and Olivia is in love with Viola. This shows both to be vulnerable, despite their outward appearance.
Love is the central theme of the play, and the way in which Shakespeare has created a situation where many characters are all secretly in love with others, allows him to separate the kinds of love intended to be serious, and those intended to be comic. Orsino’s unrequited love for Olivia is reflected in both Sir Andrew’s and Malvolio’s secret love for the same woman. Orsino’s love for Olivia is dealt with more seriously, as Viola tries to educate Orsino to love intelligently and not sentimentally. However, the love that Andrew and Malvolio have for Olivia is used for comic effect by Shakespeare as Sir Toby in particular, manipulates them for his own amusement, using their secret love for Olivia as a weapon. The fact that Olivia is loved by both two characters from the sub-plot and one from the main plot, reminds the audience that the stories are proceeding in the same place, and that the plots are connected.
The theme of disguise is one which dominates the play throughout. Viola both disguises herself as a woman, and disguises her true feelings for Orsino. Likewise, Olivia disguises her love for Viola. This theme is extended by Shakespeare when it is revealed that Sebastien went under the alias of Roderigo whilst he was being aided by Antonio. The purpose of this is unclear, though Shakespeare may simply be emphasising that disguise is a facet of human nature.
The structure of the play creates parallels. In particular, Act One Scene Two echoes Act Two Scene One. The scenes are almost identical, with both Viola and Sebastien arriving in Illyria. The almost duplicate scenes increase anticipation of the future reconciliation, and the extended conversation between Antonio and Sebastien, and the fact that Antonio is named, causes the audience to expect Antonio to make another appearance later in the play.
In addition, Act One Scene Four mirrors Act Two Scene Four, with Orsino and Viola discoursing about his love for Olivia. There is heavy dramatic irony and the scenes emphasise Viola’s sense of duty and courage in going to declare her master’s love for Olivia, when she anonymously worships Orsino.
Shakespeare’s puts great emphasis on messages throughout the play. The message and the messenger are bound together, but the message and its dispatcher are more divorced. This separates characters from their desires, thus creating confusion and mystery, and adding to the comedy of the play.
Shakespeare uses repetition of language to enhance our conceptions of certain characters, and to establish themes for the audience to recognise and remember. Orsino creates a verbal echo the second time he speaks in Act One Scene One, with the repetition of self-related pronouns, “I…mine…me…my…methought,” again displaying his sense of self-importance.
In Act One Scene Two, the wordplay on the words “chance” and “perchance” lodge the word “chance” in the mind of the audience, and we expect the theme of chance, or fate to be important for the rest of the play. It links with the repeated references to time made my Viola and Feste in his songs. Viola says, at the end of Act Two Scene Two,
“Oh time thou must untangle this, not I:
It is too hard a knot for me t’untie.”
Feste’s warning that “Youth’s a stuff will not endure” also relates to time and its passing. Olivia displays her conviction in the idea of fate when she instructs fate to “show thy force; ourselves we do not owe.” This instant willingness to break out of her artificially imposed isolation and take a chance on her deepest feelings is a mark of Olivia's emotional courage. Unlike Orsino (at the moment), she is not one to deny the chance to escape her self-imposed emotional isolation.
Both Olivia and Orsino make repeated references to their eyes, when describing their feelings of love. Olivia says of Viola,
“Methinks I feel this youth’s perfections
With an invisible and subtle stealth
To creep in at mine eyes.”
These references cause the audience to recognise that the feelings of these two characters are largely shallow and superficial.
In addition, the echo created by “Illyria,” where the play is set, and “Elysium,” the Greek term for heaven, shows the richness of poetry and also illustrates that Illyria is a kind of fantasy world. We are reminded that it is not of this world.
The echo created by the references to love being like an illness reminds us that love can have negative effects. Olivia calls love “the plague” and the emotion has made Orsino ill. Orsino associates the appetite for food with the appetite for love and relates overeating to lust. This again ties in with Orsino and Olivia’s pre-occupation with appearances in matters of love.
Orsino talks about the sea with relation to the size of his love for Olivia, demonstrating his arrogance. This draws a parallel to the shipwreck from which Viola and Sebastien have been involved in. This theme of the sea is echoed again when in Act One Scene Two, the Captain refers to the myth of Arion and the Dolphin, which suggests to the audience that Sebastien might well be alive, and creates anticipation of a future reconciliation.
Repeated references to flowers remind us of the fickleness of love. It is beautiful at first, but the feeling can wither and die, like a flower. This is rather like Orsino’s view of music. In the first scene, he asks for music but almost instantly, he becomes bored and commands it to be stopped.
“Enough, no more:
‘Tis not so sweet as it was before.”
Music symbolised “the food of love” in the first line, so Orsino is not only demonstrating his own fickleness, but indeed the fickleness of love.
Music echoes throughout the entire play and apart from altering the mood of a scene or of a character, in Twelfth Night, music signifies love. It comes before the words and is the first thing we hear in the play. The word music appears in the first line of the play. Music sends Orsino’s imagination wild, just as thoughts of love would do. Music also demonstrates Orsino’s fickleness and how easily bored he can be. Every time the audience hear music in the play, they will anticipate a progression of a love storyline.
Music also reminds us of the festival of Twelfth Night, for which the play was written. It was a time of celebration and of music and dancing.
Music is very important as it largely dictates the mood of the play. Shakespeare uses music for comedy when Sir Andrew and Sir Toby sing whilst intoxicated to aggravate Malvolio. However, Shakespeare also uses music to create an underlying elegiac note, a note of sadness. Feste sings twice, both times about love. They add an air of melancholy and can change the atmosphere of a scene, important especially if a sober scene follows a scene of comedy. Feste is the only real observer in Twelfth Night, and his songs are warnings about the destructiveness of time and the impermanence of love.
The echoes and parallels in Twelfth Night help the audience to understand more about the themes of the play and its messages. The audience can also expect a reconciliation between Viola and Sebastien due partly to these parallels. The echoes highlight and augment our knowledge and awareness of the traits and personalities of different characters, especially Orsino and Olivia. The parallels also allow Shakespeare to distinguish between which characters’ loves are intended to be comical and which are more poignant. The music which fills the play dictates the atmosphere, be it comical or serious, and allows the important ‘sad clown’ character of Feste to sing about time and love’s impermanence, which become important and stirring as the play concludes.
