Shakespeare

Twelfth Night and the Morality of Indulgence 273connection with “the plot” in a trivial sense, to be the other epiphany, theperception that follows the anagnorisis or discovery of classic dramaturgy. But wehave been dealing with the Action of Twelfth Night as representing the killing offof excessive appetite through indulgence of it, leading to the rebirth of theunencumbered self. The long final scene, then, serves to show forth theCaesario-King, and to unmask, discover and reveal the fulfilled selves in themajor characters.The appearance of the priest (a real one, this time) serves more than thesimple purpose of proving the existence of a marriage between Olivia and“Caesario.” It is a simple but firm intrusion into the world of the play of a way oflife that has remained outside of it so far. The straightforward solemnity of thepriest’s rhetoric is also something new; suggestions of its undivided purpose haveappeared before only in Antonio’s speeches. The priest declares that Olivia andher husband have been properly marriedAnd all the ceremony of this compactSealed in my function, by my testimony.Since when, my watch hath told me, toward my graveI have travelled but two hours. (V. i. 163–166)It is possible that the original performances had actually taken about two hoursto reach this point. At any rate, the sombre acknowledgment of the passage oftime in a real world is there. Antonio has prepared the way earlier in the scene;his straightforward confusion is that of the unwitting intruder in a masqueradewho has been accused of mistaking the identities of two of the masquers.That the surfeiting has gradually begun to occur, however, has becomeevident earlier. In the prison scene, Sir Toby has already begun to tire: “I wouldwe were well rid of this knavery.” He gives as his excuse for this the fact that heis already in enough trouble with Olivia, but such as this has not deterred him inthe past. And, in the last scene, very drunk as he must be, he replies to Orsino’sinquiry as to his condition that he hates the surgeon, “a drunken rogue.” Selfknowledgehas touched Sir Toby. He could not have said this earlier.As the scene plays itself out, Malvolio alone is left unaccounted for. Thereis no accounting for him here, though; he remains a bad taste in the mouth. “Alaspoor fool,” says Olivia, “How have they baffled thee!” And thus, in Feste’s words,“the whirligig of time brings in his revenges.” Malvolio has become the fool, the“barren rascal.” He leaves in a frenzy, to “be revenged,” he shouts, “on the wholepack of you.” He departs from the world of this play to resume a role in another,perhaps. His reincarnation might be as Middleton’s De Flores, rather than evenJaques. His business has never been with the feasting to begin with, and now thatit is over, and the revellers normalized, he is revealed as the true madman. He is“The Madly-Used Malvolio” to the additional degree that his own uses havebeen madness.