Twelfth Night - Malvolio and the Cruel Joke

Comedy and Disturbing Revenge in Shakespeare's Romantic Comedies

Oct 9, 2008

Jokes and deceit are abundant in Twelfth Night, directed mainly at Malvolio. But the nasty tricks aren't just comic interludes - they are disturbing reminders of reality.

There are very few occasions in Shakespeare’s comedies in which he allows us to laugh without feeling. Shakespeare reminds us that revelry and comedy of revenge, which ends well within the plot of the play, can still have real and cruel effects on people, as in Shakespeare’s tragedies such as Hamlet. Nowhere is this cruelty more apparent than in the treatment of Malvolio in Twelfth Night by both the protagonists and the playwright himself.

Revenge on Elizabethan Puritans

Revenge is taken on Malvolio in Twelfth Night as he is a killjoy, an interrupter of plays. He is also a Puritan, and Shakespeare could well be seen as exacting his own personal revenge on the Puritans of Elizabethan society who wanted to close down the theatres. The decadent aristocracy, such as Sir Toby Belch, therefore entrap Malvolio in a play of his own.

Persuading him to wear yellow stockings turns Malvolio into an almost festive figure and is a cruel but satisfying manipulation by the revellers of a Puritan. Here, revenge seems justified as Malvolio not only threatens festivity but elevates himself above the others, saying:

Laughter at the Expense of Human Feeling

Malvolio sets himself on a pedestal. The misplaced feeling of Malvolio’s own self-importance is the trigger certainly for characters such as Feste to be included in the psychological revenge against Malvolio. Indeed, Malvolio accuses Feste of being barren. Unfortunately for Malvolio, this is the last straw for Feste, who has his own injustices to cope with.

Feste appears as a product of an unfeeling hierarchical society. He has great intelligence and understanding. He masters language and music, yet for all this, he is only a jester and his situation is humiliating. His personal life is unfulfilled and his only alliances are temporary. Orsino treats him dismissively, having asked him to sing, and this lack of recognition is furthered as he actually does not recognise Feste while he sits outside Olivia’s house.

Feste may have been treated unjustly, but this does not stop his own cruel streak coming into play against Malvolio. When Malvolio discovers the cruel joke played upon him, Feste exacts his revenge, saying that Malvolio is hated; that he is a failure. In doing so, he reveals unconsciously, how he believes people feel about his own personality. In trying to destroy Malvolio, he is attacking the things he despises about himself.

However, the joke turns sour in the dark room at which point Malvolio loses all of his human dignity. Comic irony and cruelty is apparent as Feste appears, dressed as a clerk, to exorcise Malvolio’s madness. Just at the moment when he is being ridiculed most, Malvolio reproaches others for being unfeeling and ungentle. He begs and pleads that he is not mad and that he is being treated unjustly, and it is here that the laughter begins to curdle in the minds of the audience (or the reader) and creates some sympathy for Malvolio.

The joke becomes crueller once we realise that the motive for revenge has gone and the revellers are merely having fun at Malvolio’s expense. The vicious joke that Malvolio has gone mad is emphasised by Olivia’s seriousness in thinking that he really is mad. After being locked in the dark room, Malvolio is patronised by Olivia, who says:

The Real World Outside the Play

Malvolio realises that he is isolated. He borders on the tragic because he knows he will not gain fair treatment in the society of this play. He therefore displays the darker side of his nature amid all the amusement, leaving us with the words:

Malvolio’s statement disturbs both the audience and those protagonists involved in the revelry. This disturbing exit reminds us that there is a world away from the theatre stage and the threatened violence imagined by the audience as yet to come, and exacted by Malvolio outside the confinements of the play. It shows the real demoralising effects such a revenge trick can have on the lives of people such as Malvolio and displays petty revenges which have their basis in human denigration for all to see.

It can be seen, then, that Twelfth Night contains cruelty and injustice to run parallel with the gaiety and festivity. Shakespeare uses the cruel and unjust incidents forced on Malvolio to both create sources for comic action and to comment on the Elizabethan social forces and Puritanical inhibitions, forcing the audience to relate the actions on the stage to that of the real world. It is this that gives the comedy in the play its disturbing quality.

Footnote

All quotations taken from: William Shakespeare, Shakespeare – Complete Works, OUP, 1986

Bibliography

Linda Anderson, A Kind of Wild Justice, Associated University Presses Inc, 1987

G Bevier, Shakespeare’s Antagonistic Comedy, Associated University Presses Inc, 1993

Clifford Leech, Twelfth Night and Shakespearean Comedy, University of Toronto Press, 1965.

The copyright of the article Twelfth Night - Malvolio and the Cruel Joke in British/UK Fiction is owned by Claire Cowling. Permission to republish Twelfth Night - Malvolio and the Cruel Joke in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.