The Lady Said Take Away the Fool; Therefore

The solitary fool:
The masks and cages of Shakespeare's Feste

Makenzi Hunker

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T he Fool is a stock character used by many playwrights, just in 12th Night, Shakespeare diverges from the typical character of the jester to create Feste, a man who is more than simply a Fool. He is an private who defies existence put in the same category as whatsoever other person; he exists, in some undefined way, exterior of the frame, outside of the boundaries, of the idyllic Illyria, entering scenes to notice and interact and comment on those other inhabitants of the play, but he ultimately is the simply one who is untouched by the play'due south "happy ending," in a positive or a negative sense. Geoffrey Bush proposes that the reason the Fool, in general, is thus unaffected by the ending of the comedy is considering 

the fool is not in progress towards himself, the fool is always himself, and he preserves what he is by ignoring a earth rushing headlong toward weddings. The fool is a fact, and he is the just fact that cannot be governed past the comic dream. (qtd. in Willeford 174)

Bush therefore suggests that the Fool lives in a state of perpetual stasis: he does not movement, does not grow, and does not modify, different the other characters in whose midst he walks. He is caught in a position of immobility, where he must detect others continuing on with their lives without being able to exercise so himself. Only Bush-league does non take into business relationship the idea that such stasis might be crippling to a Fool such equally Feste, and that, trapped in a life that never changes, his words might begin to be touched by melancholy and hints of bitterness, dark undertones that outcome from the loneliness of a perpetual existence in such a confined cage.
Feste is constrained by his role as a Fool. He is defined by his title; he is a jester, a wit; his sole purpose is to be a "corrupter of words," and to amuse those in whose service he is employed (III.i.36). Every bit part of his function as an immune Fool, Feste is permitted greater freedoms than virtually any other servant, and is given leave to use his wit and intelligence to propose to others that it is they who are the fools, not he. And yet he is caged by these freedoms; they isolate him from others. He is "a professional person entertainer, a shrewd wit," and consequently is set apart from both Orsino and Olivia, who are his superiors, and servants like Malvolio or Maria. Thus he is "a loner, with few, if any, attachments of affection […] he is entrapped, or at the very least divers, by his role––a hired clown who sports his mask because information technology is the only sanctioned outlet for his insights" (Greif 77). Feste's shrewdness permits him to see truths almost people more clearly than anyone else in 12th Night, with the possible exception of Viola.
Merely his intelligence is crippling, because he can only limited his observations in the maxims of the Fool; equally anything else, he would be criticised for speaking truths that people do non want to hear. Consequently, he cannot escape his role; he is a jester, a clown, and every bit such will always be viewed in a particular light. This is a tragic situation for a man who is

probably the virtually intelligent character in the play, and [who] undoubtedly possesses the most capacious understanding. He has a mastery of music and song and of all the resources of language besides. Yet he is a mere jester. Information technology is a ludicrous as well as a haunting sight to see Feste grossly habited in a fool'due south garb. (Levin 156)

In order to speak truth, Feste sacrifices the ability to exercise as he pleases; his words may exist his ain, just his actions are dictated by the moods of his mistress. He must perform to her liking, to please her, because he is ultimately still a servant, and fooling is his occupation. If he is unable to delight Olivia, he may well be turned away, which for a man working to earn his staff of life might be "every bit good equally a hanging" (I.iv.17-18). His freedom, then, is express, if not mostly illusion, and indeed is limited only to speech; he has far less freedom in action.
Because Feste must jest to please, he "tin can have no real emotions of his own, and may only live in his quibbles" (Salingar 136). That is to say, what pleasure Feste gets out of life he must become from playing with words and twisting them to suit his purposes. His strength lies especially in language, and it is in this mode that he can, on occasion, escape from the cage he resides in. And even so even in his freedom of words, "to a caste, at least, Feste has 'festered.' His talents accept non constitute a satisfactory outlet…and so have deteriorated" (Levin 156). Most of the people he interacts with on a daily ground are non well-nigh a match for his tongue. Olivia is mostly content to be tickled. Until he meets Viola, Feste cannot truly banter wits with anyone, and with Viola, he is confesses that "who yous are, and what y'all would, are out of my welkin" (III.i.57-8). This is not to be taken lightly; Feste is the principal of words, and the tiredness he feels from a lack of claiming to his skills is briefly lifted during his run across with Viola.
This meet, however, does not occur until one-half-way through the play. Feste's get-go appearance comes as he returns to Illyria from a long absenteeism, an absenteeism that has taken place at a time when Olivia was likely most in need of amusement to distract her from the deaths of her father and blood brother, so close together (I.three.36-9). His absenteeism threatens the security of his position as Olivia's fool; he is, after all, all the same a servant, and subject to the same rules that govern the other servants. Unexplained absences were more than plenty justification for existence turned away, and information technology is only considering he is able to use his skill with words to amuse his way back into Olivia'south graces by proving that she herself is a fool, that he escapes penalty (I.v.66-72). Olivia would take been well inside her rights equally Feste's mistress to dismiss him, just he has been an established figure in her life for so long that she is accepted to his presence, takes him for granted, and would miss him if he were gone. Regardless, Feste puts his position at risk past taking such freedom as disappearing for so long; withal, considering "he is cut off from an independent life of his own by his traditional role," and consequently "what he sees at the bottom of the well is 'nothing,'" at that place is the proffer that, because he sees his life going nowhere, he simply no longer cared what happened if Olivia dismissed him (Salingar 136).
This sort of melancholy points to a subtract in his interest in what occurs in his life. Had Olivia not been willing to exist entertained, Feste might have found himself out wandering the lonely roads of the world outside of Illyria. And yet, as J.Westward. Draper points out, "Feste cannot exist very young. …surely, he has no wish to be bandage forth on an unfeeling world" (27). With this in mind, then, maybe Feste ventured out on what would go a long absence trusting in Olivia to take him back. He has, after all, been with her for a long time, and is almost a part of her extended family. Even if Olivia had intended to turn Feste away, even so, she likely would not have succeeded; he is extremely skilled at winning others over with words, and "shows considerable acumen in judging the aims and motives of those about him, and so keeps himself in the good graces of his betters, and lives most shrewdly by his wits. In the exercise of his profession, Feste [is] certainly no fool" (Draper 26). Indeed, a Fool cannot truly be foolish if he hopes to cater successfully to his mistress. Viola's observations of Feste after her first encounter with him support this assertion:

This boyfriend is wise plenty to play the fool,
And to exercise that well craves a kind of wit.
He must observe their mood on whom he jests,
The quality of persons, and the time;
And like the haggard, cheque at every feather
That comes before his eye. This is a practise
As full of labor every bit a wise man's art;
For folly that he wisely shows is fit,
But wise [men], folly-fall'n, quite taint their wit. (3.i.60-65)

She recognises in Feste the ability to brand his jests wisely, an power that requires the talent of reading a person and knowing how best to make them smile, and on what subjects to concur one'south tongue. Feste, whose livelihood depends on keeping his mistress and others pleased with his witticisms, knows that as long as he is capable of teasing a smile out of Olivia he is in little danger of losing his position.
Information technology is a foreign irony that a man who makes his living keeping others tickled and in good spirits might himself not be specially happy. Twelfth Night is, in a number of ways, about disguises, pretending to be someone other than one'southward true cocky: Viola disguises herself as a man; Malvolio dresses every bit he believes Olivia desires; and Feste cloaks himself in the garb of a curate. Karen Greif suggests that "all the characters in Twelfth Night are masqueraders," only that "merely Feste the jester keeps his mask from slipping" (61). We are allowed glimpses into the minds of virtually every graphic symbol other than Feste, whose mask stays firmly in place. Yet, information technology is non hard to believe that Feste's role equally jester is no more real than his role as Sir Topas, that the constant bantering wit hides a middle that is weighted down with years of plying the aforementioned tricks and making the same jokes. The closest Feste comes to revealing the "agonized sadness at the very heart of his character" is during his bantering with Olivia after his return to her manor (63). In response to her bidding the fool exist taken abroad, he says "'Cucullus non facit monachum': that's every bit much to say every bit I article of clothing not motley in my brain" (I.v.56-vii). The actual translation is that "the cowl does not make the monk," only either way, Feste's point is clear: he is drawing Olivia'south attention to the fact that simply considering he is called Fool does non mean that that is all he is. In other words, the title does non make the man.
At that place is more to Feste than fooling, but that is all most people meet. He "has been over the garden wall into some such globe as the Vienna of Measure for Measure [a world that is not as pleasant equally Illyria]. He never tells where he has been, gives no details. Only he has an air of knowing more of life than anyone else––too much, in fact" (Levin 154-5). Unlike the others that movement about Illyria, Feste is globe-weary, worn down with knowledge of things that do not trouble anyone else, equally occupied as they are with dearest and games of beloved. This has taken a toll on his fooling; he shows an "awareness that for some listeners his fooling [has] indeed grown sometime" (Greif 63). His offset scene shows this awareness, as he sees Olivia approaching and cries "Wit, and't be thy will, put me into good fooling!" (I.5.32-three). It seems he fears that, especially after having been abroad for so long, his power to jest and brand Olivia express mirth, particularly every bit he is out of favour, may not come as readily as it has in the past. Malvolio undoubtedly hits a nervus when he says "I marvel your ladyship takes please in such a arid rascal. I saw him put down the other 24-hour interval with an ordinary fool that has no more encephalon than a stone. Wait you at present, he's out of his guard already. Unless you lot laugh and government minister occasion to him, he is gagg'd" (I.v.83-88). Certainly, aught is heard in retort from Feste, which is very much unlike his usually sharp repartee, and indicates that there is some truth to Malvolio's annotate: Feste has grown tired. Indeed, Feste fixates on getting his revenge on the steward, right up until the cease of the play, which suggests he took Malvolio's attacks to heart.
The allegation of barrenness past one, however mean-spirited, means that there are probable others who have perceived his skills every bit declining, which does non bode well for his position: there is no need for a Fool who cannot provide skillful fooling. In return for the darts Malvolio throws at him, Feste "tries to make Malvolio feel as barren," and he crows over his defeat at the end of the play (Levin 157). Despite this victory over the killjoy, Feste already sees Olivia moving abroad from him, and "there is a persistent hint…that his enigmas glance at himself every bit well equally others, and that he feels his own position to be insecure" (Salingar 136). The topsy-turvy, funfair-esque world is righting itself, and Feste does not know where he will stand in resulting new world. Olivia has married Sebastian, and Feste is abruptly no longer the virtually significant male in her life, and thus is in a potentially unsafe position. Furthermore, she has expressed frustration with his fooling; she quickly grew tired of his "mad" reading of Malvolio's letter (V.i.291-301). At the very stop of the play, Olivia leaves with the other lovers, without a astern glance at Feste, who is left alone on stage.
It is significantly symbolic that Feste is the only i left at the stop of the play. He does not belong with the lovers, only neither does he belong with Sir Toby and Maria, Sir Andrew, or Malvolio. He is a dissever entity, and "lives in ii planes of being, like and so many clever people, an outward façade of professional raillery, and a serious inner urge for the good things of the great world to which he was not born" (Draper 30). He balances between the world of the servants and the world of the masters, belonging to both and and then unable to truly vest to either. He is the only person of whatsoever significance who is not pursued or does not pursue someone else in a romantic sense at some signal during the play. Orsino, Sir Andrew, and Malvolio pursue Olivia; Olivia pursues Cesario (both Viola and Sebastian); Viola indirectly pursues Orsino; Sir Toby and Maria pursue each other. Of the remaining characters, only Antonio is of whatsoever significance, and he arguably pursues Sebastian, if not in a romantic sense, then certainly after some course of love. Feste lonely, and then, is isolated from whatsoever human relationship of a romantic sort. There is a passing mention from Sir Andrew that indicates that Feste might take a mistress, but Feste's response, every bit to exist expected from a Fool, tin be interpreted either flippantly or seriously, and thus leaves u.s.a. in doubt as to whether or not he actually has a woman (II.iii.25-27). The songs Feste sings of love are not calorie-free or happy songs, suggesting the possibility that Feste might take one time been in love and and so jilted.
Even if that was not the case, information technology is not difficult to believe that Feste simply struggles with melancholy and bitterness when information technology comes to romantic relationships: he is surrounded past people who seek after love, while he is only a Fool, and Fools are sexless. The song he sings for Orsino is not a "dizzy" song that "dallies with the innocence of dear," as Orsino leads us to believe (2.iv.46-47). It is made of much darker stuff. Feste sings of expiry, of being "slain by a fair cruel maid," neither of which are what we expect a human being who fancies himself as in honey as Orsino does would request (II.iv.51-54). It, along with the other three songs Feste sings, give united states of america an inkling of the Feste that lies beneath the mask. The song he chooses as he goes to visit Malvolio in prison speaks of an unkind lady, who "loves another," perhaps hinting towards the idea of Feste having been jilted by a woman he loved, or having the woman he loved not return his angel (co-ordinate to Greif, there have been productions of Twelfth Nighttime that propose Feste has an unrequited dear for Olivia, thus explaining his dislike of Malvolio (66)) (4.ii.75, 79). The song he addresses to the audition at the end of the play contains a stanza with the lines "But when I came, alas, to wive,… By swaggering could I never thrive" (V.i.397-9). Here, as at that place is no indication that Feste is physically intimidating, "swaggering" may be interpreted in a verbal sense, that his way of showing off is to swagger with words, and that he was never successful in attracting women in that style. The terminal vocal occurs earlier in the play, and is peradventure the more famous of Feste's songs. The first stanza is innocuous enough, simply the second stanza is less charming:

What is dearest? 'Tis not future;
Present mirth hath nowadays laughter;
What's to come is still unsure.
In delay at that place lies no plenty,
Then come osculation me sweetness and twenty;
Youth's a stuff volition not endure. (II.iii.47-52)

He implies that dearest is only a fleeting thing, because what the hereafter holds is uncertain, and that if one wants a take a chance at dear, it is best to seize information technology while nevertheless immature, considering youth does non last forever. The implication, of course, is that one time youth has vanished, as his has, that the chances of finding love are slim.
This idea of time marching inexorably on is 1 that weaves its way throughout Twelfth Nighttime. Olivia, while talking to Viola, says that "the clock upbraids [her] with the waste of time" (Three.i.130); one of the officers who arrests Antonio exclaims, "the time goes by, abroad!" (Iii.iv.364); Orsino asks Viola (as Cesario), "what wilt thou exist/When time hath sow'd a grizzle on thy example?" (V.i.164-5); and Feste, having gotten back at Malvolio, says, "And thus the whirligig of fourth dimension brings in his revenges" (V.i.376-7). There is a preoccupation with time, and time floating by. For Feste in particular, there is an awareness of the movement of time; equally per Bush'southward argument that a Fool is always himself, Feste is fixed in one identify. His duty is to others, not to himself, so he is unable to grow or change like anybody else. Instead, he must detect those effectually him flowing fluidly on in their lives, equally he grows older but remains firmly stock-still in his unchanging position equally Fool. He is static, unlike the rest of Illyria, and as such will always be alone. Even his terminal song, which he sings while solus on stage, emphasises the loneliness of his life:

But when I came to man's manor,
With hey ho, the wind and the rain,
'Gainst knaves and thieves men close their gate,
For the rain it raineth every twenty-four hour period.

But when I came, alas, to wive,
With hey ho, the wind and the rain,
Past swaggering could I never thrive,
For the pelting it raineth every twenty-four hours. (Five.i.393-400)

Knave once was synonymous with clown; in a sense, Feste implies that he has been shut out of the club of Orsino and Olivia, and also, he has been shut out of the realm of women, at least in the romantic sense. He lives his life lonely, hovering betwixt primary and retainer, celibacy and marriage. Greif points out that the repeated lines emphasise that

the reality of wind and rain wins out, the monotony of everyday. The passing of time is painful [for everyone, merely particularly for Feste, as he does not travel through it as others do], may even seem unendurable, merely at that place is nothing for it but resignation, the wise credence of the Fool. (72)

The Fool may exist trapped in a lonely existence, but Feste is wise enough to bow his caput and endure information technology, for there is no employ in struggling against what he cannot change.
A Fool is a curious character, and it would have been easy for Shakespeare to cast Feste in the role of the traditional fool, of the i-dimensional sort that speaks riddles, holds a sceptre, wears a jester cap, and falls into the vulgar to achieve laughs from his audience. The fact that he did non suggests that he was trying to produce a graphic symbol that reflected multiple aspects of humanity. People go to the theatre to see characters that they tin recognise in their friends, their neighbours, or their family, and the sadness and melancholy that bleed through Feste's jests give him a realness that is hard to deny. He knows a great deal and is wise in the ways of the world; despite his loneliness, Feste is still able to produce a smile for his mistress, and nosotros expect that of him. After all, "we accept searched for our answers in the play's mirror; and the image cast back has been that of a wryly smile, somewhat weary jester, one of life's privileged spies into the mystery of things" (Greif 61).

Works Cited

Evans, G. Blakemore, ed. The Riverside Shakespeare. 2nd ed.

Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1997.

Works Referenced

Draper, J.Due west. "Et in Illyria Feste." Shakespeare Association

Bulletin 17 (January 1942): 25-32.

Greif, Karen. "Review: A Star is Born: Feste on the Modern

Stage." Shakespeare Quarterly 39 (Spring 1988): 61-78.

Levin, Richard A. Love and Society in Shakespearean Comedy.

Newark: U of Delaware P; London: Associated U P, 1985.

Salingar, L.G. "The Design of Twelfth Night." Shakespeare

Quarterly 9 (Leap 1958): 117-139.

Willeford, William. The Fool and his Scepter: A Written report in Clowns

and Jesters and Their  Audition. Northwestern U P, 1969.

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