ENG 3U1
Twelfth Night
Your task is to write a formal 800 – 1,000 word persuasive essay on
Shakespeare’s play Twelfth Night: Or What You Will. You will select one of the topics below which analyzes
the play from a specific literary perspective. You will also read selected essays on the play and integrate this
research in your own analysis of the topic. (Note: This is not a 5 paragraph essay – it may be more)
Period 2
1. Analyze how Maria or Viola breaks free of society’s stereotypical females in Elizabethan
Times. (Feminist)
2. Viola comments that Feste “is wise enough to play the fool,/ And to do that well craves a
kind of wit; / He must observe their mood on whom he jests. . . / This is a practice/ As full of
labour as a wise man’s art.” (3.1.50 – 53; 55-56).
Analyze how Feste’s role of the “allowed fool” enables him to practice this “wise man’s art”
and psychoanalyze other characters whom he observes. (Psychoanalysis)
3. In the play “nothing that / is so is so” (4.1.6-7) according to Feste. Analyze how Feste’s words
could be the motto of the play as false appearances deceive all characters.
4. Analyze Malvolio’s character as a representation of the super ego in a society that seems to
be driven by its id. (Psychoanalysis)
5. Analyze whether or not it is possible for Malvolio to “achieve greatness” despite the fact that
he is a servant? (Marxist)
6. The subheading of the play is “or what you will”. Analyze how this is a representation of the
Illyrian society’s attitude and their unwillingness to accept responsibility for their actions.
(Marxist / Psychoanalysis)
7. Analyze Ilyria as Shakespeare’s Western version of a fantasyland where the motto is “or what
you will”. (Post colonial)
Due Dates: 1. Brainstorm / Secondary Source (article) Tues. Dec. 2nd,2014
2. Thesis: Tuesday, December 2nd, 2014
3. Outline (with secondary source): Fri. Dec. 5th, 2014
4. Final: Wed., Dec. 10th, 2014 (turnitin.com)
Closing date: Friday, Dec. 12th, 2014 (-10% no essays will be accepted after this date)
NOTE: Once the process has begun you will receive Life of Pi (as well as reading your
culminating) so please adhere to due dates!
ENG 3U1
Twelfth Night
Your task is to write a formal 800 – 1,000 word persuasive essay on
Shakespeare’s play Twelfth Night: Or What You Will. You will select one of the topics below which
analyzes the play from a specific literary perspective. You will also read selected essays on the play
and integrate this research in your own analysis of the topic. (Note: This is not a 5 paragraph essay –
it may be more).
Period 3
1. Analyze whether or not Twelfth Night is an anti-feminist play through the character of Viola
or Olivia. (Feminist)
2. Choose one of the characters from Twelfth Night and analyze how their speech (ie. their use
of words) is a representation of their personality. Analyze the importance of words to
character. (Psychoanalysis)
3. Sebastian comments “Are all the people mad?” (4.1.23). Choose one character and how they
illustrate the “madness” in the play. (Psychoanalysis)
4. At the beginning of the play Viola says “What else may hap, to time I will commit” (1.3.60).
At the end of the play Feste taunts Malvolio by saying “And thus the whirligig of time brings
in his revenges. Analyze how one of the characters decision to leave things to time has
brought “revenges” on themselves or others.
5. Analyze how Sir Toby or Sir Andrew illustrate the frivolity of the rich or upper class in the
Elizabethan Era. (Marxist)
6. Analyze Viola and/or Sebastian as foreigners in a new land who are forced to adapt in the
strange new land of Illyria. (Post Colonial)
7. In the play “nothing that / is so is so” (4.1.6-7) according to Feste. Analyze how Feste’s words
could be the motto of the play as false appearances deceive all characters.
Due Dates: 1. Brainstorm / Secondary Source (article) Tues. Dec. 2nd,2014
2. Thesis: Tuesday, December 2nd, 2014
3. Outline (with secondary source): Fri. Dec. 5th, 2014
4. Final: Wed., Dec. 10th, 2014 (turnitin.com)
Closing date: Friday, Dec. 12th, 2014 (-10% no essays will be accepted after this date)
ENG 3U1
Twelfth Night
NOTE: Once the process has begun you will receive Life of Pi (as well as reading your culminating) so
please adhere to due dates!