Twelfth Night III.i.1-50 (Sarah Rusher)
Act III of Twelfth Night opens up with a bit of verbal sparring between Viola—dressed as Cesario—and a clown, probably Feste. The whole of their exchange is hilariously metadiscursive at moments, with the clown, almost paradoxically, stating some startling truths about language, marriage, all while getting in some slight jabs at Viola/Cesario’s questionable gender identity.
After a few puns and the aforementioned metadiscursive asides about double-entendre and the limitations of language, the conversation devolves a bit.Cesario reminds Feste that he is Olivia’s fool. Feste, however, remarks that Olivia will not truly have no fool “till she be married” seeing as “fools are as like husbands as pilchards are to herrings; the husband’s the bigger” and that he is no fool—he is simply Olivia’s “corrupter of words” (III.i.32, 33-5, 36).
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