Poetry for the Inner Ear

“There are only three industries in this Shakespeare’s comedy: making love, making songs and making feasts and they make them all to perfection” (Thorndike). Twelfth Night is the happiest comedy of Shakespeare. This highest achievement of the Bard of Avon has always been admired by both critics and audiences. The fact is that Twelfth Night or Epiphany is a festival of mirth and joy celebrated after twelve days of Christmas. The alternative title of the play “What You Will”. The play is the most delightful comedy of Shakespeare. Hazlitt aptly remarks about Twelfth Niight: "It is perhaps too good-natured for comedy. It has little satire and no spleen. It aims at the ludicrous rather than the ridiculous. It makes us laugh at the follies of mankind not despise them and still less bear any ill will towards them." The love of Viola is the sweetest and purest kind of love as seen in her following lines spoken to Duke Orsino. Duke. And what ’s her history? Vio. A blank, my...