In Twelfth Night Shakespeare constantly has his characters lie and deceive each other in order to get what they want or to hide who they really are.Shakespeare employs trickery in his play in order to reveal the true nature of the characters. Both the people who are being tricked and doing the tricking are being deceived. Viola shows multiple acts of deception in Shakespeare 's play Twelfth Night. Viola decides that she wants to disguise herself as a boy as she talks to the captain of her ship.“There is a fair behavior in thee, captain;/And though that nature with a beauteous wall/Doth oft close in pollution, yet of thee/I will believe thou hast a mind that suits With this …show more content…
Maira who is a very clever serving-woman for Olivia, decides along with Sir Toby that they want to play a trick on Malvolio who is Olivia 's head servant. The trick was to write a letter to malvolio saying that it was from Olivia to make him believe that she loved him. “Get you all three into the boxtree. Malvolio’s coming down this walk. He has been yonder i’ the sun practising behavior to his own shadow this half hour. Observe him, for the love of mockery, for I know this letter will make a contemplative idiot of him. Close, in the name of jesting!”(2.5.14-19) Here Maria is being extremely enthusiastic about writing the letter to trick Malvolio. She is ready to watch Malvolio make a complete imbecile of himself in order to impress Olivia. Maria also makes a reference to Malvolio personality by saying “He has been yonder i’the sun practising behavior to his own shadow this half hour.” This part of the passage suggests that Malvolio is very egotistical character, which is one of the reasons why Maria had intentions to trick him. Shakespeare shows that Maria’s trickery and lies starts to reveal who Malvolio is. Along with Malvolio falling for Maria and Sir Toby’s trick, you start to see how Malvolio deceives himself. Malvolio is already seen as a cocky Character but after he gets to letter he is convinced that Olivia is madly in love with …show more content…
He does this by making almost all the characters lie and deceive each other in order to get what they want. This is seen with Viola, Orsino, Sir Toby, Olivia, Malvolio and Maria. They each have very different personalities that relate to real people, making it clear that Shakespeare wanted to show how people were in his time. Showing that not only can you deceive others you can also deceive yourself, which is common among most of the main