Key Quotations

Act 1

"If music be the food of love, play on."

• Orsino expresses his unrequited love for Olivia by comparing his longing to an insatiable appetite for music.
• This quote uses the metaphor to illustrate Orsino's infatuation, portraying his love as both nurturing and overwhelming. It establishes the theme of love as both nourishing and consuming, reflecting Orsino's romantic nature.
• Key themes: Love, desire, excess

"O spirit of love, how quick and fresh art thou!"

• Orsino marvels at the ever-changing nature of love.
• This quote uses personification, depicting love as a dynamic and living entity. It highlights the unpredictable and vibrant essence of love.
• Key themes**:** Love, change, vitality

"I am sure care's an enemy to life."

• Sir Toby dismisses the notion of worrying about life's troubles.
• This quote employs personification by giving care an adversarial role in life. It underscores a hedonistic attitude towards life, advocating for joy and merriment over worry.
• Key themes**:** Hedonism, carefreeness, conflict

"Better a witty fool than a foolish wit."

• Feste, the fool, argues that being clever and playful is better than being foolishly intelligent.
• This quote uses antithesis to contrast wit and foolishness. It emphasizes the value of wit and the importance of being able to entertain and enlighten others.
• Key themes: Wit, intelligence, folly

"I wear not motley in my brain."

• Feste asserts that, although he dresses as a fool, he is wise in mind.
• This quote uses the metaphor to differentiate between appearance and intellect, highlighting the theme of true wisdom versus superficiality.
• Key themes: Appearance vs. reality, wisdom, superficiality

Act 2

"My master loves her dearly; And I, poor monster, fond as much on him."

• Viola laments her situation where she loves Orsino, who loves Olivia.
• This quote uses dramatic irony since Viola is disguised as Cesario, complicating the love triangle. It also employs metaphor, calling herself a "monster" to express her feelings of internal conflict and abnormality.
• Key themes: Love, identity, disguise

"O time, thou must untangle this, not I; / It is too hard a knot for me to untie!"

• Viola resigns her fate to time, unable to solve her complicated situation.
• This quote uses the metaphor to describe the complexity of her predicament as a knot, reflecting themes of fate and destiny.
• Key themes: Fate, complexity, resignation

"I am all the daughters of my father's house, / And all the brothers too."

• Viola cryptically reveals her true identity to Orsino.
• This quote uses ambiguity and duality to reflect Viola's complex identity as both herself and Cesario. It highlights themes of gender and disguise.
• Key themes: Identity, gender, disguise

"Journeys end in lovers meeting."

• Feste sings about the joy of lovers finally being together.
• This quote uses the metaphor to equate life's journey with the culmination of finding love. It conveys a sense of destiny and fulfilment.
• Key themes: Love, destiny, fulfilment

"She sat like Patience on a monument, / Smiling at grief."

• Viola describes her own patience and hidden suffering.
• This quote uses simile to compare Viola's patience to a statue, emphasizing her silent endurance and stoicism in the face of unrequited love.
• Key themes: Patience, suffering, love

"Dost thou think, because thou art virtuous, there shall be no more cakes and ale?"

• Sir Toby criticizes Malvolio's puritanical attitude.
• This quote uses rhetorical questioning and juxtaposition of virtue with enjoyment of life's pleasures. It challenges the moral rigidity and promotes a more balanced approach to life.
• Key themes: Pleasure, morality, hypocrisy

Act 3

"Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon 'em."

• Malvolio reads a letter that he believes is from Olivia, encouraging him to embrace his supposed greatness.
• This quote uses parallelism and anaphora to emphasize the different paths to greatness. It reflects themes of ambition and destiny.
• Key themes: Ambition, destiny, deception

"Foolery, sir, does walk about the orb like the sun; it shines everywhere."

• Feste comments on the pervasive nature of foolishness.
• This quote uses simile to compare foolery to the sun, suggesting that it is a universal and inescapable aspect of human nature.
• Key themes: Foolishness, universality, human nature

"Love sought is good, but given unsought is better."

• Olivia expresses her preference for genuine, unsolicited love.
• This quote uses antithesis to contrast sought love with spontaneous love, highlighting the value of genuine affection.
• Key themes: Love, sincerity, desire

"This fellow is wise enough to play the fool."

• Viola recognizes Feste's cleverness beneath his foolish exterior.
• This quote uses paradox to highlight Feste's intelligence and the theme of appearance versus reality.
• Key themes: Wisdom, appearance vs. reality, intelligence

Act 4

"I am as mad as he, / If sad and merry madness equal be."

• Olivia declares her emotional turmoil, equating her feelings with madness.
• This quote uses paradox and juxtaposition to highlight the conflicting emotions she experiences, reflecting the play's theme of madness.
• Key themes: Madness, emotion, conflict

"This is the air, that is the glorious sun; / This pearl she gave me, I do feel't and see't."

• Sebastian questions the reality of his experiences with Olivia.
• This quote uses sensory imagery and repetition to express Sebastian's amazement and disbelief at his good fortune, emphasizing the theme of reality versus illusion.
• Key themes: Reality vs. illusion, fortune, amazement

Act 5

"For the rain it raineth every day."

• Feste sings about the inevitability of life's challenges.
• This quote uses repetition and metaphor to convey the persistent nature of difficulties, reflecting a philosophical acceptance of life's hardships.
• Key themes: Life, inevitability, acceptance

"And thus the whirligig of time brings in his revenges."

• Feste comments on the cyclical nature of time and karma.
• This quote uses the metaphor to describe time as a whirligig, emphasizing the idea that actions have consequences.
• Key themes: Time, karma, consequences

"I'll be revenged on the whole pack of you!"

• Malvolio vows revenge on those who have tricked him.
• This quote uses hyperbole and foreshadowing, highlighting Malvolio's anger and the darker elements of the play's comedy.
• Key themes: Revenge, anger, deception