Title
The foretitle, Twelfth Night is believed to be an afterthought. While Shakespeare was writing the play, he may have intended the title as simply What You Will, but before it was performed John Marston premièred a play also titled What You Will. The title Twelfth Night, or What You Will prepares the audience for its jovial feel of festivities consisting of drink, dance, and giving in to general self-indulgence.
Read more about this topic: Twelfth Night
Famous quotes containing the word title:
“Greatness is a light-hearted title for theatrical entertainments. Or a definition endowed on men too long dead to know that it’s been awarded.”
—Arthur Ross. Leslie (Tony Curtis)
“It is impossible to strive for the heroic life. The title of hero is bestowed by the survivors upon the fallen, who themselves know nothing of heroism.”
—Johan Huizinga (1872–1945)
“Et in Arcadia ego.
[I too am in Arcadia.]”
—Anonymous, Anonymous.
Tomb inscription, appearing in classical paintings by Guercino and Poussin, among others. The words probably mean that even the most ideal earthly lives are mortal. Arcadia, a mountainous region in the central Peloponnese, Greece, was the rustic abode of Pan, depicted in literature and art as a land of innocence and ease, and was the title of Sir Philip Sidney’s pastoral romance (1590)