Twelfth Night
Act III, Scene 1
Olivia’s garden.
- Enter Viola, and Clown with a tabor.
Viola
1 - 2- ’Save thee, friend, and thy music! Dost thou live by thy
- tabor?
Feste
3- No, sir, I live by the church.
Viola
4- Art thou a churchman?
Feste
5 - 6- No such matter, sir. I do live by the church; for I do live
- at my house, and my house doth stand by the church.
Viola
7 - 9- So thou mayst say the king lies by a beggar, if a beggar
- dwells near him; or the church stands by thy tabor, if thy
- tabor stand by the church.
Feste
10 - 12- You have said, sir. To see this age! A sentence is but a
- chev’ril glove to a good wit. How quickly the wrong side may
- be turn’d outward!
Viola
13 - 14- Nay, that’s certain. They that dally nicely with words may
- quickly make them wanton.
Feste
15- I would therefore my sister had had no name, sir.
Viola
16- Why, man?
Feste
17 - 19- Why, sir, her name’s a word, and to dally with that word
- might make my sister wanton. But indeed, words are very
- rascals since bonds disgrac’d them.
Viola
20- Thy reason, man?
Feste
21 - 22- Troth, sir, I can yield you none without words, and words
- are grown so false, I am loath to prove reason with them.
Viola
23- I warrant thou art a merry fellow, and car’st for nothing.
Feste
24 - 26- Not so, sir, I do care for something; but in my conscience,
- sir, I do not care for you. If that be to care for nothing,
- sir, I would it would make you invisible.
Viola
27- Art not thou the Lady Olivia’s fool?
Feste
28 - 32- No, indeed, sir, the Lady Olivia has no folly. She will keep
- no fool, sir, till she be married, and fools are as like
- husbands as pilchers are to herrings, the husband’s the
- bigger. I am indeed not her fool, but her corrupter of
- words.
Viola
33- I saw thee late at the Count Orsino’s.
Feste
34 - 37- Foolery, sir, does walk about the orb like the sun, it
- shines every where. I would be sorry, sir, but the fool
- should be as oft with your master as with my mistress. I
- think I saw your wisdom there.
Viola
38 - 39- Nay, and thou pass upon me, I’ll no more with thee. Hold,
- there’s expenses for thee.
Feste
40- Now Jove, in his next commodity of hair, send thee a beard!
Viola
41 - 43- By my troth, I’ll tell thee, I am almost sick for one—
- Aside.
- though I would not have it grow on my chin. Is thy lady
- within?
Feste
44- Would not a pair of these have bred, sir?
Viola
45- Yes, being kept together, and put to use.
Feste
46 - 47- I would play Lord Pandarus of Phrygia, sir, to bring a
- Cressida to this Troilus.
Viola
48- I understand you, sir. ’Tis well begg’d.
Feste
49 - 53- The matter, I hope, is not great, sir—begging but a beggar:
- Cressida was a beggar. My lady is within, sir. I will
- conster to them whence you come; who you are, and what you
- would, are out of my welkin—I might say “element,” but the
- word is overworn.
- Exit.
Viola
54 - 62- This fellow is wise enough to play the fool,
- And to do that well craves a kind of wit.
- He must observe their mood on whom he jests,
- The quality of persons, and the time;
- And like the haggard, check at every feather
- That comes before his eye. This is a practice
- As full of labor as a wise man’s art;
- For folly that he wisely shows is fit,
- But wise men, folly-fall’n, quite taint their wit.
- Enter Sir Toby and Andrew.
From: The Flowers of Shakspeare
Viola, 1883
Sir Toby
63- ’Save you, gentleman.
Viola
64- And you, sir.
Sir Andrew
65- Dieu vous garde, monsieur.
Viola
66- Et vous aussi; votre serviteur.
Sir Andrew
67- I hope, sir, you are, and I am yours.
Sir Toby
68 - 69- Will you encounter the house? My niece is desirous you
- should enter, if your trade be to her.
Viola
70 - 71- I am bound to your niece, sir; I mean she is the list of my
- voyage.
Sir Toby
72- Taste your legs, sir, put them to motion.
Viola
73 - 74- My legs do better understand me, sir, than I understand what
- you mean by bidding me taste my legs.
Sir Toby
75- I mean, to go, sir, to enter.
Viola
76 - 79- I will answer you with gait and entrance—but we are
- prevented.
- Enter Olivia and Gentlewoman.
- Most excellent accomplish’d lady, the heavens rain odors on
- you!
Sir Andrew
80- That youth’s a rare courtier—“rain odors,” well.
Viola
81 - 82- My matter hath no voice, lady, but to your own most pregnant
- and vouchsafed ear.
Sir Andrew
83 - 84- “Odors,” “pregnant,” and “vouchsafed”; I’ll get ’em all
- three all ready.
Olivia
85 - 86- Let the garden door be shut, and leave me to my hearing.
- Exeunt all but Olivia and Viola.
- Give me your hand, sir.
Viola
87- My duty, madam, and most humble service.
Olivia
88- What is your name?
Viola
89- Cesario is your servant’s name, fair princess.
Olivia
90 - 92- My servant, sir? ’Twas never merry world
- Since lowly feigning was call’d compliment.
- Y’ are servant to the Count Orsino, youth.
Viola
93 - 94- And he is yours, and his must needs be yours:
- Your servant’s servant is your servant, madam.
Olivia
95 - 96- For him, I think not on him. For his thoughts,
- Would they were blanks, rather than fill’d with me.
Viola
97 - 98- Madam, I come to whet your gentle thoughts
- On his behalf.
Olivia
99 - 103- O, by your leave, I pray you:
- I bade you never speak again of him;
- But would you undertake another suit,
- I had rather hear you to solicit that
- Than music from the spheres.
Viola
104- Dear lady—
Olivia
105 - 116- Give me leave, beseech you. I did send,
- After the last enchantment you did here,
- A ring in chase of you; so did I abuse
- Myself, my servant, and I fear me you.
- Under your hard construction must I sit,
- To force that on you in a shameful cunning
- Which you knew none of yours. What might you think?
- Have you not set mine honor at the stake,
- And baited it with all th’ unmuzzled thoughts
- That tyrannous heart can think? To one of your receiving
- Enough is shown; a cypress, not a bosom,
- Hides my heart. So let me hear you speak.
Byam Shaw, 1901
Viola
117- I pity you.
Olivia
118- That’s a degree to love.
Viola
119 - 120- No, not a grize; for ’tis a vulgar proof
- That very oft we pity enemies.
Olivia
121 - 129- Why then methinks ’tis time to smile again.
- O world, how apt the poor are to be proud!
- If one should be a prey, how much the better
- To fall before the lion than the wolf!
- Clock strikes.
- The clock upbraids me with the waste of time.
- Be not afraid, good youth, I will not have you,
- And yet when wit and youth is come to harvest,
- Your wife is like to reap a proper man.
- There lies your way, due west.
Viola
130 - 132- Then westward-ho!
- Grace and good disposition attend your ladyship!
- You’ll nothing, madam, to my lord by me?
Olivia
133 - 134- Stay!
- I prithee tell me what thou think’st of me.
Viola
135- That you do think you are not what you are.
Olivia
136- If I think so, I think the same of you.
Viola
137- Then think you right: I am not what I am.
Olivia
138- I would you were as I would have you be.
Viola
139 - 140- Would it be better, madam, than I am?
- I wish it might, for now I am your fool.
Olivia
141 - 152- Aside.
- O, what a deal of scorn looks beautiful
- In the contempt and anger of his lip!
- A murd’rous guilt shows not itself more soon
- Than love that would seem hid: love’s night is noon.—
- Cesario, by the roses of the spring,
- By maidhood, honor, truth, and every thing,
- I love thee so, that maugre all thy pride,
- Nor wit nor reason can my passion hide.
- Do not extort thy reasons from this clause,
- For that I woo, thou therefore hast no cause;
- But rather reason thus with reason fetter:
- Love sought is good, but given unsought is better.
Viola
153 - 158- By innocence I swear, and by my youth,
- I have one heart, one bosom, and one truth,
- And that no woman has, nor never none
- Shall mistress be of it, save I alone.
- And so adieu, good madam, never more
- Will I my master’s tears to you deplore.
Olivia
159 - 160- Yet come again; for thou perhaps mayst move
- That heart which now abhors, to like his love.
- Exeunt.
C. Kovalenskaya as Olivia
New York Times, circa 1916