Lying for Truth’s Sake;
Examining the Disguises and Deceit of Feste, the Clown, in “Twelfth Night”
By Molly Miller
“For since the little wit that fools have was silenced, the little foolery that wise men have makes a great show.”
Shakespeare is well known for his great characters. Everyone knows the tragic lovers Romeo and Juliet, the noble and just prince Hamlet, the spunky and mischievous fairy Puck, and his other great characters. All of these characters are well known and well loved so much that they are even used by modern authors as a basis for characters, plots, and dialogue. Out of all of his great characters, however, none are quite as memorable as Shakespeare’s Fools.
Shakespeare’s Fools are highly beloved by audiences worldwide because they are filled with wit and humor. No character has as much to say in as little time as the Fools of Shakespeare’s plays. They are also, as portrayed by Feste the Clown in Twelfth Night, filled with disguise and deceit that audiences feed upon and enjoy.
The disguise that Feste, the clown, wears is cleverly put on and consists of three articles: ignorance to disguise his knowledge, entertainment to disguise his messages, and innocence to disguise his cleverness.
The ignorance Feste feigns is needed to disguise his knowledge. Knowledge such as Feste possesses could get any common person into trouble with the nobility. The knowledge he has is the knowledge of truth. The nobility were not truthful people. Instead, they often covered up the truth for their own, personal gain. Because the nobility frowned upon truth, Feste hid his knowledge of the truth in order to stay in favor with them. That was how he survived at the house of nobility.
He did not take this aspect of his disguise off willingly. It was too risky to do so. However, in certain cases the disguise cannot stand up to the scrutiny of prying eyes. Such an example happens in Act 3 scene 1, when Feste talks with Viola. He does not say very much but Viola, being used to disguises herself, sees through the clown’s disguise and says “This fellow is wise enough to play the fool,
And to do that well craves a kind of wit…
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.”
Another part of his disguise focuses on entertainment to conceal the messages of his tongue. Feste needed an excuse to remain in the home of noblemen and what better way than to amuse and entertain his host? Feste did many things to amuse; he told jokes, sang, etc… and so gained the affection of many of the household.
However, little did they know that Feste was not just joking or being foolish. The clown also put serious messages into his entertainment. These messages were so subtle that the noblemen often did not notice they were there. As long as the messages were subliminal, they were taken in through laughs and could start a spark of an idea of truth into the household’s noble, yet oblivious, heads.
In one such instance, in scene 5 of act 1, Feste talked with Olivia. Olivia did not much care for Feste, but he convinced her to listen to what he had to say by playing a silly game with her. In that game, he tried to prove Olivia the fool (which is impossible; no one can prove to a woman that she is a greater fool than he!) and, in doing so, slipped in a few messages trying to convince her not to mourn the death of her brother anymore. This was a serious message and would not have been accepted without Feste’s clever game.
The final aspect of Feste’s disguise is the innocence that he used to make his cleverness invisible. Many times Feste pretends to be oblivious of the true meaning behind words. This way people would think him simple or stupid and would be less careful about the things they told him, thinking he would not understand them anyway.
In Act 4 scene 5 of Twelfth Night, Feste not only learns Malvolio’s plans, but convinces him to do what Feste wants as well. The clown’s disguise serves as just what he needs to manipulate people for their own good.
Why would he do so? What purpose has Feste to disguise himself as a fool? Because he believes in truth and the only way to get the truth out- veiled as it might be- is to play the part of the fool and deceive the royalty. If he were to go up to the royalty, without his disguise, and tell them all he knew, he would face a very sever punishment if not death. So, to remain alive and able to speak out the truth, Feste must twist the truth of who he is in the eyes of those who hate truth.
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