Shakspere's Twelfth Night
Or What You Will (Classic Reprint)

Excerpt from Shakspere's Twelfth Night: Or What You Will

"Twelfth Night" did not appear in print during the lifetime of its author. It was first printed in the folio of 1623, as evidenced by the entry of November 8 in the Stationers' Register in that year. The absence of a quarto edition is little to be regretted, however, as the text of the play thus produced is exceptionally free from corruptions, its few errors being merely typographical. The best evidence of the date of composition of "Twelfth Night" is afforded by the Diary of one John Manningham, at that time a student in the Middle Temple. In this there is found an entry under date of February 2, 1601, as follows: "At our feast we had a play called 'Twelue Night, or What You Will,' much like The Commedy of Errores, or Menechmi in Plautus, but most like and neere to that in Italian called Inganni. A good practise in it to make the Steward beleeve his Lady widowe was in love with him, by counterfeyting a letter as from his lady in generall termes, telling him what shee liked best in him, and prescribing his gesture in smiling, his apparaile, etc., and then when he came to practise making him beleeue they took him to be mad." How much earlier than this date it was written and produced can only be conjectured, but it can scarcely be believed that the Benchers would have selected for their Candlemas festivity a wholly untried play. It is probable that it was originally performed by the Lord Chamberlain's Company, and that Shakespeare, at that time a member of this body, played a part in it; but of this there is no evidence. That the play had an established value from some cause or other is amply shown by the circumstance that the lawyers paid for the production given before them the then liberal sum of ten pounds. On the authority of Ilalliwell, "Twelfth Night''was performed before James I. on Easter Monday, 1618, and again at Candlemas, 1623, by the King's Servants, under the title of "Malvolio." It was certainly also acted occasionally after the Restoration of Charles I. In the preface of a comedy entitled "Love Betray'd, or The Agreeable Disappointment," by Charles Burnaby, it abundantly appears that this piece was merely an adaptation of "Twelfth Night," following the license accorded by custom in those times to dramatists in dealing with Shakespeare.

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