Joie Jernigan
02/13/13
PAP English II
Feste or The Fool
Feste or as he is labbled in the character the Fool is anything but. He is very witty and smart man as were most “Fools” from this time period. Fools from this time period were generally the smarter people. The reason they were called fools is because they generally made fools of them selves even, they were also the smarter people because they knew how to make jokes but also to just be there for a serious entertainment. The fool tried to do this for Olivia in Act 1 Scene 5. “Two faults, madonna, that drink and good counsel will amend. For give the fry fool drink, then the fool is not dry. Bid the dishonest men mend himself. If he cannot, let the botcher mend him. Anything that is mended is but patched. Virtue that transgresses is but patched with sin, and sin amends is but patched with virtue”(Shakespeare 34). Feste is a minor character but can has so many different roles as he is to cheer up Orsino that he cannot have Olivia and to cheer up Olivia when she cannot have ‘Cesario’. “Come away, come away, death, And in sad cypress let me be laid. Fly away, fly away, breath; I am slain by a fair cruel maid. My shroud of white, stuck all with yew, O, prepare it! My part of death, no one so true did share it. Not a flower, not a flower sweet, On my black coffin let there be strown. Not a friend, not a friend greet My poor corpse, where my bones shall be thrown. A thousand thousand sighs to save, Lay me, O, where Sad true lover never find my grave, To weep there!” (Shakerspear 90). In this song Feste is singing about love and not being able to be loved back and ‘dying’ of heartache. He also enjoys his job. “No pains, sir. I take pleasure in singing, sir”(Shakespeare 92).
