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Shakespeare on Stage
American Shakespeare Center, The Duchess of Malfi. To Jun. 15, 2013.
American Shakespeare Center, Twelfth Night. To Jun. 16, 2013.
Folger Shakespeare Library, Twelfth Night. To Jun. 9, 2013.
American Shakespeare Center, Love's Labour's Lost. To Jun. 15, 2013.
American Shakespeare Center, Return to the Forbidden Planet. To Dec. 1, 2013.
More Performances…
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Twelfth Night (Modern)

Author: William Shakespeare
Editors: David Carnegie, Mark Houlahan
Not Peer Reviewed
655

2.2

Enter Viola [as Cesario] and Malvolio [with the ring], at several doors.
Malvolio Were not you even now with the Countess Olivia?
Viola Even now, sir; on a moderate pace, I have since 660arrived but hither.
Malvolio She returns this ring to you, sir. You might have saved me my pains to have taken it away yourself. She adds, moreover, that you should put your lord into a desperate assurance she will none of him. And one 665thing more: that you be never so hardy to come again in his affairs, unless it be to report your lord's taking of this. [Offering the ring] Receive it so.
Viola She took the ring of me; I'll none of it.
Malvolio Come, sir, you peevishly threw it to her; and 670her will is, it should be so returned. [Throwing the ring down] If it be worth stooping for, there it lies, in your eye; if not, be it his that finds it.
Exit.
Viola [To the audience] [Picking up the ring] I left no ring with her. What means this lady?
Fortune forbid my outside have not charmed her!
675She made good view of me; indeed so much
That methought her eyes had lost her tongue,
For she did speak in starts distractedly.
She loves me, sure; the cunning of her passion
Invites me in this churlish messenger.
680None of my lord's ring? Why, he sent her none;
I am the man! If it be so, as 'tis,
Poor lady, she were better love a dream.
Disguise, I see thou art a wickedness,
Wherein the pregnant enemy does much.
685How easy is it for the proper false
In women's waxen hearts to set their forms.
Alas, our frailty is the cause, not we,
For such as we are made of, such we be.
How will this fadge? My master loves her dearly,
690And I, poor monster, fond as much on him,
And she, mistaken, seems to dote on me.
What will become of this? As I am man,
My state is desperate for my master's love;
As I am woman--now alas the day--
695What thriftless sighs shall poor Olivia breathe?
O time, thou must untangle this, not I,
It is too hard a knot for me t'untie.
[Exit.]