Digital Assignment: Mining Twelfth Night for Wit or Will
Read through the definitions from the Oxford English Dictionary that appear below.
Definitions (Oxford English Dictionary)
Will (noun)
1 I. 1. a. Desire, wish, longing; liking, inclination, disposition (to do something).
2. spec. Carnal desire or appetite: = DESIRE n. 2.
3b. A desire or wish as expressed in a request; hence (contextually) the expression of a wish, a request, petition What's your will? (now arch. or dial., esp. Sc.): What do you want? What do you wish me to do?
4. a. Pleasure, delight, joy.
II. 5. a. The action of willing or choosing to do something; the movement or attitude of the mind which is directed with conscious intention to (and, normally, issues immediately in) some action, physical or mental; volition.
9. a. Undue assertion of one's own will; wilfulness, self-will.
18. a. of (one's) will. Of one's own accord, spontaneously, voluntarily. Now only with poss. and own, e.g. ‘He did it of his own (free) will’.
Will (verb)
1. trans. with simple obj.: Desire, wish for, have a mind to, ‘want’ (something); sometimes implying also ‘intend, purpose’. Obs.
3. Denoting expression (usually authoritative) of a wish or intention: Determine, decree, ordain, enjoin, give order (that something be done). Obs.
a1325 MS. Rawl. B. 520 lf. 32b, Ant te King wole {th}at
1. trans. To wish, desire; sometimes with implication of intention: = WILL v.1 1, 2, 5. Obs. or rare arch.
1b. To assert, affirm
3. To determine by the will; to attempt to cause, aim at effecting by exercise of will; to set the mind with conscious intention to the performance or occurrence of something; to choose or decide to do something, or that something shall be done or happen.
d. To control (another person), or induce (another) to do something, by the mere exercise of one's will,
4. To express or communicate one's will or wish with regard to something: with various shades of meaning.
4.a. To enjoin, order; to decree, ordain.
Wit (noun)I. Denoting a faculty (or the person possessing it).
2. a. The faculty of thinking and reasoning in general; mental capacity, understanding, intellect, reason. arch. (now esp. in phr. the wit of man = human understanding).
c. pl. Mental faculties, intellectual powers (of a single person or a number of persons: cf. 2b); often practically equivalent to the sing. in sense 2.
4. The understanding or mental faculties in respect of their condition; chiefly = ‘right mind’, ‘reason’, ‘senses’, sanity. esp. in phrases in (one's right) wit, sane, of sound mind; chiefly out of (by, from, of) wit or one's wit, insane, mad, out of one's mind; also out of wit, madly, furiously.
5. a. Good or great mental capacity; intellectual ability; genius, talent, cleverness; mental quickness or sharpness, acumen.
5.b. Practical talent or cleverness; constructive or mechanical ability; ingenuity, skill. Obs. as a specific sense.
6. a. Wisdom, good judgment, discretion, prudence: = SENSE n. 11. phr. like to have the wit to, which combines the notions of intelligence and good sense.
6. c. A prudent measure or proceeding; an ingenious plan or device.
7. Quickness of intellect or liveliness of fancy, with capacity of apt expression; talent for saying brilliant or sparkling things, esp. in an amusing way. arch.
9. A person of great mental ability; a learned, clever, or intellectual person; a man of talent or intellect; a genius.
11. a. Knowledge; learning; pl. departments of knowledge, sciences.
11. b. The fact of knowing, knowledge, awareness.
Questions
1. Consider characters in the play’s Dramatis Personae in relation to the definitions. Given the plot of Twelfth Night, which characters does the play associate with wit? Which ones are more associated with will?
2. Choose either wit or will, and, using the electronic text or an online concordance, find all the passages that feature the word itself or forms of it in different tenses. Put these instances in a spreadsheet or document so that you can track them easily. Then make a list of synonyms and antonyms for the concept, find them in the play, and add them to the spreadsheet.
3. Add other data of interest to your spreadsheet. For instance, you might add the act number, setting, character speaking, or characters present, so that you can deepen your sense of what the word is doing in context, how its usage appears over the course of the play, and whether it shifts in meaning based on where it appears in the play's plot structure.
4. After examining the passages (some or all) in context, try to figure out what definitions/meanings of the word (wit or will) are “active” or being used in those passages and add that information to the items in your spreadsheet.
5. Take notes on these passages; list specific words, phrases, puns, and devices that Shakespeare uses to explore the concept of will or wit. What stands out in the passages you compile? Are there patterns or commonalities in the use of the word?
6. Come up with some analytical claims (which can be more than 1 sentence) based on some of the specific passages about the function of wit or will as words and concepts in the play. Some ways of crafting such a statement include:
In Twelfth Night, characters use multiple senses of the word “will,” but none more significant than [which one(s)?]; ultimately, the play suggests of “will” that [what does the play’s emphasis on “will” convey or demonstrate for viewers and readers?]You can also come up with a different structure that better suits your thoughts on Shakespeare’s deployment of the word you choose!
Characters in Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night demonstrate that “wit” consists primarily of the ability to [do what?]; when characters are witty, they [what do they advance/enable/convey in the play overall?]
The relationship between the subtitle of Twelfth Night, “what you will,” is related to other instances of the concept of “will” in the play in the following ways: [list the ways in which that meaning of “will” is similar or different from other uses of “will” in the play]
6. Follow up your claim with a discussion of 1-2 pages, using specific examples to support it.