of any period has likely encountered. His willingness to dress and act in a certain way to attract the woman he desires is comical in a manner that any audience can understand. Maria, Feste, Fabian, Sir Andrew, and Sir Toby are all clown types, mischievous and playful to one degree or another. These character types are not particular to the seventeenth century and are still present in popular storytelling today.

One of the central themes in Twelfth Night is strength of love, or fickleness. A second theme is even the arbitrariness of love. Since love is always arbitrary, people throughout the ages will always have a tendency to be fickle; therefore, fickleness and even the arbitrariness of love will always be relevant for any time period, and will especially have modern relevance.

We especially see the theme of the arbitrariness of love disclosed in the scene in which Olivia meets Viola as Cesario for the first time. Olivia tells Cesario that she cannot possibly return Duke Orsino's love, even though she knows he is a virtuous, noble, intelligent, and even brave man, as we see in her lines:

I cannot love him:
Yet I suppose him virtuous, know him noble,
Of great estate, of fresh and stainless youth;
In voices well divulged, free, learn'd, and valiant. (I.v.242-245)

In other words, in these lines, Olivia is describing Orsino as an excellent catch, yet for arbitrary reasons, she feels she absolutely cannot love him. Instead, she falls for Cesario who is so obviously not a real man that he is described as being too under developed to be a man yet too old to be a boy. Viola as Cesario is even a bit cruel to Olivia in her open judgements of Olivia, calling her overly proud and the cruelest of women. Yet, again, for arbitrary reasons, Olivia prefers Cesario over Orsino.

The theme of the fickleness of love is disclosed in several speeches, especially the conversation between Cesario and Orsino in Act 2, Scene 4 in which Orsino admits that men can be very fickle. However, the theme of fickleness is further proved by the final events of the play. Olivia very quickly switches from loving Cesario to loving Sebastian, simply because she learns Cesario is really a woman, Viola. In addition, Orsino quickly switches from loving Olivia to loving Viola, simply because he learns she is a woman who loves him just as much as he had loved Olivia. While these are correct choices, the suddenness of the choices certainly do show the fickle nature of love. And since the fact that love can be both fickle and arbitrary are enduring truths, we see very easily how the play is relevant for all eras, even today.

One of the prominent themes of Twelfth Night has to do with gender identity, love, and sexual relationships. Many characters in the play are not as they might appear: Viola is disguised as a male, and she falls in love with Orsino. Olivia falls in love with Cesario, who is actually Viola. Orsino ultimately falls in love with Viola when he discovers she is a woman. In a time when gender identities are becoming more fluid, the play takes on a new relevance and offers modern ways of thinking about whom we love.

Other themes in the play have to do with the considerations of one's class or social rank and how that comes into play in romantic relationships and marriages. These issues, while perhaps not as pronounced as in earlier times or perhaps in America, have nonetheless not disappeared. Marrying above, below, or within one's socioeconomic class remains another dynamic in modern courtship. In Shakespeare's day and milieu the notion of the absurdity of social climbing seemed natural, and the abuse of Malvolio was accepted by Elizabethan and Jacobean audiences in a way that it might not be by audiences today.

In lots of ways, I would argue. Shakespeare's plays are often talked about as being universal, because, though they are from 400 years ago, they deal with themes and problems that come up in everyone's lives.

Viola, for example, the central character, has to deal with (what she thinks, anyway, has happened) the death of her brother at sea - and, at the end, discovers that he is still alive and reunited with him. Everyone will experience the death of a loved one at some point in their lives, and the wonder and beauty of being reunited with a loved one who you supposed to be dead is something that can strike a chord with anyone who has lost someone. These are universal concerns.

Twelfth Night thinks extensively about death: Olivia is mourning the loss of her brother and father, Viola supposes Sebastian to be killed in the shipwreck (and vice versa) and Feste is constantly making references or remarks to death (his song, 'Come Away Death' imagines what it would be like to be buried).

I'll give you two more examples of Shakespeare's universality. The basic premise of the Viola plot is that she is head over heels in love with Orsino, but cannot tell him, because she is disguised as a boy. This leads to her, late one night, saying things to him which - though he has no idea about it - are actually about her:

My father had a daughter loved a man,As it might be, perhaps, were I a woman,I should your lordship.

Surely everyone experiences the pain of loving someone who - for whatever reason - they cannot tell. Again, it is not the situations themselves but their emotional implications that are universal.

One more: think about Malvolio. He's serious, self-important, pompous, malicious and enjoys nothing more than stopping people's fun. Everyone knows someone like that (I bet you've just thought of one). And moreover, everyone takes some delight in the idea of them being humiliated; exactly as the yellow stockings plot does to Malvolio.

So - in short - you can find analogues in your own life of the situations and emotional relationships in Shakespeare's play which should help to explain why it is that Twelfth Night is still one of hte world's most popular plays after 400 years.

Hope that helps!

One way of approaching this question would be to consider how you would stage a production of this excellent play if you were a director, and how you would highlight the themes that you feel are relevant to society today. One of the themes that we can definitely relate to today, given the current financial crisis and the cult of personality that is so important is that of the dangers of ambition.

Clearly, any discussion of this theme would have to focus on the character of Malvolio, who we discover has massive ambitions to rise above his station. Of course his ambition makes him a sitting target for Maria, whose letter wonderfully manipulates his hopes to convince him that his mistress is in love with him, which is something that Sir Toby and other characters find so amusing due to the difficulties of achieving social mobility in Shakespeare's time. Consider the famous quote from the letter that Maria writes to Malvolio, pretending to be Olivia:

In my stars I am above thee, but be not afraid of greatness. Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon 'em.

The play is the story of how Malvolio tries to reach for greatness that is above him and falls terribly, to the great amusement of others. If we think about this theme of ambition and how it relates to the financial crisis, I think it is perfectly clear that using this theme the play is very relevant to today's society. Shakespeare produced plays with timeless themes, and this is one example of a theme that is equally applicable to today's world as it was in the world of Shakespeare.