‘What is love?’ asks Feste the clown in one of his songs. It is a very old question. One of the most influential answers to it comes from ancient Greece in the imaginary voice of the comic dramatist Aristophanes in Plato’s dialogue the Symposium. Love, says Aristophanes, is a quest, a journey in search of our lost other half.

Viola and her twin brother Sebastian have been shipwrecked off the coast of Illyria. Each believes that the other has been drowned.Viola disguises herself as a boy and, under the name of Cesario, enters the service of the duke Orsino.The duke sends Cesario to woo the lady Olivia on his behalf, but Olivia falls in love with the lovely ‘boy’.Viola/Cesario, meanwhile, has fallen in love with Orsino. and he too arrives in Illyria.Olivia meets Sebastian and, mistaking him for Cesario, arranges for them to be secretly married. Further confusion follows upon mistakes as to the identity of the twins.

William Shakespeare ( 26 April 1564—23 April 1616) was an English poet, playwright, and actor, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon". His extant works, including some collaborations, consist of around 38 plays, 154 sonnets, two long narrative poems, and a few other verses, of which the authorship of some is uncertain. His plays have been translated into every major living language and are performed more often than those of any other playwright.