1. Viola: I am the man. (II.ii.25)
This quote is said by Olivia post interview with Olivia. Viola is confused about Olivia's feelings regarding Orsino and now she is considering the possibility that Olivia may very well be in love with her. Viola comes to understand that it is she who Olivia is in love with. Viola feels sorry for Olivia because Olivia mind as well be in love with a dream seeing as how she will never be able to be with who she thinks is Cesario. The countess decides to come out of mourning for a phony. Viola goes on to say in her speech that disguises are never a good idea, they are in fact, wicked. I think Viola feels that she should have known better because she knows personally how weak women are in terms of their feelings. She has now manipulated the feelings of a woman, which will make things quite complicated. Viola has dug herself a great hole because her disguise makes it so that neither Orsino nor Olivia can love her. I feel as though Viola would be a lot more scared and nervous when she found out another woman was in love with her. I didn't think that this portion of her speech was dramatic enough. She is a woman with heavy emotions that don't really come through in this scene. I'd expect her to get emotional, perhaps a bit scared, and very vulnerable. Reading this, I felt like she handled it as a man as if she were giving a big "whatever" to the situation.
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Viola may have acted as a man to the situation as a kind of joke. After all, she is disguised as one, so maybe Shakespeare was demonstrating that she was also starting to think like one. That may be a stretch, but throughout the play I don't picture viola being feminine at all, only proper.
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