Duke Orsino: Love Sick or Disorder?
Abstract
This case study of Duke Orsino, the Duke of Illyria, will examine the mental state in which he is in. A panel of doctors, will be reviewing the study I conduct of his behavior and actions to come to a conclusion about his recent behavior. Afterwards we will review the findings and recommend a treatment plan then further the study by having follow ups with himself and others to see if his behavior and actions have changed.
A Qualitative study of Duke Orsino
This study is being conducted on account of Orsino’s servant, who thinks the Duke has been acting strange lately. He has been quite depressed about something that at the moment is unclear. Orsino has been having constant mood swings, seems to be living in a fantasy world of love and has been having an impulsive behavior. Also the servant, Valentine, has noticed Orsino had been overly emotional about Olivia, a Lady he has been courting. The Duke himself also agreed to the study and is in full cooperation.
Method
Participant
Orsino is the great Duke of Illyria and a bachelor. His age seems to be unknown but possibly mid to late twenties. He lives in his palace in Illyria and has various servants. He has a page boy named Cesario and seems to speak very fondly of him. Has been sending love letters to Lady Olivia, in which he sends his page boy to deliver them for him.
Measures
To get an idea of how Orsino acts the doctors and I have decided that it is best to observe him in his natural environment. I will be at his palace every day for twelve days to study how he interacts with others and how he goes about his day. While doing so I will also be conducting interviews with people that are around him the most and also live in his palace. I will be writing down all his behaviors and then comparing them to articles on mental illnesses and also referring to the DSM IV to get a better understanding of his illness if one is present.
Procedure
First day Orsino seems to be depressed about something and tries to cure it with music. I made a note of what the Duke said that morning, he states “If music be the food of love play on, give me excess of it, that surfeiting, the appetite may sicken and so die” (Shakespeare, 1623, Act I, Scene I). A couple of days later I was interviewing Cesario since Orsino has been confining in him about his inner thoughts. Cesario states that the Duke has been having mood swings, I have also confirmed this with the Duke’s servant Valentine (Shakespeare, 1623, Act I, Scene IV). Later that day I observed Orsino asking Cesario to go over to Olivia’s place and court her for him. Cesario says that she is troubled by the death of her late brother and may not want to speak with him but the Duke seems to not understand what that means. He goes on talking about how love is in the air and the time is right and he encourages Cesario to cause a huge a commotion at the Lady’s house (Shakespeare, 1623, Act I, Scene IV). To my knowledge Lady Oliva is mourning her late brother and is in despair. It seems apparent that the Duke is aware of this but ignores it. It is apparent that meeting his needs seems to be more important in his mind.
The most interesting sight that occurred was when the Duke describes his page boy Cesario. He describes the boy’s luscious red lips and talks if he finds him attractive. A couple of days later I witness Orsino speaking very highly of himself. From my notes I wrote down what he said, “For such as I am all true lovers are, Unstaid and skittish in all motions else” (Shakespeare, 1623, Act II, Scene IV). After being there a week I have gathered that Orsino is very moody, over emotional, impulsive and seems to be confused of his sexual orientation. There is not much information about his past, nothing I could get form any of the servants or from Orsino himself. Which makes it a bit difficult to unravel the reasons behind his issues. During the last 5 days I witnessed Orsino fantasying about how wonderful love is and being in love will cure his loneliness. Furthermore I heard him and Cesario speaking about love and Orsino proclaimed that “An elder than herself: so wears she to him, so sways she level in her husband's heart” (Shakespeare, 1623, Act II, Scene IV). The Duke seems to be very shallow in the way he thinks about women and the way they look.
Results
The Symptoms that the Duke displays is prominent in the personality disorders borderline and Histrionic. Borderline personality disorder is when people are “highly unstable, with wide mood swings…impulsive behavior, and confusion about career goals, personal values, or sexual orientation” (Black, 2013, p. 2593-2598). People with Histrionic Personality Disorder often have symptoms like “overly emotional, overly dramatic, and hungry for attention… may be flirtatious or seductive as a way of drawing attention to themselves, yet they are emotionally shallow” (Black, 2013, p. 2593-2598). As I have witnessed through a full study of his behavior for twelve days, Orsino demonstrates a good amount of the symptoms from both Borderline Personality Disorder and Histrionic Personality Disorder.
Discussion
After my twelve days of observation I discuss my findings with the other doctors. A treatment plan has been devised and we have given the plans to the Duke. For example when he keeps trying to court Lady Olivia he cannot seem to come to a conclusion as to why she denies him. The doctors think it’s because “The hypersensitivity of BPD patients to others’ emotions…means that they often fail to develop plausible scenarios concerning others’ states of mind …and are unable or unwilling to consider alternative explanations” (Fonagy, 2015, pg. 380-392). The Duke can’t see any other possible explanations except his own.
The treatment we have devised is a three step communication system. Step one would be The Teaching and Learning of Content, two; The Reemergence of Social Learning and three Learning beyond Therapy. In step one we will have the Duke come in and have therapy to reach the core of his issue. Across the course of therapeutic treatment “if the Treatment is sufficiently coherent, reliable, and predictable in its delivery—the patient begins to feel safe enough to allow a relaxation of epistemic hypervigilance” (Fonagy, 2015, pg. 380-392). This will allow Orsino to feel at home and confortable to be able to open up and trust us doctors to help him. System 2 is “concerned with how learning is made possible again. In the process of effectively passing on knowledge about the patient’s condition” (Fonagy, 2015, pg. 380-392). Here we can see if the Duke can begin to understand others feelings and interrupt them to fully understand the situation.
In system three we want the patient to be able to be able to improve in relations outside of therapy and to have “higher level of epistemic trust [which] enables the individual to learn from their social experiences in a positive way” (Fonagy, 2015, pg. 380-392). That way the Duke can look beyond just how he feels and take that and applying it to others situations. After about a month of therapy we have seen improvement, not a great amount but a slight one. Orsino can understand a little to why others feel the way they do but still seems to be having trouble grasping the concept of it. If he continues in therapy for 6 months he should only need to check in once a week after that then to once month.
References
Black, B. (2013). Personality Disorders. In B. Narins (Ed.), The Gale Encyclopedia of
Nursing and Allied Health (3rd ed., Vol. 5, pp. 2593-2598). Detroit: Gale.
Retrieved from gale Reference
Fonagy, P., Luyten, P., & Bateman, A. (2015). Translation: Mentalizing as treatment target in
borderlinepersonality disorder. Personality Disorders: Theory,
Research, And Treatment, 6(4), 380-392. doi:10.1037/per0000113
Gross, S. (1998). The Orsino complex. Psychodynamic Counselling, 4(2), 203.
Shakespeare, W. (1623). Twelfth Night. Retrieved November 5, 2015
