If music be the food of love, play on,
Give me excess of it; that surfeiting,
The appetite may sicken and so die.
That strain again – it had a dying fall.
O, it came o’er my ear, like the sweet sound
That breathes upon a bank of violets,
Stealing, and giving odour. Enough, no more,
‘Tis not so sweet now as it was before.
O spirit of love, how quick and fresh art thou,
That, notwithstanding thy capacity
Receiveth as the sea, naught enters there,
Of what validity and pitch soe’er,
But falls into abatement, and low price,
Even in a minute; so full of shapes is fancy,
That it alone is high fantastical.
(The Duke Orsino in Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night)
Paradoxically, Twelfth Night is both important and unimportant in this part of the world. It is vague, neglected, unobserved or hardly known by the general population as a calendar festival, yet it is very strictly observed unfailingly by all as a tradition in the popular culture. It remains largely non-existent as a traditional festival in the consciousness of the general population, yet that same population observes it as an important part of the traditional Christmas season. It passed unobtrusively yesterday (January 6), but is both an important feast in the Christian calendar and a religiously observed date in the popular secular tradition.
Twelfth Night, like the vast majority of dates, symbols, traditions and practices related to the Christmas season, is a mixture of religious, secular and popular traditions. Like all of those, too, there is a good deal of confusion about actual dates, but there has been no doubt about it in Guyana where the general population of both Christians and non-Christians observed it on January 6. It is unambiguous common practice that all Christmas decorations are taken down; fairy lights turned off; trees, lighted images and cribs dismantled. It is marked in this way as the official end of the Christmas season and was so universally acknowledged.
However, it is paradoxical because most of those who religiously observe it are hardly aware of the reasons. The twelve days of Christmas which come to an end on twelfth night are not prominent in their consciousness. There is no real Christmas season in Guyana, or, it has been significantly shifted because of popular practice and the overpowering commercial interest that has completely taken it over. If there is a ‘season’ in Guyana it begins on November 1 and ends on December 25. The ‘season’ is the protracted period of frenzied, chaotic preparation, commercial activity and custom leading up to a limp, diffused ‘celebration’ that comes to an unceremonious anti-climactic end by sunset on Christmas Day, December 25. The excitement and the observance seem to be in the preparation and the hectic commercial activity which dominates, accompanied by the emphatic playing of Christmas music and a number of customs. The old traditional ‘twelve days of Christmas’ beginning on the ‘first day’ (Christmas Day itself) are not observed, but as observed above, the ‘twelfth day’ is unambiguously marked as the time to remove the decorations and stop playing the seasonal music, thus signalling the end of the ‘season.’
Again, like most customs and traditions of the season, those twelve days and the feast that ends them are a mixture of Christian and pagan rituals. The dates are confused and it is not universally clear whether Twelfth Night ought to be January 5 or 6. It is said that this arises from the fact that in ancient times when the tradition began each day actually began from its ‘eve’ or evening, that is, the night before. It was only in more modern times that the day began after midnight. This made the twelfth night after Christmas the night of January 5. It was observed with feasting and merry-making as well as the removal of all decoration. The decorations were sometimes burnt because otherwise they would bring bad luck upon the home. If they were not dismantled on that day they would have to stay up all year. It is not clear whether that belief has persisted in the Caribbean.
For Christians Twelfth Night is the eve or beginning of Epiphany. Epiphany marks the time when the Magi or the three Wise Men arrived to present their gifts to the baby Jesus. It was therefore a time for gift-giving and, again confused with secular custom, in some traditions a gift was given for each of the twelve days after Christmas. Starting on Boxing Day (the Feast of Stephen), it was also a time of feasting when the rich were supposed to share what they had with the poor. A popular song celebrates this practice in mediaeval times in lines that begin ‘Good King Wenceleslas looked out on the Feast of Stephen.’ It was cold, bitter weather, “When a poor man came in sight gathering winter fuel.” The king asked, “Yonder peasant who is he, where and what his dwelling,” sent his servant to fetch the poor man and ordered, “Bring me flesh and bring me wine, bring me pine logs hither/Thou and I will see him dine
