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Let Rome Melt: Antony and Cleopatra

Let Rome Melt: Antony and Cleopatra

Last updated on: September 6, 2017 at 11:46 pm by Peter Leithart

Let Rome Melt: Antony and Cleopatra 2017-09-06T23:46:08+06:00 Peter Leithart

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INTRODUCTION
Antony and Cleopatra is set in the 30s BC, during the period of the Second Triumvirate, which consisted of Antony, Octavius Caesar, and Lepidus. It is a story of middle-aged infatuation between the title characters, carried out in the context of a political struggle between Antony and Octavius for supremacy in the Mediterranean world. Unlike Shakespeare?s other romantic plays, the title characters are mature adults with adult responsibilities. The middle agedness of the main characters matches the aging character of Rome, as it moves finally from any semblance of Republicanism into pure Empire. The title characters belong to a world that is dying.

EGYPT AND ROME
The thematic backbone of the play is a contrast of East and West, Egypt and Rome, a contrast evident from the first scenes of the play. Antony refuses to hear a report from Rome about disruptive Fulvia?s political activities, and instead insist that ?there?s not a minute of our lives should stretch without some pleasure now. What sport tonight??E(1.1.43-47). Enobarbus?Egorgeous description of Cleopatra?s barge (taken from Plutarch) emphasizes the more than Oriental splendor of the Egyptian court (2.2.200ff). In contrast to this, Octavius is all business, chiding Lepidus for being ?too indulgent?Ein his judgment of Antony (1.4) and quizzing Antony about Egyptian agriculture while everyone else revels on Pompey?s barge (2.7). Cleopatra summarizes the initial contrast concisely: Antony ?was disposed to mirth; but on the sudden a Roman thought hat struck him?E(1.2.81-82).

Shakespeare changed a number of features of Plutarch?s life of Antony in order to render the contrast more starkly. According to Plutarch, Octavius was attractive and well-liked, and inclined to womanize. None of this is left in Shakespeare?s Octavius, who is a politician through and through and shows no human affection for anyone but his sister Octavia. These changes make Octavius a more austere, a more Roman character than the Octavius of Plutarch. On the other side, the Cleopatra is a much more accomplished woman than Shakespeare?s play suggests. She was passionate and changeable by Plutarch?s description, but also fluent in a half-dozen Eastern languages and a skillful political operator. (Another key change was to delete some of Antony?s history, particularly his cruelty toward Cicero and his incompetence in his Parthian wars.)

The contrast of Egypt and Rome is the backbone; let?s look at the rest of the thematic skeleton of the play:

East West
Egypt Rome
Luxury/Pleasure Duty
Sea Land
Feminine Masculine
Antony Octavius
Cleopatra Octavia
Idleness Efficient activity

DISSOLUTION: LANGUANGE, CHARACTER, STRUCTURE
These dualities are part of the fundamental outlook of the play and of many of the characters, but much of the play blurs these stark contrasts. In Antony and Cleopatra, Shakespeare achieved a brilliant synthesis of language, character, stage-managing and structure, and theme, all of which contribute to a sense of Rome decaying, rotting, slipping away like mist. Fundamentally, Rome?s difference from Egypt is being blurred or erased. First, the language of the play often has recourse to imagery of melting and dissolving. In the first scene, Antony expresses the hope that ?Rome in Tiber [would] melt and the wide arch of the ranged empire fall!?E(1.1.33-34). ?Melt Egypt into Nile,?ECleopatra says in the following act (2.5.78), and later declares her love to Antony by saying that her life would ?dissolve?Eif she could be cold toward him (3.13.162). The unusual word ?discandy?E(meaning, ?melt like a candy?E is used twice in the play (3.13.165; 4.14.22). As Antony prepares to die, he compares himself to a cloud that changes shape: ?The rack dislimns and makes it indistinct as water is in water?E(4.14.10-11), and after he dies Cleopatra declares that ?The crown o?Ethe earth doth melt?E(4.15.64).

The dissolution of the world that has been is described also in terms drawn from biblical prophecy. Antony?s stars are fallen from the sky (3.13.145-7), and his moon is eclipsed (3.13.153-5). ?The star is fall?n,?Esays one of the guards (4.14.106), and Octavius speaks of the unreconcilable stars (5.1.46-48). From Cleopatra?s viewpoint, Antony embodies the cosmos in himself (5.2.79-86); he is an Atlas, one of the “triple pillars of the world,” whose fall brings the sky crashing down.

Second, the characters, further, are very changeable. Cleopatra is a mercurial figure, whose moods change rapidly (and manipulatively). She is especially erratic in her reception of messengers. She doesn?t like the ?but yet?Eof the messenger that brings her news of Antony?s marriage to Octavia, and she strikes the servant (2.5.42ff). But she is delighted with what she must know is a false report about Octavia?s physical appearance and manners (3.3). Enobarbus captures her: ?Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale her infinite variety?E(2.2.244ff.).

Antony is equally paradoxical, blurring Egypt and Rome in his own person. In one sense, he is supermasculine, a soldier?s soldier, whose men are devoted to him. He is a descendant of Hercules, the patron deity who accompanies him through his wars, and late in the play he challenges Octavius to single combat, like some Homeric warrior. On the other hand, Antony has become a ?strumpet?s fool,?Eand has been conquered by the ?serpent of old Nile.?E Cleopatra mentions that she and Antony playfully exchanged clothes with one another, Cleopatra wearing Antony?s sword and taking a dominant role (2.5.19-25). Antony?s devotion to Cleopatra costs him the battle of Actium; when Cleopatra panics and flees from the battle, Antony cannot keep himself from following (3.10). His masculine honor is turned into shame. Antony has become what the Elizabethans would call ?effeminate,?Edominated by a woman. His men recognize he has given up honor for the sake of a woman, which makes them ?women?s men?E(3.10.69-70). Antony realizes that he is captive to Cleopatra, and knows he must break away or lose his reputation and prowess (1.2.115). But he cannot.

Antony alludes several times to his loss of identity; he is melting. He loses honor, and without honor, what is he? (3.4.22-23). He can establish some sense of himself only by brutally torturing one of Octavius?Emessengers: ?Have you no ears? I am Antony yet?E(3.13.92-93), and he angrily charges Octavius with ?harping on what I am, not what he knew I was?E(3.13.142-143; those two ?I am?Estatements are probably theologically charged).

Third, the stage-management and structure of the play reinforce the sense of vaporousness. The average number of scenes in a Shakespeare play is 19; Antony and Cleopatra has 42. That means that the scene dissolves, the stage clears, very frequently. Many of the scenes include exits and entrances of one sort or another. Messengers come and go, interrupting even the briefest scenes. Act 4, scene 7 is only 17 lines long, and has an exit, two entrances, and an alarum of retreat. The stage, like Antony, is melting.

POLITICS OF EROS
The triple-layered ?melting?Ediscussed above is connected to the political situation of the play, Rome?s dissolution. Antony was once the embodiment of Roman virtue and endurance, as Octavius himself admits in 1.4.55ff. Philo?s opening speech contrasts the younger Antony, whose ?goodly eyes . . . have glowed like plated Mars?Ewith the current Antony, who is, paradoxically, both ?the bellows and the fan to cool a gypsy?s lust?E(1.1.1-10). If Antony is melting, so is Rome.

The political system of Rome is change like a cloud from one shape into another. One of the key themes running through the great Roman plays is the question of the ?one man?Ewho fills Rome entirely by himself. Coriolanus and Julius Caesar both are characterized as one-man cities. Coriolanus, banished, banishes the c

ity, as if the city were himself. Cassius bitterly rebukes Rome for allowing one man to dominate all. In the first two Roman plays, the one man who seeks to dominate the city is destroyed ?ECoriolanus is banished and Caesar assassinated. With Antony and Cleopatra, however, Rome has moved beyond that, and come to the point where one man will rule not only Rome but the world (cf. Cleopatra?s speech, ironically about Antony, in 5.2.83ff).

This gradual shift to acceptance of ?room/Rome for one man only?Eis accompanied by a shift in basic values. Comparison of Coriolanus , set in the early Republican period, with Antony and Cleopatra , set just before the empire of Augustus took shape, shows something about Shakespeare’s understanding of the shifts in Roman culture. As Cantor points out, Coriolanus makes little reference to sex or food, and there are no feast scenes on stage; on the contrary, Rome is in the grip of famine at the beginning of the play.

Antony and Cleopatra , by contrast, has one long, drunken feast scene (2.7), and many references to food throughout the play (1.5.26-31; 2.1.23-27; 2.2.222-6; 3.5.13-15; 4.15.52-4; 5.2.271-4; etc.). The problems of famine seem to have been resolved, for good. Further, the whole of Antony and Cleopatra is about a love affair. Cantor says that Coriolanus ’ Rome is dominated by a spirit of “public service, energy, self-discipline,” while Antony and Cleopatra is dominated by eros, pleasure-seeking (Antony even has a servant boy named Eros). This is not entirely due to the presence of exotic Oriental settings in Antony and Cleopatra ; the Romans of the play have become as indulgent as the Egyptians. Rome is melting into Egypt; the Roman world, like the Romans in 2.7, are drunk in bacchanalian revelries, ready to fall.

Roman institutions and customs have been emptied of their power and traditional meanings. Roman marriage is politically convenient for Antony but empty of real affection, understanding, or commitment. Antony, almost comically, fails in his first attempt at suicide (?How, not dead? Not dead??E, and then is dragged to Cleopatra?s monument so he can die in her arms. Cleopatra?s suicide is not an act of resignation and final control; rather, she seeks death as passionately as she loved Antony. Instead of stabbing herself like a sturdy Roman, she commits suicide with a slinky, slimy, slithery, very Egyptian serpent.

But why? Why has Roman honor melted into ?What sport tonight??E How is Rome?s lurch toward eros connected to the political changes of the early Empire? The plays give us several answers. First, in the empire ambition and competition are squelched. Republican Rome encouraged ambition, since it provided avenues for talented men to rise in the military or politics. Imperial Rome discouraged ambition; any ambitious and hungry man is a threat to the single ruler at the top. In Julius Caesar , Shakespeare shows that empire is inimical to ambition: Caesar fears “lean and hungry” men like Cassius, who might challenge Caesar. He wants “sleek, fat” men like Antony, who will be pacified by pleasure. When political and military advance is discouraged, men find private ways to spend their time and energies. Hedonistic indulgence is a direct consequence of Empire.

As a result, second, loyalties become privatized. Dramatic dilemmas in the two plays are reduced from choices between public and private loyalties to choices between two private desires. Where Volumnia must choose between her son and her city, Octavia, in a parallel speech, must choose between two private relations ?Eher husband or her brother ( Coriolanus 5.3.104-13; Antony and Cleopatra 3.4.12-20). Enobarbus is a key illustration of this point. He is not fighting for Rome, but for Antony, and when Antony shames himself at Actium, there is nothing to fight or live for. He dies, apparently by sheer force of will, like a lover, with Antony?s name on his lips (4.9.12-23).

Third, the city of Rome has been ?dissolved?Einto the wider world, becoming indistinct as water is in water. In Shakespeare?s other Roman plays, the characters refer to Roman landmarks (the Forum, the Tarpeian Rock, the walls and gates), but this is absent in Antony and Cleopatra. ?Rome?Ecan refer to the entire Roman empire, and the play skips around from place to place (Egypt and Rome especially). Without an identifiable ?Rome?Eto live and die for, the valor necessary to defend it melts away too.

Finally, Republican virtues are military virtues, and one of the ?problems?Ethat Rome faces in the imperial period is a lack of enemies. Warriors now have too much time on their hands, and they turn to erotic pursuits. Romans no longer fight have Volscians or anyone to fight, and the ?time of universal peace?Edraws near (4.6.5). One result of this is that Romans have opportunity to fight each other. Shakespeare is frequently interested in the way men become rivals during peacetime, when they no longer have a common enemy but do have common desires (cf. Much Ado About Nothing ).

LOVE CONQUERS ALL?
What are we to make of the love affair, then? On the face of it, it was a bold move to make the love of Antony and Cleopatra as moving as it is. After all, it is adulterous from beginning to end (Antony is first married to Fulvia, then to Octavia); it is intense and full of conflict; both lovers have their less-than-admirable qualities. Yet, Shakespeare not only makes their love attractive, but infuses it with a kind of religious intensity. Cleopatra begins her suicide by saying ?I have immortal longings in me,?E(5.2.280-1), and both speak of their death in erotic terms as a means of re-union with the other (4.14.44ff; 5.2.300ff).

Shakespeare is working with a typical romantic dilemma: Marriage provides security, but may dampen desire; the uncertainty and daring of an affair keep it emotionally exciting, but without conventional structures it is doomed to constant insecurity. In this world, marriage is the only structure that would enable love to endure, but were Antony and Cleopatra to settle down in the exurbs (with a grill on the deck and a Lexus in the garage), they would risk losing the very thing that makes them attractive to each other. In their view, this world is not sufficient to satisfy their desires; as Antony says at the outset of the play, if Cleopatra is going to set a ?bourn?Eor limit to ?how far to be beloved,?Eshe ?needs find out new heaven, new earth?E(1.1.16-17). Is this an Elizabethan English Patient, where love cancels out politics and the demands of love rightfully overwhelm the demands of duty?

No, or not entirely, and that for several reasons. First, their love has some disagreeable effects. The tyranny they suffer and exercise in love is manifested in tyranny of others. This is because, second, the love is all tangled in the politics. There is no separating the two. It is impossible for love to be a completely apolitical act. Adhering to Cleopatra while he?s already married to Fulvia damages his standing among the Romans, and abandoning his marriage to Octavia is even more politically dangerous. When she hears Antony has married Octavia, Cleopatra wants to cut off Herod Agrippa?s head for suggesting such a thing; a private lovers?Esnit threatens to become an international incident. The connection of passion with tyranny is especially evident in Cleopatra?s treatment of messengers: She will not allow the truth to be told, but only comforting falsehoods. When Antony discovers Octavius?Emessenger seducing Cleopatra (politically, though the language is sexually charged, 3.13.65-72), he does into a jealous rage and has the messenger whipped. Shakespeare?s too wise to think that queens and triumvirs might retreat into a private world of pleasure without leaving corpses in their wake.

Third, Antony gives up all for love, and this
means literally all. He leaves Octavia, who is the bond of peace with Octavius, for Cleopatra, knowing full well that this will embroil him in further civil war. He leaves the battle at Actium to chase Cleopatra, losing not only the battle but his honor with it. His love is not done in a corner; because love and politics cannot be disentangled, his irresponsibility is ruinous to him, to his men, and hurtful to Rome.

But yet. There is no doubt that Shakespeare intended us to see something magnificent in the love of Antony and Cleopatra, and in their deaths. We might get a clue to what that magnificence is by noting that Cleopatra?s death scene is undercut by a weirdly comic, and weirdly theological, exchange. Just before Cleopatra dresses to meet Antony in another world, she converses with the ?clown?Ewho brings her the asp and repeatedly wishes her ?joy o?Ethe worm.?E What can this mean in a scene dramatizing one of the most famous suicides in history? It is characteristic of Shakespeare (as it is of Jane Austen) to bury the wisest words in his plays in speeches from rustics. The clown?s conversation includes references to figs, worms, serpents, works, and belief, as if, one critic noted, he?d been listening to Protestant preachers. One writer suggests that the basic opposition in the play is between faith and works, and the lovers receive honor and immortality not because of their achievements but in spite of all their failures as political actors, military leaders, and lovers. Octavius is left to gain the whole world alone; but, it seems, Antony and Cleopatra have saved their souls, and have found out that ?new heaven, new earth?Ethat can accommodate their immortal love.

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What did Jesus feed the 5,000 with?

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