The Instability of Moral Phenomena in Antony and Cleopatra

The Instability of Moral Phenomena in Antony and Cleopatra

The conception of morality presented herein implies an instability in moral phenomena that is generally overlooked. For if moral actions are determined by our responsibility to a common life that is valued in itself then there must be a particular kind of structure involved. Necessarily, the ways in which a life is valued by an individual can be realized only through his or her contact with ways in which the same life is valued by others. It is only by interacting with other people that we can even acquire a sense of what makes for a life that is valued in itself and this has an obvious consequence for the stability of moral phenomena. Namely, it is clear that the inclinations behind my sense of a life that is valued in itself will inevitably conflict with inclinations that lie behind the same sense in others, and the possibility of such conflict will be true of all of my relations with other people. The vast array of activities and different psychological tendencies that are relevant to our engagement with each other as reflective beings makes a divergence of moral attitude inherent in our contact and communication with each other. For example, something as basic as gender creates an instability that affects moral judgement through a divergence of natural inclination. We cannot uncouple the necessity of moral virtue from this instability, and, as the representation of reflective life in action, dramatic form is capable of assuming a structure that reflects the structure of our experience in this respect. In this discussion of the instability of moral phenomena in a particular play, we must assume from the outset that the logic of dramatic form is ideally suited to an exploration of the inner life behind such instability.

   Insofar as the physical object is given its identity by our experience of others in whom the sense of a life that is valued may be opposed to our own, the instability of moral phenomena is implied in the ontological distinction between sensory perception and the material. Thus, the superficial and familiar conflict between morality and self-interest conceals an inbuilt tension in the structure of reflective experience. We can appreciate this by analysing the fundamental nature of such experience in its relation to moral phenomena. In the first place, moral values like honesty, integrity and justice are objective, but, in contrast to this, the phenomena to which they apply are unnervingly insecure. For the individual pursuit of a life that is valued in itself is necessarily both created and qualified by the same pursuit in others. Therefore, the substance of our lives emerges from the lives of others, while at the same time their pursuit of a life that is valued in itself continuously comes into conflict with our own. If the values of one individual are opposed to those of another, or those of a section of society to those of another, then in some cases the moral law itself is unstable, since there are conceivably legitimate differences concerning what is responsible to life that is valued in itself. Furthermore, this instability implies that in the individual and the community what is objectively moral is open to change, and therefore vulnerable to the vagaries of experience. Hence, there is no possible revaluation of values that will make them perfectly stable. For example, in the actual experience of an individual or society when they are viable the values of humility, self-sacrifice and self-subdual can never be unquestionable. Nor can the values of self-assertion and the imposition of will upon others.

   In Shakespeare’s use of dramatic form, the ontological distinction is spontaneously observed in that reflective life in the individual is realized (directly or indirectly) by engagement with the same form of life in other people. It is by means of contact with others having a life that is valued in itself that we ourselves have a life that is so valued, and this interaction is portrayed specifically in works that employ dramatic form. Insofar as propositional language does not portray reflective life in action in this way it fails to observe the ontological distinction, and is therefore less responsive to the nature of our existence as reflective beings. It is less capable of showing us what we are. Showing in psychological detail how Antony’s experience of Cleopatra and Octavius creates a perception of himself and the world is contrary to the relatively simple identification of sensory perception with the physical image that is implied in a proposition like ‘x is a good man’ or ‘x is deceiving himself’. It may be true that in his observable behaviour a man reveals himself to be good or self-deceiving but this is too general a truth to fully reveal the individual –  representation in dramatic form as the portrayal of reflective life in action can thereby correspond to philosophy of mind, and the depth of this correspondence in Antony and Cleopatra will become clear as the enquiry progresses. In short, it is primarily by observing the ontological distinction that Shakespeare is able to explore the instability of moral phenomena and achieve a true representation of reflective life.

In Antony and Cleopatra, the mastery of dramatic form is striking for its lucid representation of moral phenomena as inherently unstable, and this is reflected in its structure. Therefore, compared with the great tragedies Macbeth, King Learand Othello, in which action that is highly theatrical in nature is primarily created by an idea that is morally unambiguous, Antony and Cleopatra is meticulously constructed in order to exploit the form in another way. Here the structure is governed by two successfully integrated principles. A clear though subtle narrative of the fall of the protagonists can be identified with a mosaic of events which pre-eminently reflect the instability of moral phenomena from different angles. We can see this already in the opening scenes – in their rapid movement from one sphere of action to another in accordance with the ideas of ethos and psychology that link them.

Act 1, scene i

                  Alexandria, Cleopatra’s Palace

                  Enter Demetrius and Philo

Philo. Nay, but this dotage of our general’s

         O’erflows the measure. Those his goodly eyes

         That o’er the files and musters of the war

         Have glowed like plated Mars now bend, now turn

         The office and devotion of their view

         Upon a tawny front. His captain’s heart,

         Which in the scuffles of great fights hath burst

         The buckles on his breast, reneges all temper

         And is become the bellows and the fan

         To cool a gypsy’s lust.                        (lines 1 to 10)

The opening of this speech reveals to us that Philo is responding to some kind of dismissal or equivocation on the part of his companion, and this is the occasion for an emphatic assertion centred on Antony’s decline. Thus, the exaggeration in ‘dotage’, and ironic reference to office and devotion in relation to his passion give expression to a Roman anxiety political power is dangerously enfeebled by a crumbling sense of duty. This is completed by the denial of strength and discipline (‘reneges all temper’) for the sake of a degenerate ‘gypsy’s’ world marked by sensuality and deception. In terms of the dramatic narrative, Philo introduces the main interest of the play with a sense of an impending crisis, while his speech is also the first piece in the mosaic of events concerned with the instability of moral phenomena.

   Beginning in mid-conversation creates a feeling of fluidity, of being in the midst of flux and changeability. This is developed by the formal oppositions of perspective between the one that frames the scene, established by Philo and Demetrius, and those within the scene expressed by Antony and Cleopatra. These contrasting viewpoints further develop the formal implication of flux by mutual influence, as the Roman attitude soon emerges in Antony himself when he refers to his Egyptian fetters. As pieces in a mosaic of dramatic action, these contrasting points of view make for a concentration of interactions that are superficially unsettled and psychologically suggestive. Thus, in the first place we are given a Roman perception of the relationship between the lovers that is quickly followed by a more inward, agitated exchange between them that reveals much about its true nature. The setting of what Antony and Cleopatra represent to the world and what they are to each other immediately presents the deepest interest of the drama that follows. 

   The entry of a messenger from Rome elicits a stream of sarcasm from Cleopatra, and then a full-blooded response from Antony.

Antony. Let Rome in Tiber melt, and the wide arch

         Of the ranged empire fall! Here is my space,

         Kingdoms are clay: our dungy earth alike

         Feeds beast as man. The nobleness of life

         Is to do thus; when such a mutual pair

         And such a twain can do’t, in which I bind,

         On pain of punishment, the world to weet

         We stand up peerless.

Cleopatra.                          Excellent falsehood!

         Why did he marry Fulvia, and not love her?

         I’ll seem the fool I am not. Antony

         Will be – himself.

Antony.                      But stirred by Cleopatra.

         Now for the love of Love and her soft hours,

         Let’s not confound the time with conference harsh.

         There’s not a minute of our lives should stretch

         Without some pleasure now. What sport tonight?

Cleopatra. Hear the ambassadors.

Antony.                                        Fie, wrangling queen!

         Whom everything becomes – to chide, to laugh,

         To weep; whose every passion fully strives

         To make itself, in thee, fair and admired.

         No messenger but thine; and all alone

         Tonight we’ll wander through the streets and note

         The qualities of people. Come my queen;

         Last night you did desire it. [To Attendants] Speak

         Not to us.

         Exeunt [Antony and Cleopatra] with the Train.

Demetrius. Is Caesar with Antonius prized so slight? 

                                                                        (lines 33 to 56)

Antony’s trenchant avowal of belief acquires its strength from a tight control of sound and rhythm, and we can see in its strict regulation of caesura, together with variations in the iambic pattern, how he gives a sense of weight and suspension to the lines from 33 to 37. In these lines, he promotes with some rhetorical force a specifically interpersonal form of naturalism, denying the attachment to political power upon which his relationship with Cleopatra clearly depends. From this naturalism, an assertion of moral value is able to emerge in a way that seems inevitable and incontestable (The nobleness of life/Is to do thus’). In the remaining lines of this speech, a measured relaxation of feeling in the verse affirms the relationship as an exemplary expression of such life. 

   This speech is notable for possessing both a looseness of thinking which is obvious in its disregard for accuracy and circumstance, in a way that suggests that Antony has indeed become a ‘strumpet’s fool’, and an intensity of thought and feeling more revealing of his inner state than anything that might occur to his Roman critics like Philo. In this respect, we can see Antony’s attachment to an image of himself that overshadows and so obscures the general and leader who, as we have seen in Julius Caesar, casually eliminates his political rivals. A considerable part of what makes Cleopatra so compelling to Antony is the experience of another life that seems to him to be inexhaustibly rich and full of meaning, while disguising the means by which it has been acquired. Hence this insight can be seen as the beginning of a second piece in the mosaic concerning the instability of moral phenomena in the play.

   From these remarks we can see that, in his reaction to Cleopatra’s needling, Antony is using language to enliven a particular view of himself, and there is a corresponding ambiguity in her response. The difference lies in the opposition of an open declaration of abstract thought that is vivid and concise on his part, and Cleopatra’s expression of a hidden idea that is not grasped by him and is purely for her own satisfaction. So, as she mocks his eulogy to their great love by referring to his marriage, another intention can be discerned in the impulsive, ‘Excellent falsehood’. For in this she vents her scepticism to his naturalism and the impartiality of his self-appeasing attitude. While it is excellent in its execution, Antony’s speech is false according to Cleopatra’s perception of things, and this is revealed in a further sense in which the words can be understood. Here, excellent falsehood lies in the elaborate physical and psychological artifice by which she entrances him – this arises out of her natural powers mainly insofar as she is deceptive by nature.

  Thus, in the opening appearance of the protagonists we can see an instability at the heart of their relationship. Cleopatra’s ‘I’ll seem the fool I am not’ is also ambiguous and refers to her letting Antony think that she is naïve; the subsequent, ‘Antony/ Will be – himself’ implies that he will simply continue to see their relationship in the way that suits him and thereby fail to see things as they are. This insight is immediately confirmed, when, in response to her more sensible suggestion that they should listen to Octavius’s messengers, he extols her nature, in which ‘every passion strives to make/Itself, in thee, fair and admired’. In this context, the word fair means both beautiful and honest, confirming his belief that her qualities are genuinely admirable. 

   The double-meaning in Cleopatra’s reply can also be seen to contain an inner contradiction. Attachment to artifice in her engagement with Antony is at odds with any serious concern about his feelings towards Fulvia, his relationship with Cleopatra thrives on infidelity. He is entranced by her sexuality and she would not be so drawn to a disciplined and cautious man. Her making a pretence of antagonism to his interest in other women is merely an expression of her mercurial gift for playing with the quarrel at hand. This is another way in which the relationship is nourished by its own instability. 

Act 1, scene ii

                               Alexandria. Cleopatra’s Palace

Charmian. Then belike my children shall have no names. Prithee, how many boys and wenches must I have? 

 Soothsayer. If every of your wishes had a womb, and fertile every wish, a million.

Charmian. Out fool! I forgive thee for a witch.

 Alexas. You think that none but your sheets are privy to your wishes.

Charmian. Nay, come, tell Iras hers.

Alexas. We’ll know all our fortunes.

Enobarbus. Mine, and most of our fortunes, tonight, shall be – drunk to bed.

Iras. There’s a palm presages chastity, if nothing else.

Charmian. E’en as the o’flowing Nilus presageth famine.

Iras. Go, you wild bedfellow, you cannot soothsay.

Charmian. Nay, if an oily palm be not a good prognostication, I cannot scratch mine ear. Prithee, tell her but a workyday fortune.

Soothsayer. Your fortunes are alike.

Iras. But how, but how? Give me particulars.

Soothsayer. I have said.

Iras. Am I not an inch of fortune better than she?

Charmian. Well, if you were but an inch of fortune better than I, where would you choose it?

Iras. Not in my husband’s nose.

Charmian. Our worser thoughts Heavens mend! Alexas – come, his fortune, his fortune! O let him marry a woman that cannot go, sweet Isis, I beseech thee, and let her die too, and give him a worse, and let worse follow worse till the worst of all follow him laughing to his grave, fiftyfold a cuckold! Good Isis, hear me this prayer, though thou deny me a matter of more weight: good Isis, I beseech thee!                  (lines 35 to 70)

The episode from which these lines are quoted has been taken to represent the atmosphere of sexual restlessness that pervades the life of Cleopatra’s Alexandria, but it has a much sharper and more specific reference. As a moment in the action that follows directly upon the opening exchange between the protagonists, it adds another piece to the mosaic by illuminating the psychology of their relationship in ways that are relevant to the overall action of the play. Immediately before the quoted passage, Charmian has confessed to wishing that she could marry Octavius and enjoy the life of her mistress as an equal, thus being fully part of her free and hedonistic world (lines 28 to 30). This prompts a natural connection with the lines 39 to 43, in which the soothsayer’s allegory is given an earthy and direct interpretation by Alexas. His allusion to compulsive sexual activity is both a strong echo of what we have already seen in the portrayal of Cleopatra, as a normal preoccupation of her world. This is obviously continued in Charmian’s judgement upon the ‘chastity’ of Enobarbus. 

   Since in these lines nothing is contributed to the unfolding of the narrative, meaning in this brief burlesque lies in its significance to the ideas that lie behind the action. Specifically, the soothsayer is an entertainer whose prophecies are, in the main, based on what might be observed by any reasonably alert person, while his subjects are engaged in various kinds of play with him and with each other. At line 60 he steps back to allow Charmian and Iras an opportunity to decide which way the conversation might develop, and it is in this change of direction that we find a deeper meaning. Charmian’s question concerning an inch of fortune invites the response that is made by her fellow attendant, so that together they intensify the nature of the exchange. Allusion to size incorporates a suggestion of male response to sexual excitement; in this an underlying trend towards sexual fantasy becomes quite explicit and Charmian feigns reproof as an expression of pleasure (‘Our worser thoughts Heavens mend!’).

   Because at this point she introduces the matter of Alexas’s fortune the dialogue takes another turn, in which a sudden and highly suggestive change of mood occurs. By assuming an attitude of violent animosity, Charmian makes his plain appearance the enemy of her fantasy, and a reason to wish upon him all of the humiliations he deserves. It should be remembered, of course, that the action in this episode is a form of play-acting, and when Iras has added her mock-tirade Alexas himself joins in the game (lines   ). However, the turn of thought from sexual fantasy to cruelty is given a wild force by inconsistency and over-emphasis. Charmian lets her mind wander in the transition from ‘Let him marry a woman that cannot go’ to ‘give him a worse’ meaning an adulterous wife. Then, the movement from ‘worser thoughts’ to a manic repetition of ‘worse’ mimics her own descent.    

   Thus, the episode as a whole can be seen as a parallel to the main action of the play. As we have been shown in the opening scene, the relationship between Antony and Cleopatra appears to be defined by psychological conflict and internal contradiction. Thus, the instability that suddenly tips Charmian’s speech from sexual fantasy to mental aggression suggests that something important is being revealed. In particular, it amplifies the feeling of uncertainty about the situation of the lovers as it has emerged in the clash of Antony’s naturalism with Cleopatra’s contriving. Either of these taken separately could be thought to threaten the relationship. His self-affirming reflection upon universal values is a transparent attempt to vindicate his judgement and its origins while she is under pressure to maintain a high-wire act that will keep him enthralled. In this precarious atmosphere, the lively performance which identifies sexual fantasy and cruelty therefore anticipates a further and more decisive rupture.

   When in this scene Antony learns of the actions of his wife and brother against Octavius he becomes acutely aware of his own neglect and resolves to break the ‘strong Egyptian fetters’ (lines 115 and 116). His change of attitude is immediately re-enforced by the news of Fulvia’s death, and a sense of remorseful disgust with himself is reflected in the speech (lines 121 to 131). Interfused with his recognition that Fulvia’s death has been wished for is a clear perception of what has infected his mind (‘I must from this enchanting queen break off’). Thus, in the ensuing exchange with Enobarbus there is a tension between Antony’s determination to hold fast to what he has just decided and his friend’s bawdy and jocular defence of Cleopatra, which refers not only to her erotic attractions but also to the genuineness and depth of her love. And while it has been shown that Enobarbus is himself enthralled by the life they enjoy in Alexandria, and so might easily be dismissed, the exchange keeps alive our sense of Antony’s susceptibility in this situation. Even as an incidental moment in the narrative this piece in the mosaic shows the instability as an enduring psychological factor. The protagonist is not allowed the luxury of simply turning from one course of action to another.

Act 1, scene iii 

                                     Alexandria. Cleopatra’s Palace 

The first part of this scene is prefaced by a difference of opinion between Charmian and Cleopatra in which the former’s standard advice to women is categorically rejected, and in this way, we are introduced to the deliberate nature of the Queen’s response to Antony’s impending departure. Cleopatra knows from the prevalence of messages from Rome that demanding changes have been taking place and is anxious that he is going to leave her. From the moment of his appearance she acts against his giving voice to this intention. 

                                    Enter Antony  

Charmian. But here comes Antony.

Cleopatra.                                            I am sick and sullen.

Antony. I am sorry to give breathing to my purpose –

Cleopatra. Help me away, dear Charmian! I shall fall.

         It cannot be thus long; the sides of nature

         Will not sustain it.

Antony.                               Now, my dearest queen –

Cleopatra. Pray you, stand farther from me.

Antony.                                                 What’s the matter?

Cleopatra. I know by that same eye there’s some good news.

                  What, says the married woman you may go?

                  Would she had never given you leave to come!

                  Let her not say ‘tis I that keep you here

                  I have no power upon you; hers you are.

Antony. The gods best know –

Cleopatra.                                   O, never was there queen

                  So mightily betrayed! Yet at the first

                  I saw the treasons planted.

Antony.                                                 Cleopatra –

Cleopatra. Why should I think you could be mine, and true

                  (Though you in swearing shake the thronèd gods)

                  Who have been false to Fulvia? Riotous madness

                  To be entangled with those mouth-made vows        

                  Which break themselves in swearing.

Antony.                                                          Most sweet queen –

Cleopatra. Nay, pray, seek no colour for your going.

                  But bid farewell, and go. When you sued staying.

                  Then was the time for words: no going then;

                  Eternity was in our lips and eyes,

                  Bliss in our brows bent, none our parts so poor

                  But was a race of heaven; they are so still,

                  Or thou, the greatest soldier of the world,

                  Art turned the greatest liar.      (lines 12 to 39)

True to her nature, Cleopatra is, at once, calculating and chaotic. When Antony ventures to ‘give breathing’ to his intentions she feigns collapse as an immediate ploy to defer such a statement until she has had sufficient opportunity to change his mind. This is why she interrupts his attempts to speak and in a seemingly scattered and aggressive style, beginning with a formal rebuke and following with diverse comments upon her situation. She denies Antony a footing in the conversation while creating a confusion of observations and underlying attitudes. Thus, a dialogue alive with comedy is also infused with psychological meaning that is directly related to the significance of the dramatic unfolding of the action.

   The opening comment, in lines 19 to 23, re-iterates the idea of Antony as Fulvia’s obedient slave, and this leads on to a sense of betrayal in the outrageously mistreated victim, Cleopatra herself (lines 24 to 26). However, in lines 27 to 31 she shares her grievance with Fulvia – they are both victims of the ‘riotous madness’ inflicted upon women by men and their hypocritical manipulations. A somewhat puzzling mobility in Cleopatra’s perception of Fulvia becomes comprehensible when we examine the off-hand dismissal of Antony in lines 32 to 39. The evocation of past rapture blends into the speech another incongruous element that is designed to both move and unsettle, since it wildly augments male hypocrisy by adding his disregard for a ‘spiritual’ integrity within their emotional and physical attachment. Thus, it is because Cleopatra is launching a deliberately disordered and immobilizing attack on Antony’s sense of honour that she changes tack in her attitude towards Fulvia. To be morally convincing she must be impartial in her argument, and that is implied in the citing of wrongs done to a woman to whom she is ill-disposed. 

   Presented in this way, Cleopatra’s invitation, ‘seek no colour for your going. But bid farewell, and go.’ is impossible to accept. At the same time, it is already impossible for Antony to depart leaving the future of their relationship in doubt, much less having made a clean break from her. So, when at last he is given the space to deliver his explanation (lines 41 to 56) he starts by reassuring her that, ‘my full heart/Remains in use with you’). This speech closes with the news of Fulvia’s death, which draws from Cleopatra the versatile cruelty of ‘Can Fulvia die?’ Far from creating a mood of conciliation Antony spurs her on to greater aggression, and she turns his celebration of the death into grounds for further moral condemnation (lines 61 to 79) based on her affinity with his wife. This passage ends with an explicit reference to honour, and therefore it suggests that Cleopatra will persist on this theme until she has extracted a satisfactory avowal from Antony that she can trust. However, his blunt and impatient decision to leave her provokes another extraordinary twist in her performance.

Cleopatra. Courteous lord, one word.

                  Sir, you and I must part, but that’s not it:

                  Sir, you and I have loved, but there’s not it:

                  That you know well. Something there is I would – 

                  O, my oblivion is a very Antony – 

                  And I am all forgotten.

Antony.                                        But that your royalty

                  Holds idleness your subject, I should take you

                  For idleness itself.

Cleopatra.                          ‘Tis sweating labour

                  To bear such idleness so near the heart

                  As Cleopatra this. But, sir, forgive me,

                  Since my becomings kill me when they do not

                  Eye well to you. Your honour calls you hence;

                  Therefore be deaf to my unpitied folly,

                  And all the gods go with you. Upon your sword

                  Sit laurel victory, and smooth success

                  Be strewed before your feet!

Antony.                                                 Let us go. Come:

                  Our separation so abides and flies

                  That thou residing here goes yet with me,

                  And I hence fleeting here remain with thee.

                  Away!                                    (lines 86 to 105)

Aware that her taunts have gone too far, Cleopatra feels that she must avoid ending the exchange on this note, and so lines 87 and 89 detain Antony while she thinks of something to say. Nothing emerges out of the initial, ‘Something there is I would’, and so she ascribes a pointed meaning to the her own mental blank. Together with the surface meaning that he has the power to take away her ability to compose her thoughts, Cleopatra makes a sexual allusion that echoes the Let Rome in Tiber melt speech of the opening scene. In that connection the word oblivion refers to the climax of what Antony calls the ‘nobleness of life’; being all forgotten is the loss of self-possession and an ecstatic form of letting-go. Hence in her moment of confusion Cleopatra rescues herself by playing upon Antony’s erotic imagination and it is clear that he is receptive to all that she wishes to convey. Though he appears to be censorious, Antony is ambivalent about idleness, which is also a form of letting-go and therefore responds to her conception of oblivion. While appearing to reprove her he is actually indulging her, the spur to his imagination has softened his feeling towards her. 

   An ingenious psychological spring has released Cleopatra from the need to constrain, and created the conditions for a shared warmth and sympathy between them. The image of sweating labour alludes to the prodigious effort of invention that she has expended on behalf of their relationship as a deep expression of idleness and oblivion; her antipathy becomes transformed into conciliation while the honour of his enterprise is now respected and given her blessing. Thus, when Antony embraces the change of tone and attitude as he departs we see that Cleopatra has skilfully averted the outcome she had feared.

   The protagonist’s exposure to the instability of moral phenomena in this encounter is perfectly obvious. Antony’s conception of himself as exemplifying the nobleness of life in terms of naturalism is defined by his relationship with Cleopatra. In this respect, his conception of a life that is valued and towards which he can conceive of himself as morally responsible is entangled with her conception of a life that is valued. Accordingly, the sense of herself that gives value to her life and to which she might be morally responsible is at odds with his naturalism, being inclined towards artifice and precarious invention. The next piece in the mosaic provides a wider context for this instability, in an exchange between Octavius and Lepidus. At the close of this exchange an essential statement is made of the Roman perception of how things have gone awry for Antony, and this perception makes his position susceptible to future uncertainty.

Act 1, scene iv

                                             Rome, Caesar’s House

Caesar.                                                                    Antony,

                  Leave thy lascivious wassails. When thou once

                  Was beaten from Modena, where thou slew’st

                  Hurtius and Pausa, consuls, at thy heel

                  Did famine follow, whom thou fought’st against

                  (Though daintily brought up) with patience more

                  Than savages could suffer. Thou didst drink

                  The stale of horses, and the gilded puddle

                  Which beasts would cough at. Thy palate then did

                  deign

                  The roughest berry on the rudest hedge.

                  Yea, like the stag when snow the pasture sheets,

                  The barks of trees thou browsed. On the Alps

                  It is reported thou didst eat strange flesh,

                  Which some did die to look on. And all this

                  (It wounds thine honour that I speak it now)

                  Was borne so like a soldier that thy cheek

                  So much as lanked not.      (lines 33 to 71)

The placement of this speech soon after the lovers’ sensual reverie is more than merely an opposition of the values of the conqueror to those of the hedonist. Octavius’s image of Antony as the model of endurance and self-mastery in a soldier is explicitly intended to highlight the qualities that have given him his status and fame. By reflecting on the past as he does, Octavius both revives the extremes to which endurance and self-mastery have been taken and portrays in Antony a combination of social elevation with a primitive and unspoiled strength. This contrast between the human ideal that Antony has represented and the decadent he has become exposes him to the argument that he is no longer worthy of his place in the world. 

In Act 2, Octavius’s sinister intentions develop in ways that betray the ruthless nature of his ambition. When he returns to Rome, Antony is asked to explain to Octavius his part in the actions of Fulvia and Lucius, and though an innocent account of the matter is justified and Antony is able to clear his name, the actions have jeopardized his position. Thus, in an already weakened state, he is further under attack for neglecting duties and obligations of a military kind; it is evident that the issue is forced in order to create a need for some significant reconciliation to be established (Act 2, scene ii, lines 59 to 100).

Act 2, scene ii

Caesar. I do not much dislike the matter, but

         The manner of his speech; for’t cannot be

         We will remain in friendship, our conditions

         So diff’ring in their acts. Yet if I knew

         What hoop would hold us stanch, from edge to edge

         O’th’ world I would pursue it.

Agrippa.                                               Give me leave, Caesar.

Caesar. Speak Agrippa.

Agrippa. Thou hast a sister by the mother’s side,

         Admired Octavia: great Mark Antony

         Is now a widower.

Caesar.                                Say not so Agrippa:

         If Cleopatra heard you, your reproof 

         Were well deserved of rashness.

Antony. I am not married, Caesar: let me hear

         Agrippa further speak.

Agrippa. To hold you in perpetual amity,

         To make you brothers, and to knit your hearts

         With an unslipping knot, take Antony

         Octavia to his wife; whose beauty claims 

         No worse a husband than the best of men;

         Whose virtues and whose general graces speak

         That which none else can utter. By this marriage

         All little jealousies, which now seem great,

         And all great fears, which now import their dangers

         Would then be nothing: truths would be tales,

         Where now half-tales be truths: her love to both

         Would each to other, and all loves to both,

         Draw after her. Pardon what I have spoke;

         For ‘tis a studied, not a present thought

         By duty ruminated.

Antony.                               Will Caesar speak?

Caesar. Not ‘till he hears how Antony is touched

         With what is spoke already.

Antony.                                        What power is in Agrippa,

         If I were to say, ‘Agrippa be it so,’

         To make this good?

Caesar.                                The power of Caesar, and

         His power unto Octavia.

Antony.                                        May I never

         To this good purpose, that fairly blows,

         Dream of impediment! Let me have thy hand.

         Further this act of grace, and from this hour

         The heart of brothers govern in our loves

         And sway our great designs.

Caesar.                                                  There’s my hand.

         A sister I bequeath you, whom no brother

          Did ever love so dearly. Let her live

         To join our kingdoms and our hearts, and never

         Fly off our loves again.                 (lines 114 to 156)

In order to understand this passage, we should be alive to ways in which language must respond to the instability of moral phenomena. Reflective life entails a sense of responsibility to its value, and this entails moral judgement. We cannot form such judgement in a language that is neutral; rather its expression must oppose the instability so as to ensure that our judgement is taken seriously. (It can also expose the speaker to comedy, and Antony and Cleopatra is skilful in covering a wide range of possibilities in this respect.) In the above exchanges, a language sensitive to the instability is employed in order to create a subtle web of deception that is designed to exploit the weakness of Antony’s case.

   Thus, in lines 114 to 119, Octavius is specific in his requirement of a correct expression of at least regret, if not contrition, after the brash response in lines 91 to 102 from which estrangement will otherwise follow. The threat of irreconcilable difference, however, leads into a wish that there might be a ‘hoop that would hold us stanch’, and this is answered in turn by Agrippa. We can already see in Octavius a psychological move that both puts Antony on the back foot and offers him the opportunity to restore his balance by mending the relationship between them. In concert with this move, Agrippa makes a proposal that is saturated in the language of moral sensitivity as well as practical sense. Hence the knitting of hearts between Octavius and Antony is united with a characterization of the latter as the best of men together with that of Octavia as the epitome of virtue in a woman. This comprehensive harmonization based on the most elevated of human values is promoted as a means by which all future dissension and present differences, real and perceived, might be averted and erased. And, above all, Agrippa claims that marriage between Antony and Octavia will strengthen the love between all three of them.

   The exploitation of Antony in this argument is suggested not only in the psychological progression from Octavius’s speech to Agrippa’s, but also in an ingenuous apology for appearing to speak out of turn and for doing so only from a sense of duty. This self-effacing conclusion to Agrippa’s speech is designed to conceal the obvious fact that he has just executed a plan that he has been given by his general. To any detached observer, it is inconceivable that an underling like Agrippa should independently propose a solution that depends upon deciding the future of his leader’s sister. That he is following the will of Octavius in a hidden purpose to that hoodwink Antony is confirmed, moreover, in a feigned opposition to the initial suggestion of the marriage (lines 21 to 24). By standing apart and allowing Antony to urge more from Agrippa, Octavius encourages the impression that the thought and decision to which it leads has been strictly their business.

   In this setting of deception, the incident illuminates the central characters in ways that might be considered to be complementary. Whereas Octavius reveals himself to be callous in his political ambitions and perfectly willing to make use of his sister whatever the consequences,

Antony is gulled by Agrippa’s eloquent moral language into accepting its hollow promise of a happy resolution to the conflict with Octavius and restitution of their shared military enterprises. The disciplined and clear thinking of one is matched by a serious loss of judgement in the other. Octavius has formed this plan because he thinks it inevitable that Antony will betray Octavia and return to Cleopatra and implicitly points to the consequences of such an action, ‘A sister I bequeath to you, whom no brother/ Did ever love so dearly’. Antony may feel that he has, in spite of her superior cunning, released himself from Cleopatra, but the means by which he has freed himself is leading him into a trap. The descent into an inattentive surrender to feeling and moral deception betrays the influence that immersion in sexual fantasy has had over him, and is in striking contrast to the resourceful Antony of Julius Caesar. His bright mood in accepting the proposal suggests that he feels that he is acting with clarity and purpose, but this only betrays the depth to which he is deluded (lines 147 to 152).

Thus, we can see how the early scenes of the play present us with two significant ways in which the instability of moral phenomena exerts a profound influence on Antony’s actions and experience. His enthrallment to Cleopatra is beset by conflicting ideas about the nature of their relationship that are largely concealed from him, while the history of his life as a Roman general and centre of power is vulnerable to a relationship with Octavius that is slipping out of his grasp and makes him prey to deceptively easy solutions. We can also appreciate how the nature of this instability has been given its lucid exposition by the use of dramatic form. Hence, in contrast with the biography of Plutarch’s Lives, dramatic interplay in Antony and Cleopatra reveals the feelings and motivations of the characters as they are realized in action. As a consequence of such close attention to the inner portrayal of the characters, events are at first shaped independently by the two significant manifestations of the instability of moral phenomena, but this will lead into an increasingly complicated interference between them as Antony’s fortunes decline.

Soon we will see how accurately Octavius has judged the situation and this is preceded by a meeting in which the attractions of Cleopatra are described to Agrippa, and undoubtedly to his satisfaction (Act 2, scene ii).

Enobarbus’s speech puts Plutarch’s description of her into the sensory experience of a character (lines 196 to 225). In this connection, it parallels the viewing of a painting, and resembles a Renaissance image with its aerial perspective and light-suffused colour. This is achieved both in the overall structure of the speech and in the progress and detailed articulation of individual elements. Hence the description is highly sensuous and predominantly visual in nature, and moves logically from foreground to background so that one detailed aspect of the ‘painting’ follows clearly from another. Accordingly, the opening lines are flowing and lucid.

Enobarbus. The barge she sat in, like a burnished throne,

         Burned on the water: the poop was beaten gold;

         Purple the sails, and so perfumèd that

         The winds were lovesick with them; the oars were silver,

         Which to the tune of flutes kept stroke and made

          The water which they beat to follow faster,

         As amorous of their strokes.         (lines 197 to 203)

In this description of an object rather than an action, we can see how the literary parallel is visually organized, so that non-visual senses and ideas are worked into the visual image (as in ‘perfumed’ sails, ‘lovesick’ winds, oars keeping time to ‘the tune of flutes’ and the water being ‘amorous of their strokes’). This entails that instead of being in colour, the writing can evoke the effect of colours with which other kinds of imagery are expressively interwoven. Consequently, an image is created in words that are enlivened by their own kinds of flow and rhythm, (as in ‘like a burnished throne/Burned on the water’, ‘the poop was beaten gold/Purple the sails, and so perfumèd that/The winds were lovesick with them; the oars were silver’). This also enables the language to move easily from concrete imagery to more abstract ideas which are relevant to the aesthetic significance of what Enobarbus wishes to recall.

   The lines that follow take us to the centre of the picture.

                                                               For her own person,

         It beggared all description: she did lie

         In her pavilion, cloth-of-gold tissue,

         O’erpicturing that Venus where we see

         The fancy outwork nature:      (lines 203 to 211)

In this climactic moment, the continuation of physical description of the barge is surrounded by a more elaborate play with abstract imagery; the hyperbole of ‘beggared all description’ being contradicted by the allusion to artistic images of the goddess of love. Here, in ‘fancy outwork nature’ Enobarbus turns the ceremonious wonder of the event into an explicit reference to the artifice that transforms nature into a higher aesthetic form of being, as a Platonic fusion of love and beauty. Thus, the mood that has been created by epithets like lovesick and amorous, and their augmented personification, is developed so that Cleopatra’s power is elevated by an intensified abstraction in the language.

   The verbal picture is completed by the mythical attendants typical of an image of this kind, followed by what can be seen as a background to the main objects and figures.

                                                                        From the barge

         A strange invisible perfume hits the sense

         Of the adjacent wharfs. The city cast

         Her people out upon her. And Antony

         Enthroned i’ th’ market place did sit alone,

         Whistling to th’ air, which but for vacancy,

         Had gone to gaze on Cleopatra too

         And made a gap in nature.         (lines 217 to 224)

In these lines, the power of Cleopatra is spread out so that it becomes a perturbation in nature. In this the higher aesthetic form of being makes itself felt as an intangible force; perfume is characteristically an olfactory experience and therefore invisible, so here the adjective is for emphasis. Moreover, Antony sitting alone is an index to the exodus of the people, which would be extended to nature itself should it not create a vacuum.

   The organization of his speech by analogy with a painting enables Enobarbus to create an illumined physical image through which abstract ideas can appear. Accordingly, the figures and objects are given composure by an interplay of concrete and abstract elements that exceeds nature in effect and significance; there is a logical order from ‘the winds were lovesick’ to ‘made a gap in nature’. In the narrative mosaic, its purpose to convey the power of Cleopatra echoes the evocation of Alexandria and its hold on Antony in Act 1. However, the richness and intensity of Shakespeare’s inventive employment of dramatic form is much greater because this reflection by Enobarbus occurs at a critical moment, and makes a strong allusion to the psychological compulsion that will drive Antony back to Cleopatra.

   Shortly after, Enobarbus affirms this compulsion in Antony and then underlines in vivid sensual terms the heightened naturalism of his description of Cleopatra.

Maecenas. Now Antony must leave her utterly.

Enobarbus. Never; he will not:

         Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale

         Her infinite variety: other women cloy

         The appetites they feed, but she makes hungry

         Where most she satisfies; for vilest things

         Become themselves in her, that the holy priests

         Bless her when she is riggish.           (lines 239 to 246)

It is important to distinguish the whole of Enobarbus’s conception of Cleopatra from a transcendent vision of her; rather, she is made compelling by the depth of her expression of natural powers. This, of course, shows Enobarbus in sympathy with the claim that the lovers exemplify ‘the nobleness of life’, and is underlined by his observation that her wantonness has the blessing of priests. The guardians of our highest moral standards are seen to bend to an authority that lies in her own nature.

   Almost immediately, Antony’s will complies with the evocation of Cleopatra’s power over him. In the next scene (Act 2, scene iii), a soothsayer warns him of the danger of being too close to Octavius, and points to competitive circumstances in which Antony is defeated by his rival. After having conceded the truth of this warning, Antony is reconciled to the acceptance of his ‘fetters’.

Antony.                               Be it art or hap,

         He hath spoken true. The very dice obey him,

         And in our sports my better cunning faints

         Under his chance: if we draw lots, he speeds;

         His cocks do win the battle still of mine

         When it is all to naught, and his quails ever

         Beat mine, inhooped, at odds. I will to Egypt:

         And though I make this marriage for my peace,

         I’ th’ East my pleasure lies.        (lines 31 to 41)

The inattention that we have seen in Antony’s acceptance of Agrippa’s proposal is repeated here in a mind clouded by superstition and desire. Because, in their sport, Fortune seems to side with Octavius it is assumed that Antony has no option but to withdraw, and this gives him reason to go where his ‘pleasure lies’. Thus, in a moment that is highly sensitive to his future and the outcome of his aims and ambitions, Antony surrenders to fleeting inclination and prepares to give his opponent an excuse to vanquish him completely. The instability in both spheres of his life coincide to turn a casual decision into an impending catastrophe for Antony. And considering that this decision hinges on the contribution of a soothsayer, we can assume that the powers of Cleopatra have played the dominant part in his motivation.

   Given this frame of mind, Antony is deprived of resources when, in Act 3, Octavius takes action in keeping with his plan. We first know about it in the reasons that are presented to Octavia for the dissolution of her marriage to Antony.

Act 3, scene iv

                                    Athens. Antony’s House

Antony. Nay, nay, Octavia, not only that,

         That were excusable, and thousands more

         Of semblable import – but he hath waged

         New wars ‘gainst Pompey; made his will and read it

         To public ear;

         Spoke scantly of me; when perforce he could not

         But pay me terms of honour, cold and sickly

         He vented them, most narrow measure lent me;

         When the best hint was given him, he not took’t,

         Or did it from his teeth.                 (lines 1 to 9)

 At the heart of this speech is a manipulation of honour as a means of acquiring power, and part of this lies in Octavius’s appeal to the people for support. Antony prefaces his complaint by reference to new wars with Pompey, but the next scene shows that Antony himself has been involved in them and even arranged for Pompey’s murder. It is by denying Antony proper recognition that Octavius has unthreaded the agreement between them; this has led to the break with Octavia that justifies the restoration of enmity between the two men. A further twist in the way that moral ideas are employed for personal gain can be seen in the dishonourable treatment of Octavia from both sides. The heartless sacrifice of his sister is completed by Octavius when he denies Antony recognition, and Antony himself cites contempt for his honour to explain the separation from Octavia (see also lines 20 to 24). His attitude is highlighted in the cold rejection of her with which Antony closes the scene.

   Further clarification of Antony’s situation is presented in scene v in which Eros explains what has happened to Enobarbus.

Eros. Caesar and Lepidus have waged wars upon Pompey.

Enobarbus. This is old. What is the success?

Eros. Caesar, having made use of him in the wars ‘gainst Pompey,

         presently denied him rivality, would not let him take part in the

         glory of the action; and not resting here, accuses him of letters he          had formerly wrote to Pompey; upon his own appeal, seizes him; so          the poor third is up, till death enlarge his confine.

Enobarbus. Then, world, thou hast a pair of chaps, no more;

         And throw between them all the food thou hast,

         They’ll grind the one the other. Where’s Antony?

Eros. He’s walking in the garden – thus, and spurns

         The rush that lies before him; cries “Fool Lepidus!”

         And threats the throat of that his officer 

         That murd’red Pompey.               (lines 4 to 20)

From this exchange, we can see how completely Octavius has out-manoeuvred all of the opposition to his power. In having imprisoned Lepidus (the ‘poor third’ of the triumvirate), with the intention of executing him, and encouraged Antony to have Pompey removed, he has also isolated Antony himself. Enobarbus insinuates as much in his image of a pair of jaws that has been reduced to an upper and lower jaw working independently and grinding against each other. In addition to this, Eros’ response to the question, ‘Where’s Antony?’ suggests that a kind of paralysis has set in. The ‘rush that lies before him’ refers to the turbulent and unpredictable situation that grows increasingly around Antony as he declines to act and looks for an excuse to blame others. Thus, as things now stand the only support for him lies in his morally unstable partnership with Cleopatra. Moreover, in looking forward to the pleasures of Alexandria he is already relinquishing the fibre that is essential to maintaining his status, and, in his frailty, he is incapable of seeing that the critical moment, in which he separated himself from Octavia, has already passed. Now, he is in a mist and does not quite know where he is going.

   In all of this we can divine the mixture of reasons why Octavius is going to prevail over Antony, and, specifically, the psychological destruction of Antony is defined by a convergence of his morally unstable relationships with Cleopatra and with Octavius. This takes a decisive turn in Act 3, scene vii, when, against the judgement of others – in particular Enobarbus – Antony chooses the support of Cleopatra by initiating the battle at sea. In this connection, anxiety has been created by the swift progress of Octavius in taking Toryne and it is combined in this scene with resistance to Antony’s dependence upon Egypt. Apart from suggesting panic and lack of preparation, made even more explicit by Antony’s, ‘For that he dares he dares us to’t’ (line 29), it creates a feeling of dissension that has unfortunate consequences. In the heat of battle Cleopatra loses her nerve and withdraws her fleet (scene x).

Enobarbus.                                           How appears the fight?

Scarus. On our side like the tokened pestilence,

         Where death is sure. Yon ribaudred nag of Egypt – 

         Whom leprosy o’ertake – i’ th’ midst o’ th’ fight,

         When vantage like a pair of twins appeared,

         Both as the same, or rather ours the elder,

         The breeze upon her, like a cow in June,

         Hoists sail and flies.

Enobarbus.                                  That I behold:

         Mine eyes did sicken at the sight, and could not

          Endure a further view.

Scarus.                                         She once being loofed,

         The noble ruin of her magic, Antony,

         Claps on his sea wing, and (like a doting mallard)

         Leaving the fight in height, flies after her.

         I never saw an action of such shame;

         Experience, manhood, honour, ne’er before

         Did so violate itself.               (lines 8 to 23)

In the view of Scarus, Antony’s side holds a slight advantage when Cleopatra is overcome by fear, and this gives emphasis to how the circumstances have undermined her confidence. Not only has Octavius made unnerving progress immediately prior to the engagement but Antony’s reasoning is generated more by bravado than by careful and persuasive calculation. We can easily surmise that already the balance of power is shifting from a ‘ruined’ Antony who is no longer capable of thinking constructively to a mentally keen and unscrupulous Octavius. In this respect, Cleopatra’s judgement is confirmed by Antony’s impulsively following in her wake, and virtually handing his place in the world to his rival. Emotional attachment to her is only part of the explanation, as it is also clear that a superstitious fear of losing to Octavius in all situations has enslaved Antony to the one remaining person upon whom he depends. Scarus is fully aware that his leader has already ‘kissed away / Kingdoms and provinces’ (lines 5 to 8); above all through shame and loss of honour. 

After the defeat at Actium we are presented directly with the bleak moral interior of the characters, especially that of the protagonists. In scene xi there is a revealing encounter between them.

Antony. O, whither hast thou led me, Egypt? See

          How I convey my shame out of thine eyes

         By looking back. What I have left behind

         ‘Stroyed in dishonour.

Cleopatra.                                   O my lord, my lord,

         Forgive my fearful sails! I little thought

         You would have followed.

Antony.                                        Egypt, thou knew’st too well

         My heart was to thy rudder tied by th’ strings,

         And thou should’st tow me after. O’er my spirit 

         Thy supremacy thou knew’st, and that

         Thy beck might from the bidding of the gods

         Command me.

Cleopatra.                          O, my pardon!

Antony.                                                          Now I must

         To the young man send humble treaties, dodge

         And palter in the shifts of lowness, who

         With half the bulk o’ th’ world played as I pleased,

         Making and marring fortunes. You did know

         How much you were my conqueror, and that

         My sword, made weak by my affection, would

         Obey it on all cause.

Cleopatra.                                   Pardon, pardon!

Antony. Fall not a tear, I say, one of them rates

         All that is won and lost. Give me a kiss;

         Even this repays me. We sent our schoolmaster:

         Is ‘a come back? Love, I am full of lead.

         Some wine, within there, and our viands! Fortune knows

         We scorn her most when most she offers blows.

                                                                                 (lines 51 to 74)

What is revealed in these lines lies specifically in the progression of ideas in Antony’s speech. Thus, the question with which he begins is not an accusation but rhetorical; it serves to introduce a lament for his own failure, and this significantly outweighs the inclination to blame somebody else. In his present state of mind such blame would look to him like a petty evasion. It follows that when Cleopatra begs forgiveness and appeals to ignorance as a form of exoneration, Antony disputes the matter in lines 56 to 61 but this can be taken in one of two ways. He could be accusing her of deliberate betrayal or he could be saying that even in being overcome by fear she knew that he would be tied to her. The second sense is not so much an accusation as an entreaty to recognize the understanding between them that is at the heart of their relationship. It alludes to the life in their feelings for each other, and is even present in such abrasive wit as ‘Excellent falsehood’ and ‘Celerity is never more admired / Than by the negligent.’

   Antony is creating a subtle reorientation of his grief in this exchange. By turning the suspicion of treachery into an enquiry into the deep understanding the exists between them, he subordinates the effect of his catastrophic lapse to an enduring attachment that is intensified by their shared sorrow. In lines 61 to 68 he refers to humiliation at the hands of Octavius and the loss of great power, but these are put into perspective in lines 69 to 74 by an expansive evaluation – ‘Fall not a tear, I say, one of them rates / All that is won and lost.’ In his moment of privation, Antony revives the creed he espoused in the opening scene of the play, but, as in that case, the instability of moral phenomena makes this affirmation appear transitory.

In the haste of events taking effect upon them it is dramatically appropriate that Antony discovers the transitory nature of his affirmation by means of an interruption. Scene xiii includes a meeting between Octavius’s envoy Thidias and Cleopatra in which she abases herself before the victor and disowns her relationship with Antony as one that has been forced upon her. As the messenger completes the agreement by kissing her hand, Antony enters with Enobarbus, who has witnessed her treachery (lines 55 to 64). When Antony calls for someone in order to have Thidias whipped the significance of ‘All that is won and lost’ is not so easy to shrug off.

Antony. (Calling for servants) Approach there! – Ah,

         You kite! Now, gods and devils!

         Authority melts from me. Of late, when I cried ‘Ho!’

         Like boys unto a muss kings would start forth,

         And cry ‘Your will?’ Have you no ears? I am

         Antony yet.                                  (lines 89 to 93)

Antony’s memory of the luxuries of power creates a perfect setting for the whipping as a projection of his own inner suffering and in the time that Thidias is actually whipped Antony gives expression to his torment.

Antony. You were half blasted ere I knew you. Ha!

         Have I my pillow left unpressed in Rome,

         Forborne the getting of a lawful race,

         And by a gem of women, to be abused

         By one that looks on feeders?

Cleopatra.                                            Good my lord –

Antony. You have been a boggler ever;

         But when we in our viciousness grow hard

         (O misery on’t) the wise gods seel our eyes,

         In our own filth drop our judgements, make us

         Adore our errors, laugh at ‘s while we strut

         To our confusion.                     (lines 105 to 115)

In this tirade, another displacement complements the displacement of feeling we have just seen. Where grief has been transformed into a eulogy to their attachment to each other, now a token of Cleopatra’s compliance with Octavius is interpreted by Antony as an expression of sexual attraction to the messenger. Clearly, he betrays the pain of seeing his sensitivity so quickly violated, and this is particularly suggested in ‘the wise gods seel our eyes, / In our own filth drop our judgements’. For though he insists upon seeing himself as cuckolded on a grand scale (lines 126 to 131) it is late in the day for such a complaint, and Cleopatra’s responses, such as they are, register bewilderment. In this case, the displacement represents a substitute for what Antony cannot bear to admit, even to himself, especially after having by tortuous reasoning opened his heart to her. By acceding to the wishes of Octavius, she has at once succumbed to his mastery and abandoned Antony, showing his allure to have been primarily in the power that he no longer possesses.

   Thus, we can see a connection between the first speech, in which Antony’s behaviour contradicts the earlier claim that temporal power is a dispensable value, and the contradiction between Cleopatra as Antony and Enobarbus see her and the overwhelming importance to her of power and status. The Roman virtues of conquest, discipline, mastery in both physical and mental strength and enduring sovereignty are not simply antithetical to the sumptuous pleasures of Alexandria, to Cleopatra they are potent values by which she is constantly preoccupied. Throughout the play, we see this reflected in her fantasies of Antony when he is absent. So, his attempt to elevate their free-wheeling riot of sensuality and joyful hedonism is out of touch both with the nature of her interest in him, and with some of the values by which he lives and expects himself to be seen.

   When Antony finishes with Thidias a tentative enquiry betrays his true anxiety about Cleopatra’s feelings for him.

Antony. To flatter Caesar, would you mingle eyes 

With one that ties his points?

Cleopatra.                                            Not know me yet?

Antony. Cold-hearted toward me?

Cleopatra.                                            Ah, dear, if it be so,

         From my cold heart let heaven engender hail,

         And poison it in the source, and the first stone

         Drop in my neck: as it determines, so 

         Dissolve my life! The next Caesarion smite,

         Until by degrees the memory of my womb,

         Together with my brave Egyptians all,

         By the discandying of this pelleted storm,

         Lie graveless, till the flies and gnats of Nile

         Have buried them for prey.

Antony.                                                 I am satisfied.

                                                                        (lines 156 to 167)

Cleopatra is characteristically quick to realize what is required, and as we have already seen at some length she has all of the skill that is necessary to give Antony the reply he craves. As a declaration of love her hyperbole is pitched so as to wish upon herself, should she be forced to admit failure, a descent that is incomparably deeper than his loss, and so she prompts his recovery. Antony responds to this calculated act of persuasion because seeing through it would be too painful, and would leave him without any hope at all. However, his gathering resolve and seeking ‘one other gaudy night’ earns a more detached assessment. 

                                                                            Exeunt [all but Enobarbus]

Enobarbus. Now he’ll outstare the lightning, To be furious

         Is to be frighted out of fear, and in that mood

         The dove will peck the estridge, and I see still

         A diminution in our captain’s brain

         Restores his heart. When valour preys on reason,

         It eats the sword if fights with. I will seek

         Some way to leave him.

In Act 4, the convergent instability of moral phenomena at the heart of Antony’s experience slides into chaos. Correspondingly, the dramatic action does not conform to a theatrically constructed narrative with strong tension, but exemplifies the play’s mosaic of events and incidents that are underpinned by stages of moral decline in the protagonists. These are linked to a series of desertions which take different but related forms. And, as a prelude to this succession of events, we see, in Act 4, scene ii, a deepening of the inner disorder that is a significant factor in precipitating the various ways in which he is abandoned.

   On the eve of battle, and to the uneasiness of Cleopatra and Enobarbus, Antony sinks into sentimentality in addressing the soldiers upon whose courage he depends for success. In a confusion of wandering emotion and anticipation he reaches of low point of indecisiveness and uncertainty in the following speech.

Antony.                      Tend me tonight;

         May be it is the period of your duty.

         Haply you shall not see me more; or if,

         A mangled shadow. Perchance tomorrow

         You’ll serve another master. I look on you

         As one that takes his leave. Mine honest friends 

         I turn you not away, but like a master

         Married to your good service; stay till death.

         Tend me tonight two hours, I ask no more,

         And the gods yield thee for’t!

Enobarbus.                         What mean you, sir,

         To give them this discomfort? Look they weep,

         And I, an ass, am onion-eyesd; for shame,

         Transform us not to women.

Antony.                               Ho, ho, ho!

         Now the witch take me if I meant it thus!

         Grace grow where those drops fall! My hearty friends,

         You take me in too dolorous a sense,

         For I spake to you for your comfort, did desire you

         To burn this night with torches. Know my hearts,

         I hope well of tomorrow, and will lead you

         Where rather I’ll expect victorious life

         Than death and honour. Let’s to supper, come,

         And drown consideration.    (lines 24 to 45)

Antony’s maudlin sense of fellowship overflows into self-directed pathos, in a way that suggests an absence of self-awareness, and a loss of contact with the circumstances in which he is speaking. His comical transition from a despairing meditation upon the imminent conflict to the evocation of a touching deathbed scene provokes a belated response from Enobarbus, who has earlier been silenced for speaking out of turn. The collapse of authority is accentuated by Antony’s attempt to undo the impression he has made by means of a tenuous recollection of what he has said. This wayward and unfocused performance before Cleopatra and Enobarbus is a deadly contribution to the series of desertions that will follow.

   The first of these is insinuated in the next scene (Act 4, scene iii), in which some of Antony’s soldiers have been aware of omens and are subjected to unsettling sounds whose source is unknown (lines 10 to 16). This somewhat eerie experience is interpreted in keeping with the mood of pessimism and depression that has fallen upon their camp, and one soldier surmises, ‘’Tis the god Hercules, whom Antony loved, / Now leaves him.’ To assume that the gods are leaving Antony is akin to an act of desertion; it expresses a loss of faith in him and, together with this, a fear of remaining in his presence.

   In scene v, Antony is told of Enobarbus’s defection and reacts as follows.

Antony. Go, Eros, and send his treasure after; do it;

         Detain no jot, I charge thee. Write to him

         (I will subscribe) gentle adieu and greetings;

         Say that I wish he never find more cause

         To change a master. O, my fortunes have

         Corrupted honest men! Dispatch. Enobarbus!

                                                                                 (lines 12 to 17)

Antony’s sorrow at this treachery is consistent with the softening that we have just seen in his sentimental attitude to his men. But in both we can also see an expression of anxiety over the crumbling away of his world. A gesture of restitution is present in the conciliatory action towards Enobarbus, and wishing that he ‘never more find cause to change a master’ reflects an impulse to rebuilt or repair. The master’s frame of mind in this connection is all the more striking when we consider that his friend has been deeply attached to the Alexandrian life made possible for him by Antony and Cleopatra. It conveys a strong sense of his having overcome the offense.

   However, life has become pitiless for Antony, as even his generosity is punished when Enobarbus is crushed by shame and guilt, and this foreshadows the final and calamitous desertions before the battle at sea.

Act 4, scene xii

                                                               Alarum afar off, as at a sea fight.

Scarus.                                         Swallows have built

         In Cleopatra’s sails their nests. The augurers

         Say they know not, they cannot tell, look grimly,

         And dare not speak their knowledge. Antony

         Is valiant and dejected, and by starts

         His fettered fortunes give him hope and fear

         Of what he has, and has not.

                                             Enter Antony.

Antony.                                                 All is lost!

         This foul Egyptian hath betrayèd me:

         My fleet hath yielded to the foe, and yonder

         They cast their caps up and carouse together

         Like friends long lost. Triple-turned whore ‘tis thou

         Hast sold me to this novice, and my heart

         Makes only wars on thee.              (lines 3 to 15)

At the battle of Actium, Cleopatra has led her fleet from the conflict out of fear and panic, but now her men are acting from orders. Her loss of confidence in Antony has been clearly indicated by the action, which has also shown her agreeing to a proposal made by Octavius that excludes Antony from any trace of mercy. Moreover, the latter’s full awareness of the betrayal is implied by the circumstances leading to the whipping of Thidias. Thus, in conjunction with the desertion of his navy, including, no doubt, a number of his ‘sad captains’, Antony is inescapably exposed to the true nature of Cleopatra’s interest in him; hence the accusation ‘Triple-turned whore’ conveys a recognition that her love of power has been the dominant impulse behind their relationship. His desire for revenge is created by more than a response to personal injury.

Antony.                                        Betrayed I am.

         O this false soul of Egypt! This grave charm

         Whose eye becked forth my wars, and called them home

         Whose bosom was my crownet, my chief end,

         Like a right gypsy hath at fast and loose

         Beguiled me, to the very heart of loss.

                                                               (lines 24 to 28)

         The shirt of Nessus is upon me; teach me,

         Alcides, thou mine ancestor, thy rage. 

                                                               (lines 43 to 44)

In these lines, we can see that in the betrayal Antony suffers a reversal in the understanding that has been implicit in his sense of a life that has value and meaning. A detailed and precise portrayal of inner life by dramatic form reveals the substance within what might superficially appear to be commonplace and contingent. So, his desire for revenge can be seen as anger directed at his own sense of disillusionment. Scene xiv presents us with a deeper exploration of his state of mind.

Antony. Eros, thou yet beholds’t me?

Eros.                                                               Ay, noble lord.

Antony. Sometimes we see a cloud that’s dragonish.

         A vapour sometime like a bear or lion,

         A towered citadel, a pendant rock,

         A forkèd mountain, or blue promontory

         With trees upon it that nod unto the world

         And mock our eyes with air. Thou hast seen these signs:

         They are black vesper’s pageants.

Eros.                                                               Ay, my lord.

Antony. That which is now a horse, even with a thought

         The rack dislimns, and makes it indistinct

         As water is in water.

Eros.                                    It does, my lord.

Antony. My good knave Eros, now thy captain is

         Even such a body; here I am Antony,

         Yet cannot hold this visible shape, my knave.

         I made these wars for Egypt; and the Queen – 

         Whose heart I thought was mine, had annexed unto’t

         A million moe, now lost – she, Eros, has

         Packed cards with Caesar, and false played my glory

         Unto an enemy’s triumph.

         Nay, weep not, gentle Eros, there is left us

         Ourselves to end ourselves.         (lines 1 to 22)

Here, the imagery changes from one half-lit impression to another and then dissolves   Thus, Antony employs a simile that also projects his inner life; the simile likens the decaying image to Antony himself, while giving expression to a loss of richness and strength in his sensory experience. Thereby, intensity is taken away from ordinary perception and concentrated in the sense of privation that accompanies an inward change. The vestigial and unstable images of wild animals and rugged physical features suggest an intangible strangeness in the world as he now perceives it, and a life that has been dominated by sensual pleasure and wilful attachment to the senses Antony now sees ruined by his lover’s betrayal. In this respect, one collapse accompanies another, since the attribution of his fall to Cleopatra’s infidelity and deception is a sentimental evasion of his entanglement in what we have seen as a complex moral instability. So, the poetry highlights a chaos at the centre of his life as a reflective being. In these lines, an extraordinary mastery of language enables Shakespeare to show the character of Antony’s inner experience fading in the wider disintegration of his identity throughout the action of the play.

In the latter part of Act 4, Antony is portrayed as the dying hero in a guise that is warped and deranged. The decline that we have just seen is immediately followed by Mardian’s false news that Cleopatra has taken her own life and Antony’s gullible reaction.

Antony. I will o’ertake thee, Cleopatra, and

         Weep for my pardon. So it must be, for now

         All length is torture: since the torch is out,

         Lie down and stray no farther. Now all labour

         Mars what it does; yea, very force entangles

         Itself with strength. Seal then, and all is done.

         Eros! – I come my queen. – Eros! – Stay for me.

         Where souls do couch on flowers, we’ll hand in hand,

         And with our sprightly port make the ghosts gaze;

         Dido and Aeneas shall want troops,

         And all the haunt be ours. – Come , Eros, Eros!

                                             Enter Eros

Eros. What would my lord?

Antony.                                        Since Cleopatra died,

         I have lived in such dishonour that the gods

         Detest my baseness. I that with my sword

         Quartered the world and o’er green Neptune’s back

         With ships made cities, condemn myself to lack

         The courage of a woman;         (lines 39 to 60)

In these lines, we can see that the once vigorous advocate of naturalism is now barely capable of coherent thought. Just moments earlier Antony has threatened Mardian, ‘She hath betrayed me and shall die the death.’ Yet he does not pause to question the lie that she is now dead, but speaks of weeping for his pardon. His sense of himself and the world is now so unstable, moreover, that he merely collapses into a series of disjointed responses that are composed of vaguely abstract ideas like ‘force entangles itself with strength’ and ‘seal and all is done’. Where he says something concrete, the image of an afterlife is a flimsy pastoral fantasy which has none of the vitality of their past experience of each other. Finally, the notion that he has lived in dishonour ‘since Cleopatra died’ could hardly be serious in the circumstances, and he presents this as the motivation for his execution of a suitably Roman suicide. By replacing his anger with contrition, he loses the sense of decisive action altogether, a loss that is directly reflected in the botched suicide that follows. Thus, the attempt to achieve a noble death is mocked in the clumsy raising of Antony to Cleopatra’s monument to die, the monument being her refuge to escape his rage at her betrayal.

At the beginning of Act 5, the action has revealed, in precise psychological detail, the instability of moral phenomena in Antony’s personal history, which ends with collapse into a kind of inner chaos. In reflective life, such instability is the inevitable consequence of a life that is valued in itself by beings involved interdependently in a shared experience. Anxiety about the value of things is an inevitable consequence of the form of reflective life, since a sense of the value of ourselves and the world can be realized only alongside this sense of value as it is formed in their own interests by other people. So, anxiety concerning the value of ourselves and the world overshadows our ideas, and it is implicit in all that has been written in this work that speech is an element of reflective life and how it is portrayed by dramatic form. In this connection, perception and understanding are pervasively influenced by how we use language, as we can easily observe in ordinary experience.

   For example, a thin man might be called skinny or lithe: the former makes him appear to be weak and undernourished while the latter makes him seem gracefully slim and supple, or even athletic. Hyperbole in the language of Antony and Cleopatra influences perception to a high degree, and plays a natural part in their self-aggrandisement. But as the sense of himself and the world slips through his fingers, Antony’s thinking loses purpose and coherence. Whereas at the beginning of the action his rhetoric is fluent and powerful eventually his self-assertion in language becomes disjointed and fragmentary. In this respect, there is a significant difference between his language and that of Cleopatra, who maintains her control and eloquence in spite of her circumstances. Therefore, her switch of allegiance from Antony to Octavius and subsequent suicide establish the setting for a new assertion of identity in Act 5. In the work as a whole, we can see that Antony and Cleopatra explores two contrasting ways in which the protagonists exemplify the instability of moral phenomena.

 The new identity is introduced at the beginning of Act 5, scene ii.

Cleopatra. My desolation does begin to make

         A better life. ‘Tis paltry to be Caesar:

         Not being Fortune, he’s but Fortune’s knave,

         A minister to her will. And it is great 

         To do that thing that ends all other deeds,

         Which shackles accidents and bolts up change;

         Which sleeps and never palates more the dung,

         The beggar’s nurse and Caesar’s.

By deciding that suicide frees her from the burden to having anything to resent in Caesar, Cleopatra strengthens her resolve to let death rescue her from the horror of his degrading procession through the streets of Rome. In this respect, she knows her new identity to be brief, and Act 5 is centred on the conflict over whose objectives will be served, her’s or Caesar’s. 

   When she has been captured by Proculeius and his assistants, the task of watching over Cleopatra and preventing her suicide is assumed by Dolabella. This is clearly designed to replace the assailants with a new face – one that might be seen as sympathetic to the captive and able to reassure her concerning Caesar’s intentions. So it appears in his opening exchange with her.

Dolabella. Most noble Empress, you have heard of me.

Cleopatra. I cannot tell.

Dolabella.                          Assuredly you know me.

Cleopatra. No matter, sir, what I have heard or known.

         You laugh when boys or women tell their dreams.

         Is’t not your trick?

Dolabella.                                    I understand not, madam.

Cleopatra. I dreamt there was an Emperor Antony.

         O such another sleep, that I might see

         But such another man.

Dolabella.                                            If it might please ye –

Cleopatra. His face was as the heav’ns, and therein stuck

         A sun and moon which kept their course and lighted

         The little O. th’ earth.

Dolabella.                                   Most sovereign creature –

Cleopatra. His legs bestrid the ocean; his reared arm

         Crested the world. His voice was propertied 

          As all the tunèd spheres, and that to friends;

         But when he meant to quail and shake the orb,

         He was as rattling thunder. For his bounty,

         There was no winter in’t: an autumn ‘twas

         That grew the more by reaping. His delights 

         Were dolphinlike, they showed his back above

         The element they lived in. In his livery

         Walked crowns and crownets; realms and islands were

         As plates dropped from his pocket. 

Dolabella.                                                              Cleopatra –

Cleopatra. Think you there was or might be such a man

         As this I dreamt of?

Dolabella.                                   Gentle madam, no.

Cleopatra. You lie, up to the hearing of the gods

         But if there be nor ever were one such

         It’s past the size of dreaming, nature wants stuff

         To vie strange forms with fancy, yet t’imagine

         An Antony were nature’s piece ‘gainst fancy,

         Condemning shadows quite.

Dolabella.                                            Hear me, good madam,

         Your loss is as yourself, great; And you bear it 

         As answering to the weight. Would I might never

         O’ertake pursued success, but I do feel,

         By the rebound of yours, a grief that smites

         My very heart at root.

Cleopatra.                          I thank you, sir.

         Know you what Caesar means to do with me?

Dolabella. I am loath to tell you what I would you knew.

Cleopatra. Nay, pray you, sir.

Dolabella.                          Though he be honourable –

Cleopatra. He’ll lead me, then, in triumph?

Dolabella. Madam, he will, I know’t.  (lines 71 to 110)

This piece in the mosaic is an especially strong representation of Cleopatra’s response to her loss of power and personal life. Beginning with his attempt to soften the tone of their encounter by claiming some past familiarity between them, Donabella tries to win her trust and confidence (lines 71 and 72). Being fully aware that her weakened situation is ripe for exploitation by Donabella, she loftily declines his gambit but immediately counters this gesture by engaging with him on her own terms. Thus, she taunts him by deflecting the conversation in a way that exaggerates her weakness: ‘You laugh at boys and women when they tell their dreams’ – her allusion to dreams is obliquely related to her captivity since dreams are all that are left to her. While Cleopatra’s thought is connected the connection is not obvious, and the speed of her thought leaves him mystified (line 75). So, into his momentary hesitation she inserts the dream that is closest to her present disposition and most relevant to her interest in Dolabella. In this respect, the psychological cogency of what we have seen thus far is absolutely essential to the flight of imagination that ensues in lines 82 to 92.

   The opening of her ‘dream’ elicits from Dolabella a detached indulgence (‘If it might please ye’), and then irony (‘Most sovereign creature’). However, his scepticism is significantly unsettled in the unfolding of her vision of Antony as a superhuman exemplar of Roman civilization. The power of this vision is created by a blending of hyperbole with the internal rhythm of Cleopatra’s striking imagery and freely flowing changes of direction. Hence the dynamism that she wishes to evoke in the person of Antony is enforced in her movement from one idea to the next (in outline, ‘His legs / his reared arm / His voice / his bounty / His delights / his back / his livery / his pocket.’). Within the magnified image of physical greatness and worldly power that frames this encomium she gives primary emphasis to qualities of spirit in terms of his generosity and the transformative ‘dolphinlike’ expression of his capacities and talents. In the light of these, the achievement of worldly importance and acquisition are ultimately treated with a casual acceptance (lines 88 to 92).

   Dolabella’s reaction (‘Cleopatra’) suggests both a desire to arrest the torrent of her thought and a disarming sense of amazement at the wealth and fertility that she reveals at the heart of her experience of Antony. Therefore, her question concerning the truth of her vision gives Dolabella an opportunity to recover his equilibrium and compose his thoughts. So, while he naturally declines to endorse what she has said (‘Gentle madam, no’) here the purpose of hyperbole is not to change opinion but to influence feeling, and that is what has been achieved. Specifically, her glorification of a great Roman in terms of Roman civilization and culture endears her to a loyal servant of that culture, and in this way she ‘captures’ Dolabella.

   Cleopatra’s response (‘You lie up to the hearing of the gods’) mimics outrage but is really a rhetorical manoeuvre to enable her to justify her polemical extravagance. In essence, she is saying that there is a realm of fancy and dreaming and another realm of imagination that is nourished by experience, and they are incommensurable. In fancy, we can picture a man with the head of an ox and this could never occur in nature (‘nature wants stuff / To vie strange forms with fancy’), whereas ‘T’imagine / An Antony were nature’s piece ‘gainst fancy / Condemning shadows quite’. As opposed to mere fancy, her conception of Antony has taken from her experience of him certain defining qualities and used them to create a synthesis of his character. She proposes something that has been revealed in the relevant speech, namely that our insight into character depends on the imagination to discern what is significant in us and to compose the elements that emerge from it into an ordered perception.

   Dolabella recognizes that he does not have her experience of Antony in, ‘Would I might never / O’ertake pursued success’ and so implies that he cannot judge the truth of her speech. Rather, he admits that he is moved, and the sense of her greatness betrays the effect upon him of her praising a figure with whom he identifies himself. Thus, we can see clearly how her encomium arises out of her circumstances, as the flight of imagination is doubly a form of self-affirmation. It combines the force of her dream of past experience with the assertion of power over her captors, Dolabella and Octavius; the latter is strikingly revealed in the final moment of her coup. As soon as Dolabella confesses his deep sympathy for her loss she demands to know what his master has in store for her, and in explicit terms (‘He’ll lead me then in triumph?’). Cleopatra has made it impossible for him to evade what both of them know since this would turn the mood of understanding between them into a sham, and one that would be quite transparent. His confusion appears indirectly in the (false) qualification, ‘Though he be honourable -‘, as Dolabella himself is caught up in what is, and is perceived to be, ‘honourable’.

   The responses in this exchange are not simply the representation of what is true to the character of an individual. Cleopatra’s response to Dolabella is a spontaneous act of self-affirmation, and while this is in character its dramatic significance is not simply representative. More expressly, from the mid-point of their dialogue her receptiveness to his state of mind perpetuates the buoyant mood that she has created in her encomium of Antony. The complex of feeling, mood and psychological impulse is itself a delineation of reflective life in action, quite apart from the representation of personal qualities and moral traits. Knowing that Dolabella is trying to manipulate her in order to please Octavius, Cleopatra does not hesitate to lure the attendant into betraying his master. In fact, this is her objective, for she already knows what Octavius has in mind and therefore has no need to draw it out of Dolabella (see lines 49 to 62).

   Thus, we find Shakespeare’s mastery in the interweaving of characterization with a subtle realization of inner experience in the interchange between individuals. Without this duality, dramatic form would not portray reflective life in action but merely stamp the character symbolically with certain moral and psychological features. The breadth and diversity of inner experience would be lost, and, in this case, Cleopatra’s self-affirmation would be comparatively lifeless and thin, impoverishing the characterization.

   After a fraught interview with Octavius, Cleopatra arranges for the delivery of her means of suicide, and there is an exchange with the clown, who brings her the asp hidden in a basket of figs. 

Guardsman.                       This is the man.

Cleopatra. Avoid, and leave him.           Exit Guardsman.

         Hast thou the pretty worm of Nilus there,

         That kills and pains not?

Clown. Truly, I have him; but I would not be the party

         that should desire you to touch him, for his biting is

         immortal; those that die of him do seldom or never 

         recover.

Cleopatra. Remember’st thou any that have died on’t?

Clown. Very many, men and women too. I heard of 

         one of them no longer than yesterday, a very honest 

         woman, but something given to lie, as a woman 

         should not do but in the way of honesty; how she 

         died in the biting of it, what pain she felt; truly,

         she makes a very good report o’ th’ worm; but he that

         will believe all that they say will not be saved

         by half that they do; but this is most falliable, the

         worm’s an odd worm.

Cleopatra. Get thee hence, farewell.

Clown. I wish you all joy of the worm.

                                                      [ Sets down his basket]

Cleopatra. Farewell.

Clown. You must think this, look you, that the worm

         will do his work.

Cleopatra. Ay, ay, farewell.

Clown. Look you, the worm is not to be trusted but in

          the keeping of wise people, for indeed there is

         no goodness in the worm.

Cleopatra. Take thou no care, it shall be heeded.

Clown. Very good. Give it nothing, I pray you, for it

         is not worth the feeding.                      (lines 241 to 270)

Because the clown represents a voice that is detached from the milieu of the play there is scant response to his comments. This means that he cannot be questioned and that what he says does not contribute directly to the action. Thus, the sententious ambiguity of his remarks alludes to the life that is portrayed in the drama, and their belonging to a moment in Act 5 makes them especially relevant to the encounter between Cleopatra and Dolabella. As we have just seen, it is here that she makes the strongest gesture of self-affirmation in response to her fall, and so, in relation to the meaning of Antony and Cleopatra, the clown’s playfully distant irony is primarily aimed at the instability of moral phenomena that is exposed by her in this encounter. 

   When the clown says ‘as a woman should not do but in the way of honesty’ there is a telling ambiguity around the idea of honesty which bends it to suggest an appearance of honesty or what is consistent with how honesty is generally perceived. In a straight-forward sense, a woman should not ‘lie with’ unless she is married, while in another sense she should not ‘lie to’ unless there is a form of lying that is considered to be honest. The clown ironically implies that things will go smoothly if lying of the second kind is not deliberate but in the way of honesty, like moral inattention or distraction. Cleopatra’s encounter with Donabella is marked by moral distraction, and this psychological disposition is deeply connected to the polysemous language in ‘a very honest woman, but something given to lie’. Cleopatra is very honest in the degree to which she is capable of moral distraction, especially when affirming her own importance, and given to lie in ways that strongly suggest a connection between one sense of the word and the other. Hence, in ‘but something given to lie’, the clown anticipates the irony in his suggestion that moral inattention or distraction should be seen as an honest form of lying.

   The force of this irony emerges in particular when we consider the ‘dream’ of Antony (as an avowal of devoted attachment) in the light of her abandonment of him once his power has been stripped away by Octavius. Cleopatra’s moral distraction is either overwhelmingly the expression of a pathological imagination or a mask for unusual powers of cunning fabrication. The latter is implied in her responses to the continuation of what the clown has to say (lines 252 to 257). Here the double meaning applies to the asp as a deadly snake and as a sexual metaphor of obvious intention. In this connection, her question at line 249 reflects interest in a method of committing suicide and so employs the former meaning, while the clown employs the latter, and Cleopatra discharges him immediately (line 259). She is clearly not receptive to his moral tale or to anything that urges her to examine her own behaviour.

   The clown’s mischievous persistence, including the repeated exhortation ‘look you’, is unlikely to have any effect upon Cleopatra, but for the audience and reader it prolongs the invitation from outside the action of the play to exercise a dispassionate insight into her character. In her case, the instability of moral phenomena is concentrated in the psychological conflict between a romantic imagination of incomparable vividness and depth and the origins and perpetuation of this passion in ambition for power and self-aggrandisement.

   In her death, however, there is a change of perception which suggests a subliminal influence, and this moment in the play is prefaced by a parting reiteration of the clown’s ‘I wish you joy o’ th’ worm’ (line 279).

Cleopatra. Give me my robe, put on my crown, I have

         Immortal longings in me. Now no more

         The juice of Egypt’s grape shall moist this lip,

         Yare, yare, good Iras; quick, methinks I hear

         Antony call: I see him rouse himself

         To praise my noble act. I hear him mock

         The luck of Caesar, which the gods give men

         To excuse their after wrath. Husband I come;

         Now to my name my courage prove my title!

         I am fire and air; my other elements

         I give to baser life. So, have you done?

         Come then and take the last warmth of my lips,

         Farewell, kind Charmian, Iras, long farewell.

                                             [Kisses them. Iras falls and dies]

         Have I the aspic in my lips? Dost fall?

         If thou and nature can so gently part,

         The stroke of death is but as a lover’s pinch,

         Which hurts, and is desired. Dost thou lie still?

         If thus thou vanishest thou tell’st the world

         It is not worth leave-taking,

Charmian. Dissolve, thick cloud, and rain, that I may say

         The gods themselves do weep.

Cleopatra.                                            This proves me base:

         If she first meet the curlèd Antony,

         He’ll make demand of her, and spend that kiss

         Which is my heaven to have. Come thou mortal wretch,

                  [To an asp, which she applies to her breast]

         With thy sharp teeth this knot intrinsicate 

         Of life at once untie. Poor venomous fool

         Be angry, and dispatch. O, couldst thou speak,

         That I could hear thee call great Caesar ass

         Unpolicied!

Charmian.                 O eastern star!

Cleopatra.                                            Peace, peace!

         Dost thou not see my baby at my breast

         That sucks the nurse asleep?

Charmian.                                             O break! O break!

Cleopatra. As sweet as balm, as soft as air, as gentle –

         O, Antony! Nay, I will take thee too:

                                    [Applies another asp to her arm]

         What should I stay –                                               Dies

                                                                        (lines 280 to 313)

Maintaining her disregard for the clown’s impertinent comment, Cleopatra now extemporizes a ceremony for her own death, which she understands as the transition from this world into one in which she is awaited by Antony. Both the disregard and the extemporization are intended to observe her dignity at this critical moment, and both are subjected to compromise by the way in which things fall out – in this respect a reversal of her expectation is vital to the meaning of the final significant piece in the mosaic.

   She constructs her speech with characteristic skill, beginning it with reference to ’Immortal longings’ that are pregnant with hope. Antony is at the heart of her musings and she gives life to his engagement with her actions by imagining him praising her noble suicide and responding warmly to her denying Octavius his (ignoble) ambition at her expense. In her excitement she substitutes, with excessive irony, ‘excuse’ for ‘punish’. From such freedom of expression her paean of self-approval reaches its climax in a celebration of personal courage that heralds a transubstantiation into fire and air, the elements associated with spirit. Cleopatra gives emphasis to the distinction by explicitly giving ‘my other elements to baser life’. Then she turns imperiously to the baser life that she expects will survive her, ‘So, have you done?’

   With the death of Iras the ceremony collapses. Cleopatra’s fantasy is emptied and even admits an echo of the clown’s unwelcome refrain. However, in this development something more human and substantial emerges, as she is clearly touched not so much by the unexpected demise of her attendant as by the manner of her passing. The moment is psychologically both remote and extreme; definition is given to the farthest point to which life can reach in the face of extinction, and in this respect it represents a crystalline revelation; a limit of human experience opens up to Cleopatra. ‘If thou and nature can so gently part’ makes imperturbably smooth the transition from life into another realm while the clown’s wordplay associating sex and death is assumed to be harmoniously resolved in the idea of a lover’s pinch. 

   In counterpoint with Charmian’s lament, Cleopatra explores the moral significance of her penetrating psychological moment in lines 300 to 308. This experience proves her base as it makes her ‘leave-taking’ unattractively noisy, ill-considered and pointless. Furthermore, her insight is impulsively followed by a further (connected) realization that proves her base: she fears that an otherworldly Antony might be compassionately drawn to Iras. Here Cleopatra is divided between self-critical sympathy for the dutiful Iras and anxiety over her own power in relation to the desired male (‘the curlèd Antony’).

   Thus, in the unfolding of her thought the knot intrinsicate will be untied by the asp, since passing into the other world will resolve the uncertainty of her future with Antony and the psychological crisis to which it is attached (a knot in her experience, and therefore ‘of life’). At the moment of death, Cleopatra’s mastery of the world over which she has exercised great power and influence is suddenly jeopardised in the instability of moral phenomena, as though to withhold until the end what she has been able, through great skill and good fortune, to keep out of sight. More widely and more obviously, the image refers to the untying of the knot of life itself, for the word intrinsicate not only combines ‘intrinsic’ with ‘intricate’ but can also be understood as intrinsically intricate. 

   That the life of a reflective being is a knot intrinsicate in this sense is commonplace. In ordinary experience the prevalence of one value in our purposes can often significantly conceal other values. When Cleopatra endears herself to Dolabella and thereby lures him into betraying Octavius, her guile conceals from her the values of honesty and integrity, and also values related to a clear perception of herself. As we have seen in her relationship with Antony, her immersion in the calculations of her own will has led to confusion in her understanding of how she is seen by him. In Dolabella, response to Cleopatra’s encomium on Antony and the values of Roman civilization conceals the value of wariness, in this case wariness of her casual disposal of inferiors like himself. 

   As a general psychological phenomenon, Cleopatra’s life has been a knot intrinsicate in the vagaries of her relationship with Antony, and her use of the image gives further play to the clown’s idea of the worm (It also makes an overtly physical allusion to the knot of nerve endings in female sexuality, suggesting an intricate interrelatedness between the body and psychology). Her change of mind has been initiated by the transformative moment of Iras’s death and is reflected again in her closing speech. ‘O Antony’ conveys the longing and uncertainty we have just seen, and is given resonance by the action of the play as a whole. So, the uncertainty of a tie that is dominated by sensuality and power is intensified by their interplay in acquisitiveness, manipulation, deception and betrayal. Cleopatra’s inner experience in the act of dying is steeped in the instability of moral phenomena as a seemingly inevitable outcome of her being.

Conclusion

Formal coherence in drama depends on what it is that is being given form. A well-organized narrative might be morally instructive and aesthetically satisfying, but this is not an adequate basis for the portrayal of reflective life. Shakespeare is primarily concerned with a projection of the disorderly contingency of reflective life in a number of interwoven strands of action possessing an order that is, in some respects, provocatively hidden. Antony and Cleopatra, is given formal coherence by a narrative that is true to the disorderly contingency of complex volition governing the interplay between characters, and is underpinned by a sure understanding of moral phenomena. Being true to such order demands a language that is adequate to the portrayal of this life in its psychological detail.

   The language by means of which we take an action, such as urging, encouraging and persuading or cautioning, deterring and forbidding, is not simply propositional and therefore cannot be adequately translated into the logic of propositions. It requires another logic, one that is related to the experience of reflective life, and therefore one that is responsive to the ontological distinction between inner experience and the physical object. For this kind of logic, it is necessary to observe all that is relevant to the psychology and social and cultural circumstances of an individual when judging his or her actions and inner experiences. Thus, we can make judgements about the inner experience and objects of a character’s motivations and perceptions. In the long poem Venus and Adonis, for example, the hero’s refusal to engage with the goddess is presented, in this comic version of the myth, as a matter of sexual orientation. Otherwise, to common understanding, Adonis could not resist the embodiment of feminine beauty and attraction, and certain details wryly indicate the reason for his doing so, such as his being unable to meet tomorrow because he will be boar-hunting with a ‘friend’. 

   Hence the proposition, ‘Adonis is a man who is able to resist the charms of Venus’ is true, but as an argument with the proposition, ‘No msn is able to resist the powers of Venus’ it fails to observe the ontological distinction between inner experience and the object, and how the former determines the latter. Correspondingly, a character can present a proposition but he does so according to the logic of a certain kind of behaviour; the logic of dramatic form entails that the object is given its character by an act of sensory perception. This logic makes it possible to interpret the inclinations behind a proposition and other uses of language, such as the psychological motivation for his urging, agreeing, opposing or rejecting and others.

   If a poem presented Antony rejecting the charms of Venus we would immediately see the inconsistency, and the presentation of character would be illogical in terms of the nature of reflective life; that is, a life that is valued in itself and necessarily in accordance with a reasonably stable sense of its value. Nobody could experience a life that is valued in itself if his or her sense of the value of things was scattered and incoherent. Shakespeare’s mastery of this logic can be found almost everywhere in his work, especially in Antony and Cleopatra, the subtlety of which we can appreciate in a detail that has been noticed in the discussion above. At a significant moment in the story, he reacts against the idea that Cleopatra is only interested in him because of his worldly power – this reflection of the instability of moral phenomena is also a convincing psychological development of his relationship with her.

   In Antony and Cleopatra, three general features exemplify the logic of dramatic form, and they can be designated as invention, imagination and integration. 

   1) The work is teeming with invention, even though the story is borrowed in the main from Plutarch. It is primarily teeming with verbal invention though there is also a great deal of dramatic invention in the mosaic of incidents and circumstances that contribute to the plot. In this respect, the two kinds of invention are co-ordinated in a profoundly original characterization of the individuality and experience of the historical figures. Specifically in relation to verbal invention, this original characterization is developed by means of figurative language that is extended in many ways in order to observe the ontological distinction as it functions in our perception of ourselves and the world. For example, we can see these elements in the spectacle of Cleopatra’s barge as it occurs in North’s translation of Plutarch compared with its description by Enobarbus in Act 2, scene ii. The original language is little more than an armature for which a transfer into the language of dramatic form involves a complete transformation of meaning and purpose. Above all, in the transformation language defines the inner experience and inclinations of the characters, in particular those of Enobarbus himself, Antony and Cleopatra herself.

   2) A powerful imagination is continually at work in the ever-changing behaviour and inner experience of the main characters. Shakespeare is able to expound convincingly on his own experience and observation of others (including, no doubt, what he has read) in the highly distinctive experience of his characters. His uncanny knowledge of how they might respond to events and to each other seems to be always capable of reaching new depths of sensitivity and insight. In Antony and Cleopatra we can see his powers of imagination in this respect, particularly in the ways in which Antony’s insecure mastery is gradually eroded by the instability of moral phenomena as it is exposed by his relations with Octavius and Cleopatra. Then, in Act 5, we see a subtle reversal of the secure mastery of others that has prevailed throughout the whole of the action in Cleopatra’s involvement.

   3) The integration of inner life in the characters with the nature of the culture and society to which they belong is equally fundamental to Shakespeare’s employment of dramatic form. Not only is the drama of Antony and Cleopatracreated out of a precise opposition of the cultures of Rome and Alexandria, a detailed perception of these cultures runs through the invention of the characters, their psychology and language. This extends, moreover, to how the protagonists are perceived by others, both sympathetically and antagonistically, and to how general attitudes can be exploited – as they are by Octavius and by the protagonists themselves. All of the psychological elements in the characters are strictly true to the world of the play, and this relationship determines the manner in which things move in the action, down to the slightest nuances. Think, for example, of how the opposition of status affects Cleopatra’s transformative experience on the death of Iras, especially in relation to how she imagines Antony to respond to it.

   Acquaintance with the plays makes it obvious that invention, imagination and integration are interdependent. Without great verbal invention, it would not be possible to achieve the imagination that is associated with conveying inner experience and the psychology with which it is connected. And nor would it be possible, without invention and imagination, to approach the subtle integration of experience and social forms as elements of reflective life. Conversely, attraction to this integration is a powerful stimulus to experiential and psychological imagination, and the accompanying verbal and narrative invention. 

   Shakespeare’s mastery of these elements individually and in concert with each other illustrates the unique capacity of dramatic form to portray moral phenomena in action, such that it can also suggest hidden aspects of the form of reflective life. We have seen, for example, that Antony and Cleopatra convincingly represents the instability of moral phenomena in human experience as it is lived. Moreover, it shows that whatever help Shakespeare took from others in devising his plots, employing biblical and literary allusion and knowledge of history, and other areas such as law and medicine, the core of meaning in his poetry and plays is created by an individual artist. Part of the key lies in the music of his dramatic language, as in sound, time, phrasing, expression and tempo, together with supple rhythm and a coherent and melodious flow of thought and ideas. This goes with choice of words and figurative language over a wide spectrum, including invention in how language is made to work. For example, as a metaphor for reflective life, Cleopatra’s ‘knot intrinsicate’ alludes to the moral and psychological complication of her sexually oriented world and also hints obliquely at the knot of nerve endings it is physically bound up with in sensation. The knot is not simply intrinsic and intricate it is intrinsically intricate, both in the psychological nature of moral phenomena and in the physical sensitivity that is fundamental to inner experience.

Related Text

Shakespeare William.1964. Antony and Cleopatra. New York