Words of Innocence and Experience

The relationship of Antony and Cleopatra is the groundwork for the poignancy of the play “Antony and Cleopatra.” When Antony and Cleopatra fall in love with each other, they are already middle-aged people, no longer lovesick youngsters. With their exceptional statuses as a member of the triumvirate and the Egyptian queen and the unstable political situation, their love affair is extremely turbulent. Together they have been confronted with a number of serious hardships throughout the play, and in the end, both die for love and dignity.

The lovers’ relationship is not intense at the beginning of the play. They love each other, but the basis of their relationship is dotage and lust. Antony and Cleopatra flirt with each other playfully, worries about their countries out of the picture. Cleopatra teases Antony about his marital status, expressing minor jealousy. Little do the lovers know that numerous challenges are awaiting them to face.

When Antony leaves for Rome due to wars against Pompey, little inside his mind does the reader see. Cleopatra, on the other hand, continues her doting on Antony. She is soon struck by shock of Antony’s remarriage to Octavia, Julius Caesar’s younger sister. The union is virtually political, yet Cleopatra is still deeply hurt and enraged when she learns about the news. After some inner struggles (not included in the play), Cleopatra still feels confident in Antony’s love for her. Later, even though the descriptions of Octavia brought by the messenger, who is frightened by her previous outrage and has learned his lesson to tell white lies, are mostly smeared, Cleopatra knows that Octavia is no match for a fun-loving, witty, and ambitious Antony. As Cleopatra and Enobarbus predict, Antony returns to her as soon as he has valid reasons to depart from his wife.

When it comes to contemplations of love in this play, Shakespeare often presents reader with scenes taking place in Cleopatra’s palace in Alexandria. Therefore, it is easier to note her transformation of thoughts than Antony’s. As the play proceeds, Cleopatra gradually develops undying trust in Antony, sometimes to the degree of being unreasonable. For instance, when Caesar launches war against Antony over the insulting treatment of Octavia, Cleopatra enthusiastically supports Antony’s decision to fight with Caesar at sea, while his followers knows clearly that Antony’s main advantage lies in his land forces rather than sea forces. Shakespeare does not tell the reader why Cleopatra flees from the battlefield out of the blue, but she possibly believes that Antony would stay strong and carry on fighting without her company.

Later in the play, no matter how grim the circumstances seem, Cleopatra always has her ways to cheer Antony up and sooth him when he is infuriated. Scene XIII in Act Three, in which she wins back the extremely indignant Antony after he sees her speaking with Thyreus, Caesar’s messenger, is especially compelling. When Antony braces up and resolves to launch wars against Caesar once more, Cleopatra says delightfully “That’s my brave lord!,” showing her confidence and affection for him.

Antony, on the contrary, although reciprocating Cleopatra’s love, does not really trust her or understand her as much as Cleopatra does him. Cleopatra is capricious and scheming. Without sufficient understanding of her characters, Antony sometimes misjudges her actions. With his strong male pride, he also tends to put the blame on Cleopatra for his failures. It seems that his trust in her starts to severely fall apart after she escapes from his first battle against Caesar and he follows her. He despises her cowardice and accuses her of being the exact reason for his failure and shame. The most obvious case occurs in Scene XIII in Act Three, where Cleopatra’s sweet-talking to Thyreus sends him into ferocious rage. It takes Cleopatra great endeavors to try to convince Antony that the good nature she shows to Thyreus is not an act of betrayal but a tactic to secure her safety now that Caesar is the victor. Antony forgives her right on the spot due to his love for her, but he does not completely believe her intentions. The next day when he loses in the second battle against Caesar, he immediately jumps to conclusions that Cleopatra has betrayed him, and the tragedy really begins.

The misunderstanding between the two lovers results in a painful separation between life and death, although their outcome is already doomed had the accident not happened. Aware of Antony’s furor and cruelty, Cleopatra (or rather, her maid Charmian) plots her fake death in an attempt to appease Antony. She does not realize that Antony is already a shaken man, and any more irritation would only accelerate his self-destruction. As for Antony, having known Cleopatra for a long time, he still cannot grasp her ever-changing mood or guess her schemes. The serious blow of his loss and his romantic obsession with her blocks out his sanity, as it happens many times in the play. Learning her death further strengthens his resolution to commit suicide.

It is noteworthy that when Antony learns that Cleopatra is not dead after having struck himself, he does not appear angry at all. His devotion to her has overcome his quick temper in the final moment of his life. They still manage to joke a little, suggesting that they are truly meant for each other in their wits and humor, if they were not faced with defeat. On his deathbed, Antony worriedly urges Cleopatra how to deal with Caesar and which man to trust. When Antony dies, Cleopatra feels that the light of her life has been taken away and the whole world has crumbled.

At the point of the play, Cleopatra not only loves Antony but also worships him. The loss of him shatters her world. When Proculeius and Dolabella, followers of Caesar, come to talk to her out of her hunger strike, she refuses to listen and refers to Antony as the ocean, the spheres, the seasons—the whole world. He is the pedestals of her strength and life. Inasmuch as she idolizes Antony, however, she turns out to be more courageous in her resolution than he ever is, as she tells Charmian “Come; we have no friend but resolution and the briefest end.” She is firm in her rejection to surrender to Caesar and her decision to end her life. She does so partly for her self-esteem, partly for Antony. Interestingly, even though Antony claims himself to be a man of strong will, his judgment is always influenced by Cleopatra because of his dotage rather than his trust in her. Conversely, with her blind trust and respect for Antony, Cleopatra makes the decision to die, which is totally against what Antony has told her. He wishes her to survive, but she loves him so much that she would follow him to another world. Her pride plays a crucial part in her insistence, too, of course.

Even though their romance has come to a tragic end, it is clear that Antony and Cleopatra has attained mutual understanding and reverence at last. Moreover, as they both concede several times in the play, with the rise of Caesar’s power, the world has become too small to accommodate them, who are both strong political powers which threaten Caesar’s influence. Perhaps they should find more happiness in another world. Their love affair on Earth is heartbreaking but beautiful.