Part 33 (1/2)
”Is Antony or we in fault for this?”
and at once Enobarbus voices the exact truth:
”Antony only, that would h you fled
why should he follow?”
Again and again Antony reproaches Cleopatra, and again and again Enobarbus is used to keep the truth before us Soant and so ill-founded that they discover the personal passion of the poet For exaler ever”
And the proof forsooth is:
”I found you as a morsel cold upon Dead Caesar's trencher”
But to have been Caesar's mistress was Cleopatra's chief title to fa Mary Fitton for being deserted by soh, this weakness of Antony increases the complexity of his character, while the naturalistic passion of his words adds enorain in this drama Shakespeare's personal vindictiveness serves an artistic purpose
The story of ”Troilus and Cressida” is in itself low and vile, and when loaded with Shakespeare's bitterness outrages probability; but the love of Antony and Cleopatra is so overwheloes to ruin and suicide and beyond, and when intensified by Shakespeare's personal feeling becomes a world's masterpiece
We have already seen that the fe Shakespeare puts in the mouth of Antony increases the realistic effect, and just in the sareed which he attributes to Cleopatra, transform her from a somewhat incomprehensible historical marionette into the most splendid specimen of the courtesan in the world's literature Heine speaks of her contemptuously as a ”kept woman,” but the epithet only sho Heine in default of knowledge fell back on his racial gift of feration Even before she enters we see that Shakespeare has not forgiven his dark scornful mistress; Cleopatra is the finest picture he ever painted of Mary Fitton; but Antony's friends tell us, at the outset, she is a ”lustful gipsy,” a ”strumpet,” and at first she merely plays on Antony's manliness; she sends for hiain, telling her er:
”I did not send you: if you find hi; if in mirth, report That I am sudden sick: quick, and return”
And when Charmian, her woman, declares that the way to keep a ,” she replies scornfully:
”Thou teachest, like a fool, the way to lose him”
She uses a dozen taunts to prevent her lover fro her; but when she sees hih awiles we discover that love for Antony which is the anchor to her unstable nature
The scene with the eunuch Mardian is a little geracious madam
_Cleo_ Indeed?
_Mar_ Not in deed,
But what indeed is honest to be done; Yet have I fierce affections, and think What Venus did with Mars
_Cleo_ O, Charmian!
Where think'st thou he is now? Stands he, or sits he?”
She is with her lover again, and recalls his phrase for her, ”my serpent of old Nile,” and feeds herself with love's ”delicious poison”
No sooner does she win our sympathy by her passion for Antony than Shakespeare chills our ad her as the courtesan:
”_Cleo_ Did I, Charmian, Ever love Caesar so?
_Char_ O, that brave Caesar!