Gender Bending in Antony and Cleopatra
Antony and Cleopatra is a fable about the destructive duality of Antony's character. Shakespeare uses gender bending as a device to portray Antony's transformation from Roman to Egyptian. This transformation causes constant conflict between Antony the Roman defined by empire and duty and Antony the Egyptian defined by folly and lust. This duality finally proves to be fatal. Antony and Cleopatra is one of Shakespeare’s Roman plays. It is a tragedy about Antony one of the triumvirates who rule the world who falls in love with, and has an affair with Cleopatra the seductive queen of Egypt. Throughout the whole of the play Antony is caught in a tug-of-war between Antony the lover and Antony the leader.
The two different worlds we are introduced to in this play are Rome and Egypt, each with different gender norms and values. Antony represents Rome, a place of law and order, duty and war, and he also represents Roman values such as honor, duty, valor bravery and self discipline. Antony forms part of the Triumvirate and it is expected of him to epitomize masculinity. His Roman nature requires him to disregard all that is sensual and emotional. In Rome, women are insignificant; Octavia is used as a mere business agreement to make amends between Octavius Ceaser and Antony. On the contrary Cleopatra embodies all that is Egypt, a place of decadence and abundance; she is sensual, sexual and exotic. As Rene’ Weis states in the introduction to the Penguin Antony and Cleopatra (2005: xxiv),”Egypt emasculates, and it does so quite literally in the case of Mardian the eunuch, a castrated attendant of Cleopatra;”
From the start of the play there is a direct contrast between the gendered roles of Antony and Cleopatra. Philo says to Demetrius, Antony has a “captains heart” and is a “pillar of the world” (Act 1, Scene 1, lines 6; 12) while Cleopatra is described as a “lustful gypsy” and “wrangling queen” (Act 1, Scene 1, lines 10; 48). However strong these perceptions may seem
The two different worlds we are introduced to in this play are Rome and Egypt, each with different gender norms and values. Antony represents Rome, a place of law and order, duty and war, and he also represents Roman values such as honor, duty, valor bravery and self discipline. Antony forms part of the Triumvirate and it is expected of him to epitomize masculinity. His Roman nature requires him to disregard all that is sensual and emotional. In Rome, women are insignificant; Octavia is used as a mere business agreement to make amends between Octavius Ceaser and Antony. On the contrary Cleopatra embodies all that is Egypt, a place of decadence and abundance; she is sensual, sexual and exotic. As Rene’ Weis states in the introduction to the Penguin Antony and Cleopatra (2005: xxiv),”Egypt emasculates, and it does so quite literally in the case of Mardian the eunuch, a castrated attendant of Cleopatra;”
From the start of the play there is a direct contrast between the gendered roles of Antony and Cleopatra. Philo says to Demetrius, Antony has a “captains heart” and is a “pillar of the world” (Act 1, Scene 1, lines 6; 12) while Cleopatra is described as a “lustful gypsy” and “wrangling queen” (Act 1, Scene 1, lines 10; 48). However strong these perceptions may seem