Antony And Cleopatra Scene One example essay topic

ANALYSIS OF SCENE ONE: ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA Scene One. Cleopatra's palace, in Alexandria. Philo complains to Demetrius that Cleopatra has transformed Antony from a great general to a whore's fool. Antony and Cleopatra enter, with Cleopatra pushing Antony to describe how much he loves her. A messenger comes from Octavius, but Antony, clearly annoyed, commands the messenger to be brief. Cleopatra, partly mocking, partly serious, chides Antony and tells him to hear the message.

But in the end Antony refuses to hear the message, and he and Cleopatra set out for a night in the city. Philo and Demetrius do not approve. Scene Two. The servants of Cleopatra's court ask a soothsayer to predict their futures. The soothsayer seems to start out well, telling Charmian that she will outlive her mistress, but then he warns that the days to come will be worse than the days past. When the soothsayer insinuates that Charmian's loose, she's had enough.

The soothsayer tells Iras that her fortune will be like Charmian's. Cleopatra enters looking for Antony, and the man himself enters shortly after. Cleopatra takes off with a huff, taking her servants with her. Antony hears the messenger: his wife, Fulvia, and his brother have united in a war against Caesar, and have been driven from Italy.

The other news is worse: Rome's most powerful adversaries, the Parthians, have overrun the territories of the Near and Middle East. A second messenger brings yet more grim news: his wife Fulvia is dead. Antony muses that he sometimes wished her dead while she lived, and now that she's gone he can only miss her. Antony resolves to stop dallying in Egypt. He summons Enobarbus, and informs him that they " ll have to leave. Enobarbus talks, with irony and cynicism, about how their departure will shatter Cleopatra.

When informed of Fulvia's death, Enobarbus continues with this lightness of tone. Antony has learned that Sext us Pompei us, the son of Pompey the great, now rules the seas in defiance of the triumvirate. Lepidus and Caesar will have need of Antony if they are to overcome him. Scene Three. Cleopatra enters with Charmian, Alex as, and Iras. She tells them to find Antony, and exactly what deceptions to use to bring him to her.

When Charmian suggests that honesty and obedience might be a better way to keep Antony's heart, Cleopatra replies that such behavior would be a sure way to lose him. When Antony appears and tries to tell Cleopatra that he must leave, her response is scathing. Even news of Fulvia's death only increases her distress: as Fulvia goes unmourned, Cleopatra says, so will she. Yet eventually she asks forgiveness for her behavior, and wishes Antony success. He promises that though they separate, they will be with each other in spirit. Analysis: The first three scenes of Act One all take place in Queen Cleopatra's palace, in Alexandria.

They establish quickly the conflict between duty and passion, ambition and pleasure, Rome and Egypt. They also showcase Cleopatra's complexity: her incredible emotional vicissitudes, her theatricality, her manipulative streak, and her genuine passion for Antony. They also hint at the destructive powers of historical necessity, a great theme of the play, through the figure of the soothsayer and the juxtaposition of his unsettling presence with the gayness of Cleopatra's court. The first scene is short, and framed by the disparaging comments of Philo and Demetrius, two of Antony's men. The Roman soldiers disapprove of Antony's decadent affair with the queen, and are quick to write her off as a whore. Philo calls her a gipsy, which in Shakespeare's time connoted sorcery, treachery, and cheap trickery.

Their view is simple and straightforward, and perhaps not perfectly in line with what we see when Antony and Cleopatra themselves appear. Cleopatra, though mocking of Antony's Roman duties, does in fact encourage him to hear the message. Her purposes for doing so are not entirely clear: she may be using reverse psychology on her lover, and her arguments already have a hint of irony, which can be played up in productions of the play. The theme of duty versus passion, and Rome versus Egypt, both come together in this scene. Antony is having too fine a time to be bothered by news from the capitol, and shirks his duties: "Let Rome in Tiber melt, and the wide arch / Of the ranged empire fall!

Here is my space, / Kingdoms are clay... ". (1.1. 33-35). Egypt is escape from the duties of empire, and in Alexandria Antony is able to live life as he loves to live it. But Antony's attitude will be sharply reversed by the next scene, and he will force himself back to Rome: Antony is torn throughout the play between duty and passion, between Roman power and the good life of Egypt. He is never able to reconcile the two, and their fundamental incompatibility are emphasized by the commentary provided by Philo and Demetrius. When Antony and Cleopatra appear before us, they are beautiful in their excess.

They are a grand, godlike couple, a handsome Roman general and a magnificent queen, playful and exuberant, and conscious of their glamour. Youth is not part of their glamour; both are middle-aged. Their beauty is one of ripeness and maturity, and Antony revels in his Egyptian life as rest from a lifetime of fighting wars. Antony proudly proclaims, "We stand up peerless" (1.1. 39), and within a certain realm he's right. But the world where they stand up peerless is a different one that Rome's world of duty, war, and ambition.

The couple's beautiful language and delight in one another make no great impression on Philo and Demetrius, who can't understand Antony's shirking of his duties.