Antony and Cleopatra

In the play Antony and Cleopatra Shakespeare portrays Cleopatra's character in many different ways; she is show to be a lustful prostitute, a professional queen and as a beautiful woman who is passionately in love with Antony.

Shakespeare places ideas about Cleopatra from the very beginning of the play, in philo's speech for example, in which she is described as having "gypsy's lust." Gypsy's in Jacobean times where highly associated with witchcraft and so he is describing her as a lustful witch. In Shakespeare's time this would be the view of the people in the audience, that she was a which that catches victims with her beauty and power. She is also described as a "strumpet" which was a word meaning a prostitute this is a very derogatory noun.

Shakespeare from the very mention of Cleopatra shows that she is teasing and downgrading Antony. The first words she speaks in the whole of the play are "If it be love indeed tell me how much" to Antony......

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Title: Cleopatra
Approximate Word Count: 776
Approximate Pages: 4 (250 words per double-spaced page)

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