Antony and Cleopatra

A major conflict throughout Antony and Cleopatra is the contrast between the values of Roman society and the values of Egyptian society. William Shakespeare affiliates Rome strongly with order, duty, masculinity, and military prowess, while Egypt is portrayed as sensual, feminine, and chaotic in contrast. The romantic union of Antony and Cleopatra results in both of them taking on certain traits of the other’s culture, often to the distress of the Romans. This notion of Rome as a society based on reason and Egypt as a society based on sensuality foreshadows the later evolution of Orientalism (See: Background)—the stereotypical construction of “the East” by Western Europeans seeking to distinguish their culture from that of their imperial conquests.

Throughout the play, the differences between Rome and Egypt cause conflict that eventually leads to war between the two countries. Initially, the Romans are distressed by Antony’s adoption of “Egyptian” ways, meaning that he enjoys pleasures and luxuries rather than focusing on military discipline. Similarly, Cleopatra is irritated when Antony displays his more “Roman” traits, complaining to her maids that “he was disposed to mirth, but on the sudden / A Roman thought hath struck him” (1.2.87-88, emphasis added). By describing Antony’s willingness to hear political messages as a “Roman thought,” she verbally affiliates the concept of Rome with serious, rational, and unpleasurable work.