Antony and Cleopatra
Do Shakespeare, in your opinion value more the goals of octavius or antony and why ?
Antony and cleopatra
Antony and cleopatra
I think Shakespeare is more interested in Antony. Antony is a great general, beloved by his men. He is middle-aged. He is also a lover of pleasure, far less single-minded than Octavius. He is a complicated and fatally divided man, failing to rise to the task of generalship at key points. Plutarch represents his love for Cleopatra as the cause of his doom, and Shakespeare shares this view, but the play also shows their love as a kind of triumph, beautiful and wonderful on its own terms. On the other hand Octavius is much younger than Antony. As in Julius Caesar, Octavius is depicted in Antony and Cleopatra as possessing nearly inhuman detachment and self-control. He is a cold, calculating, political animal. He uses Antony when he needs him, and turns on both Antony and Lepidus when he can. But he is not malicious.