“I Am His Fortune’s Vassal”: Cleopatra, Fortuna, and the Warning Against Women in Power
Katherine Spitzer
Angelo State University
Katherine Spitzer is from El Paso originally, and she is now a third-year student at Angelo State University. Katherine is majoring in English with minors in French and professional education. After graduating with her bachelor’s degree, she will pursue a master’s degree in literature and a career in teaching.
Introduction
William Shakespeare’s Antony and Cleopatra is characterized by the conflicts of
masculine versus feminine, honor versus passion, and Rome versus Egypt. These conflicts are
typically discussed in terms of the characters of Cleopatra and Caesar, with Antony vacillating
between the two. However, this discussion excludes a subtler character—the Roman goddess
Fortuna—whose presence, though elusive, permeates the play. Fortuna, much like Cleopatra, is
portrayed as holding great power over Antony, and this unnatural influence is what causes his
emasculation and demise. As a result of Fortuna’s presence, Antony’s vacillation between Caesar
and Cleopatra becomes a vacillation between upholding masculinity and allowing women to
control one’s fate. The struggle between upholding the masculine construction of power and
succumbing to feminine influence is in keeping with Machiavelli’s conception of Fortuna and of
women in power, as he saw both as something to be “relegated to the service of the ruler at times
when he sees fit to employ her” (Clifford and Romaniuk 3). If women must be made into objects
to be used and controlled, Antony fails to properly control both Cleopatra and Fortuna. Instead of
subduing them, he allows himself to be subdued. The text blames Cleopatra and Fortuna for the
subjugating and emasculation of Antony, and this blame is echoed in much of the literary
criticism surrounding the play; however, Cleopatra and Fortuna are not only similarly assigned
blame for Antony’s death, but they are similarly portrayed as capricious, promiscuous, and
manipulative. These characterizations are seen throughout the play and become more disastrous
for Antony as he continuously allows these women to control his fate, thereby allowing them to
emasculate him. Antony’s emasculation and demise culminate in the Battle of Actium and his
suicide, both of which are heavily associated with Fortuna and Cleopatra. Through
Shakespeare’s conception of powerful women and the emphasis on Antony’s emasculation at the
hands of these women, Shakespeare draws upon Machiavelli’s conception of women and
Fortuna to create a warning against feminine power and its potential to corrupt virtuous men.
Historical and Critical Reception of Shakespeare’s Cleopatra
As feminist literary criticisms and society’s view towards women have progressed, many
turn to a reading of Cleopatra that is more favorable; however, given the historical and political
contexts within which Antony and Cleopatra was written, it is unlikely that Shakespeare
intended to portray Cleopatra in a positive light. Throughout the play, Cleopatra is portrayed as
cunning, yet childish; passionate, yet insincere; powerful, but only through her sexuality—
altogether a decidedly ambivalent, but not favorable, portrait. Cleopatra is a powerful woman, a
woman who has aligned herself with the most powerful people in the world, who has exhibited a
great sense of control over herself and her expression of femininity; however, these qualities
would not have been viewed as positive in early modern England as, according to the philosophy
of the great chain of being, women were inferior creatures who must be relegated by their
superiors, men, in order to follow God’s will. There is a movement in Shakespearean studies to
view Shakespeare and his intentions as decidedly progressive, to view his intentions in crafting
his characters as decidedly feminist. Shakespeare, according to these criticisms, “realized the full
range and power of feminine identity, but he was also aware that even a brilliant woman had to
modulate her independence in the mores of his own day” (McKewin 161). While interpreting
Shakespeare’s texts through a contemporary lens is important and shows how we, as a society,
have progressed, superimposing contemporary understandings and sociopolitical awareness onto
a playwright from early modern England is simply unfair and unfounded. Furthermore, it is vital
to grapple with the full range and weight of Shakespeare’s plays and where Shakespeare drew
inspiration, as it is only through this grappling of potentially troubling social mores and
influences that we are able to pave paths away from these ideals.
​
Early modern England was not kind to women, and Shakespeare was as subject to these
biases and beliefs as anyone else. There are certainly texts of his that portray women as
multidimensional characters, Antony and Cleopatra being one of these, but these characters are
few and far between. Even in Antony and Cleopatra, which has one of his most fully-developed
female characters, his portrayal of women, specifically his portrayal of women in power, is
confined to a fear of unrestrained femininity. Femininity, here, refers to women and womanhood
as a whole; in this case, the fear results from the refusal to confine femininity to the social mores
of the Shakespearean era. This fear of unrestrained femininity is seen in the way Cleopatra is
viewed by male characters and audience reception, but it is also seen in the way Cleopatra
echoes certain perceived negative traits of Queen Elizabeth I, the primary source of a powerful
woman in early modern England. Antony and Cleopatra was published approximately four years
after the death of Queen Elizabeth I, a time period characterized by King James I pushing back
against the notion of female monarchy, as well as a nostalgia for Queen Elizabeth’s reign
throughout England. The nostalgia for the Elizabethan era caused many to romanticize the late
queen, and Shakespeare appears to be using Antony and Cleopatra to respond to the cultural
discourse surrounding Queen Elizabeth by addressing “the gap between the historical queen and
the queen represented in that discourse” (Tsukada 100). As Shakespeare appears to be
commenting upon the fact that memory and nostalgia are not reality, that a wistfulness for Queen
Elizabeth is ill-founded, that her reign is not one to be idealized through his linking of Cleopatra
and Queen Elizabeth, he presents a negative view towards women in power as a whole.
​
Literary critic Keith Rinehart devotes his article “Shakespeare’s Cleopatra and England’s
Elizabeth” to discussing the similarities between Queen Elizabeth and Cleopatra, as well as the
possible reasons for and intentions behind these similarities. Queen Elizabeth and Cleopatra were
both portrayed as treating courtiers and maids of honor roughly, affecting illnesses or other
shams to give false impressions, desiring amusement and revelry, wearing gorgeous apparel,
being witty, and relying on feminine wiles and charm to construct power (Rinehart 81). These
are traits that would have been identifiable as Elizabethan, and they are traits associated with
women who do not fit their proper societal role. According to the great chain of being, women
are weaker, lesser, more sinful creatures than men, and they must work to curb their baseness
which is typically expressed through a flaunted sexuality, vanity, pettiness, and jealousy. As a
result, Shakespeare’s incorporation of these traits in Cleopatra’s character reveals her to be,
despite her splendor and power, base and inferior to her male counterparts, to almost usurp the
natural order of things by her assertion of power and autonomy. Furthermore, by drawing upon
Queen Elizabeth to make this claim, Shakespeare asserts that women in power, as a whole, are
upsetting the natural order of the world. The most vivid example of Cleopatra’s faults drawn
from Queen Elizabeth come in Act 3 scene 3 where Cleopatra commands her messenger to
describe Octavia in detail, begging for confirmation that Cleopatra is the more desirable of the
two. This exchange is taken entirely from a letter Queen Elizabeth wrote asking for similar
details of Queen Mary of Scots (Rinehart 82-83). This scene undermines much of Cleopatra’s
prowess; it shows her to be petty, childish, vain, and insecure—negative traits typically
associated with women. Cleopatra, in this scene, is not the all-powerful queen who maintains
perfect control of Antony; rather she is inferior to and utterly dependent upon him.
Shakespeare’s inclusion of this scene begs the question of why he would undermine his powerful
queen in this way, and why he would draw upon Queen Elizabeth to do so.
​
Cleopatra greatly threatens what was thought to be the natural gender hierarchy, threatens
the power of the men around her, much as Queen Elizabeth did. As James I wanted to undermine
the power of Queen Elizabeth because a female monarch was threatening to his own reliance on
masculinity in his construction of power, as well as a personal vendetta against Queen Elizabeth
due to her execution of his mother, Shakespeare catering to this desire would have been
politically beneficial. Therefore, Shakespeare’s undermining of Cleopatra, his exposing of her as
childish and vain, and his coupling of her with Queen Elizabeth, serves as a simultaneous
warning against feminine power and a claim that feminine power is artificial, for their power is
undermined and faulty; they are not trustworthy simply because they are women. Women cannot
truly possess power because of their natural role in the world, because they are women. The
undermining of Cleopatra’s prowess exposes her, despite all of her strength, intellect, and
command, to be a woman in the most derogatory sense. Because Cleopatra is a woman, she is
not allowed to be fully powerful. By illustrating the underlying frivolity of Cleopatra’s power
with an example taken from Queen Elizabeth, Shakespeare allows for the undermining of
Cleopatra’s power to be translated to all women, for all women to appear weak and infantile.
Understanding the cultural politics and misogyny that Shakespeare operated under is
important, but it is equally, if not more, important to see how his conception of Cleopatra was
received in literary criticism beyond early modern England. Up until very recently, where
feminist literary criticism has become widely accepted, literary criticism surrounding Antony and
Cleopatra has championed views of Cleopatra as the emasculator, the cause of Antony’s ruin, at
times even the villain of the play. As Carole McKewin, a specialist in feminist literary criticism,
states in her dissertation written in the late 1970s, before feminist literary criticism became more
common, it was “taught in Shakespeare classes that Cleopatra was, despite her fascination, the
source of denigration for Antony and Roman virtue” (162). L.T. Fitz, an associate professor of
English at the University of Alberta also writing in the late 1970s, furthers this sentiment by
commenting on how much of literary criticism surrounding Antony and Cleopatra, displays an
attitude towards Cleopatra that “seem[s] to reveal deep personal fears of aggressive or
manipulative women” (298). For over 300 years, audiences and critics have seen Cleopatra as a
warning or something to be feared. Before feminism became widespread and women,
particularly women in power, were viewed more favorably and afforded more autonomy, the
responses to Cleopatra view her as something innately terrifying. Because Shakespeare’s
Cleopatra has invited a misogynistic interpretation of powerful women from the time of its
conception until very recently, it becomes clear that Cleopatra serves as a warning against
women in power to a predominantly male audience. Like Shakespeare and early modern
audiences, literary criticism prior to second-wave feminism possesses an underlying distrust and
discomfort of feminine power.
Textual Reception of Cleopatra and Fortuna
Cleopatra’s character has been heavily criticized in audience reception, but her
condemnation is just as, if not more, prevalent throughout the text itself. Throughout the play,
Antony is torn between loving Cleopatra and hating her—a conflict that brings all the men in the
text to condemn Cleopatra, and, as a result, condemn and pity Antony as he is unable to extricate
himself from her influence. Cleopatra is theatricality; her very nature is that of performance,
instability, and unknowability. Through this theatricality, Cleopatra “puts into question the very
notion of a unified, stable identity” (Singh 100), which is terrifying to the Romans, and would
have been terrifying to the early modern audience. Theatricality in early modern England and in
the Roman ideals portrayed in the play is perceived as interchangeable with the feminine (Singh
101)—meaning that Cleopatra’s theatricality, histrionics, and passion that are condemned
throughout the play are inextricable from her womanhood. Cleopatra’s faults are founded in her
femininity—she is condemned not for having faults, but for being a woman who retains
autonomy and uses her femininity to construct power. Because Cleopatra’s faults are inextricable
from femininity, from an early modern perspective, and because it is these traits that allow her to
obtain and retain power, it is Cleopatra’s femininity that is not restrained by social norms and
mores, as Octavia is, that is condemned.
​
The condemnation of femininity that is present in the character Cleopatra is seen
primarily through the Roman characters and their treatment of Cleopatra. Cleopatra’s control
over Antony is often blamed for Antony’s downfall. From the first act of the play, Antony
realizes that in order to maintain his power and virtue, he must break “These strong Egyptian
fetters” (1.2.28) and must “from this enchanting queen break off” (1.2.43). By establishing this at
the beginning of the play, Shakespeare makes it clear that Cleopatra is a corrupting influence,
and that Antony remaining with her threatens his own construction of power—Cleopatra's
success, though intertwined with Antony, necessitates his loss of virtue and masculinity. This
sentiment is carried throughout the play, not only by Antony, but by all Roman men. Enobarbus,
Antony’s closest friend, believes that the “vilest things/Become themselves in [Cleopatra ]”
(2.3.279-280), that it is her very faults, faults that are founded in her unrestrained femininity, that
make her so enticing and allow her to retain a grip on Antony. Because it is critical
commonplace to view Enobarbus as the play’s voice of reason, narrator, and audience
mouthpiece, the fact that he is carrying a misogynistic perception of Cleopatra can be interpreted
as authorial intent, and it can be further inferred that audiences would have held similar views
and prejudices. Caesar and Pompey, Antony’s opponents in the play, believe that Antony “hath
given his empire/Up to a whore” (3.6.76-77), and that the “ne’er lust-wearied Antony” (2.1.45)
must be plucked from “the lap of Egypt’s widow” (2.1.44). Antony’s rivals, soldiers, and Antony
himself—all Roman, all male—view Cleopatra as an emasculating and corrupting force who,
through her grip on Antony the “noble, courageous, high, unmatchable” (2.3.34) Roman
triumvir, is threatening the very virtue of Rome. Cleopatra is dangerous and destructive for
refusing to confine herself to social mores, but Antony is weak for not forcing her to be confined
to these social mores or, should this prove impossible, for not abandoning his affair and fully
separating himself from the “enchanting queen” of Egypt (1.2.143).
​
To this point, this paper has striven to provide a historical and textual portrait of
Shakespeare’s Cleopatra that lends itself to the reading of Antony and Cleopatra as a warning
against women in power; however, this warning is not found solely in the character of Cleopatra.
Although not a tangible character in the way that Cleopatra is, the Roman goddess Fortuna
permeates the entire play through direct textual reference, imagery associated with Fortuna, and
the cyclical nature of power presented in the play. Fortuna is a figure who Machiavelli explicitly
warns against due to her ability to usurp a man’s power, her ability to emasculate.
Like Cleopatra, Fortuna and her construction of power are confined and defined by
femininity. Fortuna is characterized throughout early modern England and Shakespeare’s canon
as “malicious, unfair, false, a strumpet...a force who elicits valiant endurance and, at the same
time, desperate supplication” (MacKenzie 357). Although she is often thought to operate in
cycles, she is characterized by an instability and unknowability—she cannot be trusted, and she
must be subdued. Fortuna is not perceived very favorably, and the traits that garner the most
resistance are those connected to sexuality; she is promiscuous, false, and indiscriminate.
Machiavelli describes Fortuna as “woman-like, a lover of young men, because they are less
cautious, more violent, and with more audacity command her” (Machiavelli 124), and through
this characterization emerges a fear of femininity. Fortuna holds a great amount of power,
possesses many traditionally masculine traits such as maliciousness and callousness, but these
traits are colored by her womanhood. While Fortuna poses a threat because of her unfair or
sometimes violent nature, she more so poses a threat because she is an unfair and sometimes
violent woman. Her faults are amplified by her gender. As Cleopatra is so compelling due to her
commanding sexuality, Fortuna is so difficult to resist because she is sexual, because she is a
woman. Fortuna is enticing, a seductress; she invites “desperate supplication” (MacKenzie 357),
a thorough self-emasculation, from men. Much in the manner of Cleopatra, it is her ability to
emasculate and her feminine prowess that causes her to become such a threat.
Throughout Antony and Cleopatra, Fortuna is directly referenced as holding power over
the characters and over the narrative arc. In 2.3 Antony confronts a soothsayer and asks “whose
question shall rise higher/Caesar’s or mine?” (2.3.19-20), prefacing the play with the fact that
Caesar and Antony appear to be situated opposite each other on Fortuna’s wheel—that is, where
one succeeds, the other necessarily fails; Pompey, despite his ultimate failure, claims that “in my
bosom shall [Fortuna] never come/To make my heart her vassal” (2.6.70-71)—recognizing that
Fortuna must be turned away if one wants autonomy; Caesar proclaims that “Our fortune
lies/Upon this jump” (3.8.6-7) in reference to the Battle of Actium, furthering the opposite
positioning of Caesar and Antony; Antony laments that his “fortunes have/Corrupted honest
men” (4.6.25-26), recognizing that his reliance upon Fortuna has destroyed not only him but his
men; upon winning the Battle of Actium, Caesar is “full-fortuned” (4.15.29) yet also “Fortune’s
knave” (5.2.3); and, in her final moments, Cleopatra announces that she is Antony’s “fortune’s
vassal” (5.2.33), recognizing both her own role in Antony’s demise and the alignment between
Fortuna and herself in the destruction of Antony. All told, there are 41 direct textual references to
fortune, significantly more than any other Shakespearean text (Williamson 423), but the
references are not all the same. For Antony, Fortuna appears to be an enticing and corrupting
force that he cannot turn away. For Pompey, Fortuna is something that must be turned away, yet
his attempt at rebuking her is unsuccessful. For Caesar, Fortuna is almost a benefactress, yet he
also seems the most adept out of the characters at relying on his own capabilities rather than
relying on Fortuna. For Cleopatra, Fortuna is an extension of herself, or more accurately, she
finds herself an extension of Fortuna.
​
While Fortuna is constantly referenced by the characters in the play, her presence and
prowess is also seen in the Fortuna-aligned imagery and symbolism that pervade the play. The
play is preoccupied with imagery of the sea, games of chance, and the moon—all of which are
closely associated with Fortuna due to their constant motion, uncertainty, and cyclical natures.
While Fortuna is associated with all of these elements, and all of these elements play important
roles in the play, her association is strongest with the sea. As literary academic and professor
Clayton G. MacKenzie asserts, Fortuna is “a woman of the sea, an arbitrary force of help or
hindrance” (360), and her association with the sea is present in much of early modern
iconography, many of Shakespeare’s works, and is discussed by Machiavelli. In The Prince,
Fortuna is described as a raging river that will destroy everything in its path, yet that can be
defended against (Machiavelli 120-121). Machiavelli’s argument is that men must remain on
guard for Fortuna’s flood, an action that Antony has not taken. Shakespeare draws upon this
association in his constant maritime references and imagery, as well as the culminating battle at
sea, to assert the fact that Fortuna presides over the play. In doing so, Shakespeare is furthering
his use of Machiavelli’s conception of Fortuna, thus allowing him to form a warning against her
and against feminine power. Fortuna is incredibly influential in the play and in the fates of every
character, and it is her influence, an influence derived from her femininity and usurpation of
masculinity, that causes the tragedy of Antony and Cleopatra.
​
Antony and Cleopatra takes place in a world filled with instability. The characters search
for something to ground themselves in, and Fortuna provides this role for many. The amount of
power and influence that Fortuna holds is profoundly terrifying for the characters in the play, and
it is something that Machiavelli explicitly warns against. Machiavelli argues that Fortuna “shows
her power where valour has not prepared to resist her, and thither she turns her forces where she
knows that barriers and defences have not been raised to constrain her” (121), and thus men of
virtue must be prepared to resist and subjugate her, or risk placing themselves at her mercy.
Fortuna’s corrupting, crafty nature echoes that of Cleopatra, and it is important to note that both
are forces that men must work to rebuke. Fortuna is an influence one cannot shake once they
have let her in, and Cleopatra appears to mirror this—a fact that I attribute to them both being
women in positions of power, particularly power over men.
​
Furthermore, Machiavelli explains what he believes to be a conflict between virtue and
Fortuna—that in order to obtain, construct, and maintain power in the proper way, one must be
able to rebuke and subjugate Fortuna. If one is unable to construct power through virtue, which
Machiavelli heavily associates with masculinity, then one is forced to construct power through
Fortuna who is faulty and associated with the feminine. Fortuna, according to Machiavelli,
“displays inherently feminine qualities as she is unpredictable, yet occasionally manageable,
though concurrently antagonistic towards all men” (Clifford and Romaniuk 3). Fortuna must be
controlled, or she will control—this is where Antony fails as he places his fate solely in the
hands of Fortuna, rather than relying on his own virtue and masculine capabilities, allowing her
to determine the course of the play. The characterization of Fortuna, and more importantly the
conflict between virtue and Fortuna, mirrors the conflict between passion and honor that informs
the central conflict of the play. Fortuna’s destructive influence over the play, her nature being
necessarily in conflict with Roman virtue, and the way that Cleopatra is portrayed and perceived
move the central conflict of the play from honor versus passion, or Egypt versus Rome, to
masculine versus feminine. When a woman is indiscriminate, ambitious, controlling, and unable
to be controlled, she is emasculating. When a woman is emasculating, when she is given power
to control not only her own storyline but also the storylines of men, tragedy follows. Fortuna and
Cleopatra are not portrayed in high esteem; they are cursed, slandered, hated, yet enticing and
seductive.
​
Fortuna and Cleopatra are both women who hold immense power in the play, who both
mirror each other in character and reception; however, there are marked differences between the
two. Much of this can be summed up by the fact that Cleopatra is Egyptian and Fortuna is
Roman. Egypt and Rome are at odds with each other throughout the entire play. For
Shakespeare, Rome represents masculinity, order, discipline, and honor—it is heavily associated
with England; Egypt represents femininity, passion, and chaos. Rome offers tangible morals and
rules; Egypt offers whims and dreams. Fortuna is emphatically Roman. While she is capricious
and promiscuous, she is contained. Despite her unknowability, Fortuna operates in cycles, there
is an order to be found in her disorder. It may not be possible to know precisely what rules she
abides by, but she does appear to abide by rules. Her association with her wheel, the tides, and
phases of the moon all provide a sense of reason and even honor, albeit an indiscriminate,
detached, and feminine version of reason and honor. Cleopatra is quite the opposite. Cleopatra is
incapable of being truly known; she is passionate, capricious, and exciting. Cleopatra is
sensuous, overtly sexual, and confident in her sexual prowess. Where Fortuna is indiscriminate,
Cleopatra chooses her lovers carefully and keeps them attached to her. There are obvious
differences between these two women, yet their construction of power and the reception of said
power remains similar. The fact that there are obvious differences between Cleopatra and
Fortuna only makes their similarities more potent. The problem with Fortuna is not that she is
malicious, the problem with Cleopatra is not that she is passionate; rather, the problem with both
is that they are women who will not be controlled. The differences in characterization and the
similarity in condemnation that surround Cleopatra and Fortuna create a Machiavellian warning
against feminine power. Machiavelli warns against “the threatening nature of women and the
threat they exhibit towards politics that must be quelled” (Clifford and Romaniuk). Through the
conceptions of Cleopatra and Fortuna, Shakespeare acknowledges the threat that women pose
and warns against allowing them to obtain power.
Antony’s Emasculation and the Warning against Feminine Power
The warning against the power of Cleopatra and Fortuna, against the power of women as
a whole, is most evident in the demise of Antony. Although both Cleopatra and Antony are
titular characters, the play centers Antony more than it does Cleopatra as the central conflict is
that of whether Antony will pledge his allegiance to Egypt or Rome, Caesar or Cleopatra.
Antony is torn between choosing Egypt and Rome, and from the perspective of early modern
England, Rome is the better choice as it is associated with England and upholds similar moral
codes. As Antony casts his lot with Cleopatra and Egypt, he allows himself to be emasculated.
The conflict between masculine and feminine power is centered throughout the play, and when
Antony must finally make his choice, he makes the wrong one.
The destructive nature of the two women is most evident in the Battle of Actium and
Antony’s suicide. The Battle of Actium is where Antony’s fate is irrevocably sealed, where he
has firmly fallen from the top of Fortuna’s wheel to the bottom. The Battle of Actium is the
climax of the play, and Antony is heavily influenced by Cleopatra in forming his military
strategies. Although Antony’s soldiers press him to fight Caesar by land, Cleopatra urges Antony
to fight Caesar by sea as this is where she is most comfortable. Fighting by sea causes Antony to
lose the battle and his last remnants of honor, and the choice to do so is a result of Cleopatra’s
influence. Cleopatra’s power over Antony is fatal in the Battle of Actium, but Fortuna holds
similar influence over the outcome of the battle. By this point in the play, Antony has fully given
Fortuna power over his life; he has failed in exerting virtue over her. Therefore, when he enters
the battle Fortuna is in control. Not only has Antony given himself over to Fortuna, but, at
Cleopatra’s request, he has placed the battle in her dominion, allowing her full control over his
fate. In this way, the two women work in conjunction to bring about the ruin of Antony.
Cleopatra persuades Antony to abandon his better judgment, to ignore his virtuous Roman
soldiers, and to throw himself to the mercy of the sea, thereby placing Antony at the mercy of
Fortuna.
​
The Battle of Actium is where Egypt and Rome come to heads for control over Antony.
Antony’s Roman soldiers are opposed to fighting at sea, yet Cleopatra insists that fighting at sea
is necessary. Enobarbus warns Antony that, “No disgrace/Shall fall you for refusing him at
sea/Being prepared for land” (3.7.49-51), and Antony’s soldiers beg Antony to “not fight by
sea/Trust not to rotten planks” (3.7.77-78). The Roman voices are emphasizing the instability of
the ocean and the stability provided by land, and they impress upon Antony the fact that his
honor faces greater peril when he abandons himself to the sea, to uncertainty, then if he were to
remain grounded. However, Antony is persuaded to fight Caesar at sea by Cleopatra, who offers
her own sails to accomplish this. This furthers the emasculation of Antony as he not only rejects
male advice in favor of a woman but relies on the military power of this woman. Throughout the
play the emasculation of Antony by Cleopatra is lamented—Caesar scorns Antony for being “not
more manlike/Than Cleopatra” (1.4.5-6), Pompey asserts that the “ne’er lust-wearied Antony” is
“in the lap of Egypt’s widow” (2.1.44-45), and even Charmian, Cleopatra’s lady-in-waiting,
warns Cleopatra to “Tempt him not so too far” (1.3.13) when she is toying with him, and by
extension his masculinity. However, here, in the culminating battle of the play, Cleopatra’s
emasculation of Antony is destroying his very life and honor, not merely his reputation and
dignity.
​
Antony’s suicide is where the Fortuna/Cleopatra coupling is the strongest, and where this
coupling is most destructive. Antony has just faced excruciating defeat; his hope of honor and
power are gone, and he believes this suffering to be caused by Cleopatra, who, despite
everything, he cannot liberate himself from. After Antony is forced to admit defeat, he attempts
to renounce both Cleopatra and Fortuna; Cleopatra he seems to successfully rebuke at least in the
moment, as he threatens to “give thee thy deserving” (4.12.36), but he is forced to admit that
“Fortune and Antony part here; even here/Do we shake hands” (4.12.21-22). Because Cleopatra
is a tangible force and therefore more present and controllable, Antony feels both that he can and
that he must gain some level of authority over Cleopatra. However, he knows that he is unable to
do so with Fortuna because she is intangible and has granted favor to Caesar over Antony,
something that Antony cannot undo. Despite his desperate desire to rid himself of Fortuna’s
controlling presence, he is forced to admit that “even here/Do we shake hands” (4.12.22) as he
has failed to rebuke her until it is too late. If, as Machiavelli argues, a ruler must “be prepared for
fortuna to strike and to subjugate ‘her’ with his virtuousness, as she will expose herself when the
Prince is not prepared” (Clifford and Romaniuk), then Antony has continuously failed to do this
and is no longer capable of righting this wrong.
​
Since Cleopatra is human, Antony retains some hope of restoring the honor that she stole
from him, or at least of revenging the death of his virtue; however, in the face of Antony’s
rebuke, Cleopatra falls back on the manipulation and dramatics that characterize her throughout
the play. Due to her status as a woman, Cleopatra is forced to align herself with powerful men—
such as Antony and Julius Caesar—in order to obtain her own power; her power is necessarily
found through controlling those who are afforded a more tangible power within the world. As
such, where Antony is able to rebuke her for the loss of his power, Cleopatra is not afforded this
choice despite the fact that her own life and honor are as much on the line as Antony’s. Cleopatra
must maintain her grip on Antony, and thus she fakes her suicide and sends a messenger to
“bring [her] how he takes [her] death” (4.14.13) as a means of testing whether Antony has truly
shunned her, whether she maintains her power or is powerless. Antony has admitted that he
cannot disentangle himself from Fortuna, and as such he is unable to reclaim the masculinity that
she stole; however, he retains hope that, by killing Cleopatra, he can reclaim at least some of his
masculinity. If in order to master Fortuna one must “beat and ill-use her” (Machiavelli 124), and
Antony has lost all hope of doing so, then Antony’s only hope of retaining any semblance of
honor is in killing Cleopatra as she has shown herself to be uncontrollable. By killing herself, as
Antony believes she has, she has once again removed his ability to reclaim his masculinity—he
has doomed himself to emasculation by Fortuna, and now his emasculation by Cleopatra is
irrevocable. This is what drives him to suicide. While Antony mourns the news of Cleopatra’s
death, he more so mourns that she, with only “the courage of a woman” (4.14.71), has exposed
that he has a “less noble mind/Than she” (4.14.71). Cleopatra was the “conqueror of [her]self”
(4.14.73) while Antony is comparatively weak and effeminate. Antony, realizing this, orders one
of his soldiers to kill him, but Eros cannot bring himself to “do/that which all the Parthian
darts,/Though enemy, lost aim and could not” (4.14.81-82) and instead kills himself. To
Antony’s knowledge, Cleopatra has proven to Caesar that “[she is] conqueror of myself”
(4.14.73), and now Eros has similarly proven himself to be more manly, more Roman, then
Antony is. It is this emasculation, primarily at the hands of Cleopatra, that leads Antony to
commit suicide. It is not until Antony comes face to face with Cleopatra in his dying moments
that he expresses love to her—before then, his death is directly related to his emasculation and
loss of honor. By portraying Antony’s loss of honor and subsequent suicide as directly caused by
his emasculation at the hands of Cleopatra, Shakespeare is creating a portrait of the destructive
nature of unrestrained femininity. Like Machiavelli, Shakespeare views women as “lack[ing]
sexual and moral standards” and struggling “to function in life devoid of the requisite strength to
overcome their sexual urge” (Clifford and Romaniuk). Had Antony exercised the “requisite
strength” that Cleopatra and Fortuna need to function, he would have prevented his
emasculation, subsequent loss of power, and suicide. His failure to do so serves as a warning to
properly subdue women, to keep women restrained.
​
Cleopatra and Fortuna’s corruption and emasculation of Antony are strongest at the end
of the play, specifically the Battle of Actium, but the intertwined nature of their presence is
similarly most evident at the end of the play. As Cleopatra is visited by Proculeius bearing the
message from Caesar asking for the demands of the now-conquered queen, she proclaims, “I am
his fortune’s vassal and I send him/The greatness he has got” (5.2.33-34). Cleopatra in her final
moments acknowledges the similarities between herself and Fortuna, and in doing so she
specifically aligns herself with the destructive, emasculating feminine power that Fortuna, and
herself, wield. As Fortuna has favored Caesar over Antony, so too has Cleopatra. It cannot be
argued that Cleopatra’s urging Antony to fight at sea, to give himself over to Fortuna, brought
about Antony’s demise for the purpose of aiding Caesar; however, Cleopatra acknowledges that
she and Fortuna are allied, and that they are both responsible for the death of Antony, which
necessarily dictates the success of Caesar. Fortuna works through Cleopatra; Cleopatra urges
Antony to throw himself at the mercy of Fortuna. This is possible because of the unrestrained,
unconquered femininity that both of these women possess. The power that Fortuna and Cleopatra
possess, because they are women, is destructive for the men who fail to subdue them.
Machiavelli warns of the dangers of throwing oneself at the mercy of Fortuna, the dangers of not
subduing women, and this appears to have deeply informed Shakespeare’s conception of
Cleopatra, Fortuna, and their roles in Antony’s demise. In this way, Antony and Cleopatra
becomes a warning against allowing oneself to be emasculated, a warning against not retaining
control over one’s narrative, but most specifically a warning against allowing women to obtain
and maintain power, particularly power over men.
Conclusion
When it is understood that Shakespeare’s portrayal of Cleopatra and Fortuna, his
emphasis on the emasculation of Antony, his use of Queen Elizabeth, and his use of
Machiavelli’s theory regarding Fortuna are meant to serve as a warning against women in power,
it becomes possible to look beyond this misogyny. Cleopatra is incredibly multi-faceted,
characterized by her “infinite variety” (2.3.276), and this is what feminist readings of Antony and
Cleopatra turn to. The fact that Shakespeare portrays Cleopatra in the depth that he does is
incredible; however, it is also necessary to look at and understand that his conception of
Cleopatra, and Fortuna, is deeply colored by misogyny—as is their reception throughout the text
and history. When Cleopatra is read as an intended warning against women like her, it becomes
possible to view her as an even more impressive example of female agency and power. The
power that Cleopatra and Fortuna hold in the play, though confined to a specific formation of
power due to their womanhood and when they were written, is maintained despite the opposition
they face. The full scope of their rebellion and refusal to be controlled, despite scenes where they
are undermined, cannot be appreciated until one understands how desperately society believed
they needed to be controlled.
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