Antony and Cleopatra (Vol. 47) - Drama As Deception
DRAMA AS DECEPTION
Robert Ornstein (essay date 1966)
SOURCE: "The Ethic of the Imagination: Love and Art in Antony and Cleopatra," in Twentieth Century Interpretations of Antony and Cleopatra: A Collection of Critical Essays, edited by Mark Rose, Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1977, pp. 82-98.
[In the essay that follows, originally written in 1966, Ornstein states that while Antony and Cleopatra is not an allegory of art, it nonetheless uses Cleopatra and Egypt to defend art as the means by which reality and truth are revealed.]
The last scene of Antony and Cleopatra would be less difficult if it were more obviously solemn and serious. There is no lack of grandeur in the dying Cleopatra, but the comic note struck in her conversation with the Clown persists and mingles with the ceremonial mystery of her death. She is amused as well as ecstatic; when she thinks of Octavius, her visionary glances turn into a comic wink....
[The entire page is 25400 words long]
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