Cleopatra (2011) is set in Alexandria, Egypt, and the Mediterranean, where Cleopatra VII ruled Egypt for almost twenty-two years. She was born in 69 BC and ruled from 51 BC, at the age of eighteen, until her death in 30 BC at the age of 39.
The author does a great job detailing Cleopatra’s professional life – leading the kingdom – and her personal life. Both are fascinating. Her relationship with Mark Antony was the longest, but her relationship with his rival Julius Caesar was the most enduring.
Although Cleopatra is one of the most recognized and influential women in history, the historical facts have often been misrepresented. Her enemies wrote her history. ‘There is no universal agreement on most of the basic details of her life, no consensus on who her mother was, how long Cleopatra lived in Rome, how often she was pregnant, whether she and Antony married, what transpired at the battle that sealed her fate, and how she died.’
The author attempts to separate fact from fiction using (often contradictory) classical texts, statues and portraits, and archaeological relics, in her depiction of Cleopatra’s reign in which she ‘lost a kingdom, regained it, nearly lost it again, amassed an empire, lost it all’ – and loved two of the most prominent and powerful Roman men in history – and suicided.
Cleopatra became queen at eighteen, after her father’s death. Schiff states that, at least initially, ‘survival rather seduction’ was Cleopatra’s main goal. In other words, being strategically aligned with people was top of her list. Coupled with brutal and strategic acumen and opportunism, was a certain dose of pluck and luck.
The author makes a case for society’s definition of women’s roles. Women had generous liberties, such as the right to make their own marriage, to divorce and be supported after divorce, to inherit equally and to hold property independently. Women served as priests, owned businesses, and initiated lawsuits.
Although it is unclear who seduced whom, Cleopatra is said to have captured ‘the old man’ General Julius Caesar, thirty years her senior, by magic. It was an unusual relationship because he was married, a different nationality, much older, and she ‘entered into it of her own will.’ Her post-battle banquets and trips down the Nile river are legendary.
After Caesar’s murder, Marcus Antonius (Mark Antony) was briefly the ‘man of the hour’ after defeating Caesar’s killers. Then he met 28-year-old Cleopatra: ‘The moment he saw her, Antony lost his head to her like a young man, although he was 40 years old’ notices essayist Plutarch. Cleopatra’s relationship with Antony – the power couple – made her even more influential as they attempted to forge a new empire together. They formed a new age and a new political reorientation, redefining themselves and their nations. The couple was, however, a source of gossip ‘for the whole world’ – which was really just the Mediterranean region. It was the Battle of Actium that proved to be their downfall. Together, it was an alliance that led to their demises.
Interestingly told, easy-to-follow, and with enough new information to make this worthy of reading. I would have liked more detail, more evocative language, more humourous anecdotes, than the matter-of-fact, academic tone. Nonetheless, basing the knowledge on classical texts gives more substance to Cleopatra’s personality and acumen than the images depicted in film and fiction.
MARTINA NICOLLS
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MARTINA NICOLLS is an international aid and development consultant, and the author of: The Paris Residences of James Joyce (2020), Similar But Different in the Animal Kingdom (2017), The Shortness of Life: A Mongolian Lament (2015), Liberia’s Deadest Ends (2012), Bardot’s Comet (2011), Kashmir on a Knife-Edge (2010) and The Sudan Curse (2009).
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