Antony and Cleopatra

As all of Shakespeare opening scenes, right from the start the narrator wants to explain the outcome, indeed in the first dialogue between Antony’s friends, Demetrius and Philo, they say that Antony loses military values because he falls in love with Cleopatra. The most important values of Roman soldiers was military service, they focused on the war; they always fought to defended the country or to invaded a new area. Therefore Antony’ s love with Cleopatra mustn’t have a happy ending. In the first and in the second scenes the narrator wants to underline that. For all of the first scene Antony doesn’t want to listen the messenger that comes to Rome, he refuses his duty. In the second scene a soothsayer says to Iras and Charmian “You shall outlive the lady whom you serve” (l 32), the narrator wants to underline that It doesn’t spend long time to Cleopatra’s death and so the tragic end of love between Antony and Cleopatra.  The most important feature in the two scenes is the contrast:

Antony loves Cleopatra but he’s marry to Fulvia

Demetrius and Philo don’t approve this love, but they are Antony’s friends and they must support his friends’ decisions

The soothsayer must tell good news to Charmian and Iras but he focus the attention on the Cleopatra’s death

After Antony’s wife death, Antony can marry Cleopatra but he wants to return to Rome, the city where people hate him