Shakespeare’s Cleopatra – A Post-Feminist Woman in a Pre-Modern Era
Keywords:
Antony and Cleopatra, Post-feminism, Character analysisAbstract
“Femininity is not a fixed identity…but a constantly renegotiated set of alliances and identifications”, says Myra Macdonald. With the second wave feminism turning radical and resulting in unhappy women, there emerged the need to take another evolutionary step, which resulted in Post feminism. It also differs from Feminism in that, here sexuality was not negated; in fact Post-feminist women glorified their sexuality. They searched for their individuality and were happy in it. Shakespeare’s Cleopatra is clearly such a unique and unparalleled figure. Though she is no bra-burning radical feminist, she is in no way inferior to Antony. In fact, it is Cleopatra who holds us enthralled until the very end and whom we will never forget. In this way, this paper aims to analyze Cleopatra as a Post-feminist woman in a Pre-modern era.
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