The literary study of dead white men is falling out of fashion. Students demonstrate growing disinterest in the works of Shakespeare as Western society progresses further from Elizabethan standards of prescribed gender roles, racial hierarchies, and oppressive class structures. This disinterest is due, largely, to the way these works are presented. Though a passionate professor may claim these works are discourses upon the universal human condition, teaching modalities show them to be quaintly and increasingly irrelevant. Academic writing since the 17th-century has advanced little in its interpretation and has failed to adequately, and fairly, turn the lenses of contemporary literary and cultural theories upon the sacred texts of the Bard.
This paper proposes that the play Antony and Cleopatra offers incredible relevance in this modern age when individuals are free to choose their own pronouns and their identities. We should be reading and performing and teaching this story with characters who are individuals free to define themselves as man or woman or neither or both – just as individuals sitting in the seats reading and watching the plays are free to do. I argue that Shakespeare intended Antony and Cleopatra to demonstrate, rather than extreme or essential examples of a gendernormative binary, examples of a fluid continuum.
The characters of this play exemplify the performative aspects of gender, race, and class as third-wave feminist writers have described for decades. An exploration of this topic is missing from the literary discourse. This paper examines these characters as individuals from a performative perspective, arguing that imposing Western Puritanical perspectives on Shakespeare’s works is, and has been, as out-of-place as finding fault with, as Cleopatra states, a squeaky-voiced boy playing her role.
About the presenterC. Martin Beck
Baltimore resident C. Martin “Gonzo” Beck has achieved modest acclaim for translating experiences gleaned from decades of international shoestring-travel and a panoply of dubious careers ranging from street evangelist to pornographer, from hospital administrator to transient day laborer, in thematic representations through various visual media, essays, and poetry. He currently teaches writing at Coppin State University and is a regular contributor to Zing News in Southeast Asia on topics of American politics, society, and culture.