artsykat
Junior Member
Hello, I'm Kateri, nice to meet you~!
Posts: 51 
|
Post by artsykat on Dec 9, 2016 9:10:17 GMT
Cleopatra was one conniving yet ruthless queen, or rather pharo. What stands out to me is the difference from the Romans and the Egyptians. I know I'm comparing again, but when I think about it, I never heard of a Roman leader who was female. Yet the Egyptians had quite a few female leaders. An interesting thought to me and also emphasizes the amount of freedom the women of Rome had.
Also, the fact the Cleo maneged to seduce Caesar and Antony to politically benifit her army/kingdom kinda shows to me her need for power and security. That didn't seem to affect her pride, yet as soon as her kingdom was captured she lost any form of tactical thinking and then let her pride get the better of her. This action shows the mindset leaders had at that time. Being a leader wasn't about serving the people for them, but about power, strength, and pride.
|
|
|
|
Post by Christopher Martin on Dec 9, 2016 14:44:27 GMT
Take care not to speak too generally about the topics than for what the text supports . . .
Good points about Cleopatra, certainly, but at the same time, I think one could make the argument that she was actually quite powerful, and certainly moreso than many/most women of her time. I mean, ALL leaders require power and security, right? So then Cleopatra, as a woman, merely utilized different means in order to achieve political stability . . . and a pretty impressive form of it too, all things considered! How might we compare Cleopatra, for example, to Dido?
|
|
artsykat
Junior Member
Hello, I'm Kateri, nice to meet you~!
Posts: 51
|
Post by artsykat on Dec 13, 2016 1:58:59 GMT
Well, it's kinda hard to compare the two considering that Dido wasn't herself when she fell hard in love, a lot of Venus' influence was upon her(and also she died by the fourth book, so there wasn't much of her through out the text). However, when I think of the two in comparison of each other, I find Cleopatra to be more impressive. Yes, while Cleopatra needed security and didn't seem to plan out things wholly(Caesar's death + his enemies backlash), she definitely was powerful for where she was, and the circumstances she was in, such as the constant fear of invasion and betrayal. The way she was able to gain Antony's and Julius' trust was indeed not only cunning, but smart. She saw an opportunity and took it.
However, with Dido, she was just kinda there for convenience of the plot, I don't remember her doing much. Cleopatra seemed throughout the text definitely more real, and less of a fantasy when compared to Dido, who is after all, a character. To me, the only thing that they have in common is the way they died. And even then, they both died for two different reasons, one of heartbreak, and the other of pride. From their deaths it's easy to see which queen was consumed by power, and which queen wasn't.
|
|
