Politics of Desire: A Deleuzist Reading on Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra

Document Type : Original Article

Author

Assistant Professor, English Department, Ershad Damavand Institute of Higher Education, Tehran, Iran.

Abstract

The present article intends to apply Deleuzist tenets on Shakespeare’s Antony and Cleopatra. Deleuze posits that an artwork is a desiring machine endowed with the basic components of becoming woman, becoming animal, nomadism, war machine as well as BwO (body without organs). Drawing upon them, this research aims to dissolve Rome-Egypt duality and its corresponding genderized subjectivity and racial bias. The major questions raised in the research include: First, how do the early modern biracial lovers, from contrasting geographical spaces, merge in parallelism, and to what effect? Second, to what extent is the course of desubjectification carried out? Third, what vantagepoint (in culturalists’ parlance) is envisioned for the future polity? To answer these questions, the present study probes into Deleuzist theories to demonstrate the characters’ decisiveness to transgress hegemonic codes and legitimate ideological power relations. These formulations align with Ovidian tradition of metamorphosis. Bodies in flux, reenact Shakespeare’s lovers in perpetual passage both within and without until Rome and Egypt – summing up the white/nonwhite polarity – consolidate. The disruptive theories appropriated by the lovers drive them to the communion of the disadvantaged. The final egalitarian gesture would envision a future polity of inclusion, diversity and equity.

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References

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Critical Literary Studies
Volume 8, Issue 1 - Serial Number 15
October 2025
Pages 135-161

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History

  • Receive Date: 16 March 2025
  • Revise Date: 14 September 2025
  • Accept Date: 23 September 2025

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