“Cleopatra a Gypsy”: Pretense, Performance, and Gypsy Identity in Shakespeare’s Antony and Cleopatra

This essay explores the complex relationship between authentic and counterfeit “Egyptian” identities in Shakespeare’s Antony and Cleopatra, drawing upon the racial discourses surrounding “Gypsy” identity. It examines Cleopatra’s characterization as a Gypsy figure by Roman characters who seek to limit her political power by casting her performances as deceptive, illegitimate pretenses. The essay focuses particularly upon the ways in which this disavowal of authentic performance is figured within the play’s discourses of promising, wagering, and prophecy. I posit that, within each of these discourses, Cleopatra consistently disrupts a Roman rhetorical program which seeks to denigrate Cleopatra’s performativity as non-serious and infelicitous pretense. Additionally, the essay argues that Cleopatra’s characterization as a Gypsy figure, marked by deliberate anachronism, creates meaningful connections across historical periods, thereby unsettling established early modern frameworks of racial authenticity and identity. Ultimately, the essay demonstrates that the representation of a racialized identity as “non-serious” is intimately linked to the construction, perpetuation, and enforcement of serious racial hierarchies and stereotypes. [D.C.]