[196] It is rather strange that Shakespeare, whose “accessories” are usually relevant, should choose such a subject for the decoration of Imogen’s room. Mr. Bradley, in a note to his essay on Antony and Cleopatra says: “Of the ‘good’ heroines, Imogen is the one who has most of [Cleopatra’s] spirit of fire and air.” This is one of the things one sees to be true as soon as one reads it: can it be that their creator has brought them into association through some feeling, conscious or unconscious, of their kinship in this important respect?
I regret that Mr. Bradley’s admirable study, which appeared when I was travelling in the Far East, escaped my notice till a few days ago, when it was too late to use it for my discussion.
[197] Of course the division into scenes is not indicated in the Folio, but a new “place” is obviously required for this conversation. Of course, too, change of scene did not mean so much on the Elizabethan as on the modern stage, but it must always have counted for something. Every allowance made, the above criticism seems to me valid.
[198] The irony of the proposal, which Plutarch indicates but does not stress, is entirely lost in Shakespeare. We have already been told that Hipparchus “was the first of all his (i.e. Antony’s) infranchised bondmen that revolted from him and yelded unto Caesar”; so Caesar is invited to retaliate on one of his own adherents.
[199] It is interesting to note that it had already caught the fancy of Jodelle, though being more faithful to the text in enumerating only the kings who were actually present and taking no liberties with the names and titles, he failed to get all the possible points out of it. Agrippa says to Octavian:
Le Roy Bocchus, le Roy Cilicien
Archelaus, Roy Capadocien,
Et Philadelphe, et Adalle de Thrace,
Et Mithridate, usoyent-ils de menace
Moindre sus nous que de porter en joye