SOURCE: Colie, Rosalie L. “Antony and Cleopatra: The Significance of Style.” In Shakespeare's Living Art, pp. 168-207. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1974.

In the following essay, Colie examines the play's use of Attic and Asiatic styles of speech, explaining that Atticism, the style preferred by Caesar, is characterized by plain, direct speech, while Asianism, which is more sensuous, self-indulgent, and imaginative, is the style used by both Cleopatra and Antony. Colie contends that in the Renaissance, these styles were studied not just as rhetorical effects, but as indicators of morality and cultural differences.

I

Like earlier chapters, this one is concerned with a particular manifestation of Shakespeare's control over style and styles. By definition, Shakespeare was a very stylish writer indeed, conscious of the range of stylistic alternatives available to him, concerned to honor the particular decorums of style and to extend (even to subverting those official...