Enter Cleopatra aloft with Charmian and Iras
CLEOPATRA O Charmian, I will never go from hence.
CHARMIAN Be comforted, dear madam.
CLEOPATRA No, I will not.
All strange and terrible events are welcome,
But comforts we despise. Our size of sorrow,
Proportioned to our cause, must be as great
As that which makes it.
Enter Diomedes
How now? Is he dead?
DIOMEDES His death’s upon him, but not dead.
Look out o’th’ other side your monument.
His guard have brought him thither. (4.16.1-9)
Aloft, above the stage, probably on the gallery in original stagings, perhaps—as is sometimes the case now—making use of another structure. Sometimes on a completely flat stage. But if Cleopatra and her women are aloft, there is the suggestion both of their enclosure in the monument, from which they look out, and their occupation of a space sometimes associated with the divine (and with other lovers, in Romeo and Juliet). The possibility of apotheosis, of lifting up and transfiguration, is inherent in the scene from the start, although not unambiguously so.
Unsurprisingly, Cleopatra is in a state. O, Charmian, I shall never go from hence is a statement of stubbornness and resistance—no one’s getting me out of here—but also of foreboding and fatalism. I’m not getting out of here alive. As ever, Charmian tries to calm and reassure: be comforted, dear madam. Cleopatra is absolute in her refusal, and perhaps for the first time her utter contrariness seems justified: no, I will not. No possibility of comfort, none at all. All strange and terrible events are welcome—at this stage, just bring it on, throw everything you have at us—but comforts we despise. It’s partly because no comfort, no consolation is possible in this situation, as Cleopatra awaits, as she thinks, news not only of Antony’s death but of its being precipitated by her own thoughtless scheme, but it’s also an expression of utter, unshakeable hauteur. Comfort? That’s for the little people; she is back in the royal plural. And, even more, our size of sorrow, her reaction, her devastating, inconsolable grief, is entirely proportioned to our cause, as great as that which makes it, Antony’s death. And that death is earth-shattering.
Enter Diomedes, who’s perhaps run ahead of the guards bringing Antony, and in any case is not weighed down by the burden of carrying him. How now? Is he dead? Cleopatra just wants to know. Diomedes manages her expectations brilliantly: his death’s upon him, he’s dying—but not dead. Not yet. So look out o’th’ other side of your monument. Go on, look out. His guard have brought him thither. They’ve brought him to you.