SOURCE: Habib, Imtiaz. “Cleopatra and the Sexualization of Race.” In Shakespeare and Race: Postcolonial Praxis in the Early Modern Period, pp. 157-205. Lanham, Md.: University Press of America, 2000.
In the following essay, Habib suggests that in Antony and Cleopatra, Shakespeare contrasted noble England and the white, virginal Queen Elizabeth with the torpor of Egypt and its black and wanton ruler, Cleopatra.
