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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. Pompey relates to Mark Antony the coming of whom to Sicily?

2. Whom does Alexas use as an example in saying that no one would dare not look on Cleopatra when she is ill-pleased?

3. To where does Antony decide he must go in the beginning of the play?

4. When does Caesar say he will attack after receiving Antony's challenge?

5. Whose ship hoists its sail and flies, "like a cow in June"?

Short Essay Questions

1. For what reason does Ventidius claim he leaves some soldiering undone?

2. What is the meaning and significance of "a Lethe'd dulness" as Pompey uses the phrase in line 27 of Act 2, Scene 1?

3. Why does Octavius Caesar lament the absence of Mark Antony?

4. How does Menas propose to make Pompey the ruler of the world?

5. For what reason does Antony insist upon assailing Caesar by sea at Actium, despite the protestations of his loyal men?

6. For what reason does Mecaenas imply that striking Antony while the beleaguered triumvir is in his rage is strategically sound

7. For what reason does Cleopatra send Alexas to Italy?

8. Under what condition would Caesar grant lands in Sicily to Mark Antony?

9. What characterizes the manner with which Cleopatra reacts to Antony's decisions?

10. What does Caesar imply by his directions regarding giving the soldiers a feast the night before the battle at Alexandria?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

An essential element of the tragic play is the evocation of pity from the audience. In order to evoke pity, the audience must be enabled to relate with the characters caught up in the tragedy. In a broad-minded and considerate essay, analyze the means by which the play makes those involved in the tragedy, principally Antony and Cleopatra, but also Enobarbus and Eros, as well as any others caught in the struggles between mightier characters, sympathetic to the audience or reader. What scenes demonstrate the unfortunate nature of these characters' sufferings? How do they portray the characters as pitiable? What is the fundamental root of relation between the audience and the pitiable characters in these scenes? What does this reveal about dramatic tragedy and its relationship to human nature?

Essay Topic 2

In contrast to the more nuanced influences of the play, the direct cause of the play's tragic outcome is quite obviously the external conflict between Mark Antony and Octavius Caesar. However, the drastic importance of this conflict, its political and historical implications, have a drastic influence on the overall significance of the play. Why is the conflict important to the whole world? How is this indicated in the play? What is at stake in the conflict between the two triumvirs? What is the relationship between the greater significance of this conflict and the significance of the play as a tragedy?

Essay Topic 3

A seldom explicitly mentioned theme throughout the play is the fidelity and infidelity of minor characters despite maltreatment and disregard for their more fundamental rights. Thoughtfully explicate this theme in a well-developed essay. How do the various minor characters demonstrate their fidelity and to whom? For what reasons do the characters evidently remain loyal? Contrariwise, which characters forsake their obligations to fidelity, and for what reasons are they motivated to do so? What do these various relationships of disparate levels of fidelity indicate about the fundamental human tendencies regarding loyalty?

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