Cleopatra: Sally’s role model

Smell is associated with love is no less than sight is to love.  If you read how Shakespeare describes how Cleopatra presented herself to Antony, you know Antony has no choice but surrender. “so perfumèd, that The winds were lovesick with them;”  They (the barge and all) were perfumed so heavily that they made the air seem dizzy with love.  Love at first smell, indeed.

And you wonder how Elizabeth Taylor (who played Cleopatra in the movie Cleopatra) made a fortune in her perfumes series.  Who can resist her Passion?

The barge she sat in, like a burnished throne,
Burned on the water: the poop was beaten gold;
Purple the sails, and so perfumèd, that
The winds were lovesick with them; the oars were silver

             Antony and Cleopatra,  Act 2 Scene2

NOBARBUS

Upon her landing, Antony sent to her,

Invited her to supper. She replied

It should be better he became her guest,

Which she entreated. Our courteous Antony,

Whom ne’er the word of “No” woman heard speak,

Being barbered ten times o’er, goes to the feast,

And for his ordinary pays his heart

For what his eyes eat only.

(The modern translation)

Upon her landing at the port, Antony sent an invitation for her to come to supper.  She replied by saying that it would be better for him to be his guest instead.   Our courteous Antony, who has never said “no” to any woman, after spending plenty of time being groomed by the barber, went to the feast.  For that simple meal, he paid with his heart—even though it was only his eyes that were satisfied.  

(“For what his eyes eat only”, if the Bard knew Chinese, he would have used a Chinese idiom, 秀色可餐.)

AGRIPPA

Royal wench!

he made great Caesar lay his sword to bed.

He plowed her, and she cropped.

(modern translation)

Royal seductress!

She lured Julius Caesar lay down his sword, into her bed, and she bore him a child.

(“He plowed her, and she cropped” is matched by a Chinese idiom, 藍田種玉)

Are these “the couple of things” that Sally found out  about Cleopatra? I wonder.  There went a role model for an innocent girl.