Love?

So throughout the play Antony and Cleopatra, Antony would mention how much he loved Cleopatra:

- giving Cleopatra a pearl: symbolizing the great and pure love he has for her (I.v.)

 - “I will to Egypt/ And though I make this marriage for my peace,/ I’ th’ East my pleasure lies.” (II.iii.)

 - "Fare thee well, dame, whate'er becomes of me:/ This is a soldier's kiss: rebukeable/ And worthy shameful cheque it were, to stand/ On more mechanice compliment; I'll leave thee/ Now, like a man of steel" (IV.iv.)

-"thou art/ The armourer of my heart:" (IV.iv)

And then in a moment's notice turn on her:

- "All is lost;/ This foul Egyptian hath betrayed me:/... and my heart/ Makes only wars on thee. Bid them fly;/ For when I am revenged upon my charm,/ I have done all. Bid them all fly; begone."(IV.xiii.)

- "You were half blasted ere I knew you: ha!" (IV.viii.)

This leads me to question what was actually going on between the two of them. Did they truly love each other? I can understand getting angry at one another, but to go as far as Antony did, and then just make a complete 180 makes me question their true feelings for one another. Throughout the play other characters hint at the possibility of Cleopatra not truly loving Antony. So perhaps Antony loved her fully and she didn't. Or maybe neither of them truly loved the other:

-“Madam, methings, if you did love him dearly,/ You do not hold the method to enforce/ The like from him… In each thing give him way, cross him nothing.” (I.iii.)

- “He knows that you embrace not Antony/ As you did love, but as you fear’d him”… “He is a god, and knows/ What is most right: mine honour was not yielded,/ But conquer’d merely.” (IV.xiii.)

Because of this confusion, I chose to research a little about Cleopatra, and discovered that she had been married to a few other influential men before Antony: Ptolemy XIII, Ptolemy XIV, and Julius Ceasar. She was known for her great beauty and intellect, using these charms to attract and influence several powerful men. So… she was incredibly smart and in a sense manipulative. She knew how to use her resources to get what she wanted. This could explain why she appears to not truly love Antony.

One of Cleopatra’s last actions in the play though leads the reader to further question her feelings and motives for Antony: she purposely pretends to kill herself in hopes that Antony understands that she loved him. And when he dies, she wants nothing further than to die as well, trying to take her own life by blade, and ultimately by an asp. Did she do it out of love? Or because she wouldn’t really be free if she chose to live under Caesar?