Becoming Cleopatra: The Shifting Image of an Icon

263 Pages·2003·3.221 MB·English

by  Francesca T. Royster (auth.)

Becoming Cleopatra

Becoming Cleopatra
The Shifting Image of an Icon
Francesca T.Royster
BECOMINGCLEOPATRA
Copyright © Francesca T.Royster,2003.
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2003 978-1-4039-6108-2
All rights reserved.No part of this book may be used or reproduced in
any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of
brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.
First published 2003 by
PALGRAVE MACMILLAN™
175 Fifth Avenue,New York,N.Y.10010 and
Houndmills,Basingstoke,Hampshire,England RG21 6XS.
Companies and representatives throughout the world.
PALGRAVE MACMILLAN is the global academic imprint of the
Palgrave Macmillan division of St.Martin’s Press,LLC and of Palgrave
Macmillan Ltd.Macmillan® is a registered trademark in the United
States,United Kingdom and other countries.Palgrave is a registered
trademark in the European Union and other countries.
ISBN 978-1-4039-6109-9 ISBN 978-1-137-07417-1 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-1-137-07417-1
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Royster,Francesca T.
Becoming Cleopatra :the shifting image of an icon / by Francesca T.
Royster.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Cleopatra,Queen of Egypt,d.30 B.C.—In literature. 2.
Cleopatra,Queen of Egypt,d.30 B.C.—In motion pictures. I. Title.
PN57.C55R69 2003
809’.93351—dc21
2003041302
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Design by Letra Libre,Inc.
First edition:July 2003
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
To Yia-Yia
In memory of my mother,
Sandra H.Royster
(1942–1999),
in herinfinite variety

Contents
Acknowledgments ix
Permissions xiii
Chapter 1 Introduction:Becoming Cleopatra 1
PART I
CLEOPATRA AND THE WHITE IMAGINARY
Chapter 2 African Dreams,Egyptian Nightmares:
Cleopatra and Becoming England 33
Chapter 3 Cleopatra and the Birth of Film:
Staging Perpetual Motion 59
Chapter 4 Egyptian Scandals:
Elizabeth Taylor’s Cleopatra
and the White Grotesque 93
PART II
CLEOPATRA AND AFRICAN AMERICAN
COUNTERNARRATIVES
Chapter 5 Becoming Cleopatra/Becoming Girl:
Shaw’s Caesar and Cleopatra,
Her Favorite Roman and Reclaiming
the Lives of Black Girls 121
Chapter 6 Cleopatra Jones:
Blaxploitation and Tactical
Alliances with Shakespeare 145
Chapter 7 Queering Cleo:Set It Off
and Queen Latifah’s “Butch-in-the-Hood” 171
Epilogue Cleopatra in an Age of Racial Profiling 197
Notes 211
Selected Bibliography 243
Index 253
Acknowledgments
THIS BOOK REPRESENTS MY CREATIVE BECOMING, which has
been sparked from multiple directions. I would like to thank the
teachers, colleagues, role models, friends and family who have
seen me through each new phase.
I’d like to start by thanking the shivery-smart scholars and
thinkers from different fields who have most shocked me into
writing.While I’ve never met some of them,through their exam-
ples they’ve encouraged me that there is room in the world for my
ideas:William Shakespeare,Toni Morrison,Audre Lorde,Patri-
cia Hill Collins, June Jordan, Philip M. Royster, Ann Russo,
Richard Doyle, Irene Tucker, Kim F. Hall, Janet Adelman,
Stephen Greenblatt, Margo Hendricks, Arthur Little, Joyce
Green MacDonald, Patricia Parker, Barbara Christian, Edward
Guerrero,Michael Neill,Jackie Anderson,Barbara Ransby,Gary
Taylor, Joseph Roach, Linda Woodbridge, Sharon Scott, Jyotsna
Singh, Ania Loomba, Judith Halberstam, Coppelia Kahn, Gail
Kern Paster, Marianne Novy, Constance Jordan and Julia
Cameron.I am grateful to my early teachers,to whom I owe this
life of the mind: Miss Cooley, who pushed me to improve my
handwriting by giving me a C; Jan Osada and Judith Stein, who
first introduced me to Shakespeare; my Kansas State mentors,
Donald Hedrick, Jerome “Jerrida” Dees, Steve Heller, Jonathan
Holden, and Nancy Twiss; and my professors at UC Berkeley:
Elizabeth Abel,D.A.Miller,Mitchell Breitweiser and especially
the directors of my dissertation:Janet Adelman,who first got me