Step inside Antony and Cleopatra

The film without the cuts. And the book itself.

A world pulled between Rome and Egypt, where desire keeps interrupting duty and nobody can hold both for long.

9:41

The Cast

Antony

Main

Rome's greatest soldier keeps choosing the thing that is dismantling him.

Locations

Egypt

setting

Everything Antony wants is here, and so is everything undoing him.

Passage

Rome's fiercest soldier seems conquered by desire, and loyalty itself begins to curdle.

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The Author’s Pen

Antony's Dotage

Enter Demetrius and Philo. Philo. Nay, but this dotage of our Generals Ore-flowes the measure: those his goodly eyes That o're the Files and Musters of the Warre, Haue glow'd like plated Mars: Now bend, now turne The Office and Deuotion of their view Vpon a Tawny Front. His Captaines heart, Which in the scuffles of great Fights hath burst The Buckles on his brest, reneages all temper, And is become the Bellowes and the Fan To coole a Gypsies Lust. Flourish. Enter Anthony, Cleopatra, her Ladies, the Traine, with Eunuchs fanning her. Looke where they come: Take but good note, and you shall see in him

Reading

Every image here pairs Antony's old greatness with the small use it is being put to now. The eyes that once ranged like a war-god over ranks of soldiers now "bend" onto a single face; the heart that burst the buckles of its own armor in battle has become "the Bellowes and the Fan" to cool a lover's heat. Nothing is destroyed, only spent downward, which is why the word is "dotage" and not defeat. This is the play's opening, and Philo, one of Antony's officers, is priming Demetrius, and us, to read the couple as proof the moment they walk on: "you shall see in him." He never grants Cleopatra a name, only "a Tawny Front" and "a Gypsies Lust."

World Index

The Plot

Egypt holds Antony while Rome callsA peace too thin to holdActium breaks his commandDesertion and a hollow victoryTwo deaths and Caesar’s reckoning

The Cast

AntonyCleopatraOctavius CaesarEnobarbusPompeyOctaviaLepidusCharmianAgrippaSoothsayerMenasMessengerErosMecenasThidiasCamidiusScarrusDolabellaProculeiusMardianAlexasIrasVentidiusFuluiaJulius Caesar

Locations

AlexandriaAthensEgyptMount-MesenaParthiaPompey's galleyRomeScicionth' Market-placethe Court of Guardthe gardenthe Hauenthe Monumentthe Port of Romethe Riuer of Sidnisthe Seathe sea-sideTyber

Objects of Note

A knifediuers coulour'd FannesGoldhis Sword PhillippanInke and paperLetterMandragoraOrient PearleOur written purposesSwordThe BargeThe bended hookeThe CableThis Cup

Core Concepts

Feasting beside violenceLove against officeLoyalty under strainPrediction and self-blindingRome against EgyptSpectacle as powerThe contest over shame

The Author's Pen

Let Rome In Tyber MeltThe Hand That Would Pull Her BackCleopatra Calls Antony FalseCaesar Chides AntonyCleopatra Thinks of AntonyEvery Day a Seuerall GreetingAntony Every Hour In RomeTrivial Difference LoudCleopatra on the CydnusAntony Will To EgyptOctauia To His WifeShe Makes HungryBut Yet Is a JaylorHe Is MarriedThe Marriage StranglerWilt Thou Be LordMine Honour And VillanieNo Midway Twixt These ExtreamesAntony In The Public EyeCleopatra Will Not Stay BehindAntony Flies After HerMy Heart To Thy Rudder TyedCaesar Divides Their RequestsCleopatra Submits To CaesarThere's Hope In't YetValour Prays In ReasonHercules Now Leaves HimAntony Sends Enobarbus TreasureCrowned With GoldAntony Triumphant Before CleopatraAntony Curses CleopatraCloud Shapes DissolvingAntony Commands His DeathAntony Dying In EgyptThe Oddes Is GoneRather a Ditch in EgyptAs This I Dreampt OfCleopatra Defies Their StagingImmortal LongingsAll DeadCaesar Orders Their Funeral

Objects of Note

Letter

One sealed message ends the pretence that Egypt is far from Rome.

The Cast

Cleopatra

Main

She loses everything except the power to decide how she is remembered.

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Antony and Cleopatra

William Shakespeare

The cast, locations, objects of note, core concepts, and selected passages in the Author’s Pen - at your own pace.

One of 127 classics in the Literah library

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