Product Description

In this edition of the play David Bevington shows how the theatrical design and imaginative vision of Antony and Cleopatra make it one of Shakespeare’s most remarkable tragedies. A substantial critical introduction synthesises the best criticism of the play and presents a fresh consideration of its erotic and political complexities. The edition is throughout attentive to the play as theatre: a detailed, illustrated account of the stage history is followed, in the commentary, by discussion of staging options offered by the text. The commentary is especially full and helpful, untangling many obscure words and phrases, illuminating sexual puns, and alerting the reader to Shakespeare’s shaping of his source material in Plutarch’s Lives.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #503160 in Books
• Published on: 1990-11-15
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 292 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
Antony and Cleopatra is one of the greatest love stories of all time, and one of the finest, and most poetic of all the high Shakespearean tragedies. Written between 1606 and 1607, it draws on the Roman historian Plutarch and his account of the collapse of the Roman Republic and the birth of the empire under Octavius Caesar, son of Julius. This imperial struggle for political power between Octavius, Lepidus, Pompey and Mark Antony provides the backdrop for the play's extraordinary evocation of the tempestuous love of Antony for Cleopatra, his "Egyptian dish".

The play cuts back and forth between the cold, calculating realpolitik of imperial Rome, and the sensuous, erotic world of Egypt and Cleopatra's luxurious and hedonistic court. Yet what is most memorable about the play is its remarkably poetic language; its lush image of Cleopatra in her barge, "like a burnished throne / Burned on the water", and "beggared all description", and its erotic fusion of images of sex and death which find their ultimate culmination in the suicides of Antony and Cleopatra in the final scenes of the play. A notoriously elusive play for both critics and theatre directors alike, Antony and Cleopatra's fascination with questions of race, sex, death, power and politics makes it one of the most compelling of all of Shakespeare's plays. However, the stage is undoubtedly held by Cleopatra, and Enobarbus' attempt to explain her fascination, as powerful and evocative today as ever: "Age cannot wither her, Nor custom stale her infinite variety".--Jerry Brotton

Customer Reviews

Fantastic
Scholarly, informative, interesting.
All are adjectives that you would want to be able to describe a Shakespeare edition as, and, thankfully, this doesn't disappoint.
From the hugely informative, well researched and surprisingly interesting introduction, to the well layed out and easy to follow text, with the hugely useful index of terms set out on each page, this edition is designed to aid and enhance the reading of one of Shakespeare's great plays.
Antony and Cleopatra is a superb, and often underrated work of Shakespeare's, and The New Cambridge edition is the perfect starting point for anyone with any interest in the play, be it from a study point of view, an acting stance, or someone who just wants to read an extremely interesting and solid piece of drama history.
Never failing to cover an interesting point, be it an editorial change, a discrepancy across editions, an historical point of interest, or a potential Shakespearean error, this edition is perhaps the definitive Antony and Cleopatra.