Customer Reviews

Antony and Cleopatra (The New Cambridge Shakespeare)

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This is a review of a specific edition of Shakespeare's "Antony and Cleopatra" - namely the New Cambridge edition of 1990, edited by David Bevington.

The book is a good size, and the print is easy to read. There are about 70 pages of front matter in this edition, and, on each page of the play, copious notes. Following the play's text, there is a discussion of general editorial choices and approaches, supplementing the specifics covered in notes.

The front matter dutifully took up the sources of the play, its dating, structure, stage history, and a number of other topics. I found it occasionally a bit heavy going, as, in many sections, any straightforward statement seemed to be buried under a pile of citations from various critics. This was by no means always the case, and in such things as stage history I found the discussion brisk but entertaining.

The text was thoroughly annotated - too thoroughly for my taste. It did not get tedious, as in the Arden editions, but still, too many notes were devoted to specific editorial decisions, and too many supersized with references to other plays. I guess there is some interest in this, and one does not have to read the notes one does not want to, but it does tend to slow one down. This is good though, if one wants to delve. Moreover, virtually every word or passage that might cause difficulty is discussed and interpreted, which is certainly what one wants.

In summary, I would say this edition is well worth having: it gives one most of the information one could conceivably need, does some interpretation, and explains the text helpfully. It does not include a transcription of Shakespeare's main sources (although this is done piecemeal in the notes), nor a plot and scene summary. These would have been nice, but are not necessary.

Cleopatra may be a somewhat ambiguous female character, but I totally loved her, and Bill's portrayal of her. I don't know if he expected the reader to judge her, but I suspect not. The harshest criticism of her comes from Octavius Caesar, who himself doesn't do a single noble thing throughout the whole play. She is fully aware of the fact that she is a sensual, passionate woman- which has no negative effect on her ability to rule Egypt. Her biggest faults are her violent temper (which I suspect is just part of her passionate nature) and her tendency to lie when it suits her (either for sport or for serious politics). Antony (I feel) is actually kind of a loser compared to her. His insincerity runs deep- he marries Caesar's sister in a political move, although he had repeatedly pledged his undying love for Cleopatra. She forgives him, because she truly loves him, even though he doesn't do anything to deserve forgiveness. Antony never fully allows himself to love Cleopatra. He constantly is overreacting to the slightest indication that she might be betraying him or whatever. It is one of these overreactions (combined with an ill-timed lie on Cleo's part) that ends up destroying them both. Even in the end, Cleopatra's death is more dignified and better conceived than Antony's messy and fumbling suicide.

The Cambridge editions are well edited academic editions but what sets them apart is their relationship to theatrical performance. As a diretor or actor working on the play, these editions offer great background information into theatrical practice and past productions . Productions are discussed from the ancient past through the modern day. They are remarkably current and their essays on staging are unmatched by other editions.

In the history of femme fatales, Cleopatra is still the queen -- she wasn't pretty, but she had charm, wit and power.

And she's the center of Shakespeare's "Antony and Cleopatra," a play that follows the tragic affair between Cleopatra and her second high-profile Roman lover. The tragedy is undermined by the fact that Cleopatra and Antony aren't very likable people, but the story does have an empire-ending grandeur.

Mark Antony has been neglecting his duties as a Roman soldier ever since he fell in love with the Egyptian queen Cleopatra. But eventually Octavian calls him back to Rome, and Antony is even pressured into marrying Octavia's sister -- which unsurprisingly throws a wrench into his relationship with Cleopatra. She's only soothed by the assurances that Octavia is ugly.

In the meantime, tensions between the Romans and the increasingly Egyptophilic Antony are getting worse, until finally they break into full-out war -- despite the prophecy that Antony will lose if he fights Octavian. And the tempestuous love between Cleopatra and Antony takes a terrible turn as Egypt is about to fall...

"Antony and Cleopatra" is sort of a sequel to "Julius Caesar," and it's also half epic romance and half tragedy. On one hand, it's all about the passionate, stormy love affair between Antony and Cleopatra; on the other, it's also about the final crash of an empire that had endured for thousands of years, and its last monarch.

Shakespeare manages to fill the story with a sense of epic grandeur, and his writing really gets across that these conflicts and people are deeply important. Aside from the famous "Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale/her infinite variety" speech, there's a lot of powerful writing in here, particularly the climactic scene between Cleopatra and her maidservants.

The biggest drawback of the play is... well, Antony and Cleopatra are pretty nasty people. Antony is no longer the heroic Roman soldier of "Julius Caesar," and Cleopatra throws bratty tantrums and spreads false rumors to keep her boyfriend in love with her. They're a little like A-list celebrities -- they're weirdly fascinating, but you wouldn't want them as friends.

"Antony and Cleopatra" is a grand, engaging epic about how a love affair helped bring down the last remnants of an empire, and its nasty characters don't stop it from being fascinating.