Antony and CleopatraThe New Cambridge Shakespeare appeals to students worldwide for its up-to-date scholarship and emphasis on performance. The series features line-by-line commentaries and textual notes on the plays and poems. Introductions are regularly refreshed with accounts of new critical, stage and screen interpretations. For this second edition of Antony and Cleopatra, David Bevington has included in his introductory section a thorough consideration of recent critical and stage interpretations, demonstrating how the theatrical design and imagination of this play make it one of Shakespeare's most remarkable tragedies. The edition is attentive throughout 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. |
Common terms and phrases
Actium AGRIPPA Alexas Antony and Cleopatra Antony’s Ardenz battle battle of Actium Canidius Capell subst Charmian Commentary notes Compare Compositor conj death Dent DERCETUS division in F DOLABELLA dramatic drink edited editors Egypt Egyptian Elizabethan emendation Enobarbus Enobarbus’s Eros eunuch Exeunt Collation notes Exit F reading fortune Fulvia give GUARD Hanmer hath heart Hercules honour Iras Johnson Julius Caesar King Kittredge Lepidus lord lovers madam MAECENAS Mardian Mark Antony means Menas Menecrates MESSENGER noble North’s Plutarch notes for Act Octavia Octavius Caesar perhaps play’s Pompey Pompey’s Proculeius proverbial queen Renaissance Roman Rome Rowe subst S.Sur Scarus scene division sense Sextus Pompeius sexual Shakespeare’s play soldier SOOTHSAYER speak speech heading spelling stage direction suggests sword Theatre thee Theobald There’s Thidias thou tragedy tragic triumvirs Ventidius Venus What’s William Shakespeare Wilson woman women word