The Tragedy of Antony and Cleopatra

The Tragedy of Antony and Cleopatra, most known as Antony and Cleopatra, is a play written by William Shakespeare in 1921.

The story introduces us to Mark Antony, one of the triumvirs of Rome along with Octavius Caesar and Lepidus, and very close to the late Julius Caesar. Antony falls totally in love with Cleopatra, queen of Egypt. He goes after her even leaving aside his duties as a soldier, the internal problems of Rome or the rebellion and death of his wife.

Antony is torn between loyalty to his people and family and his love for Cleopatra. However, the play shows Cleopatra's total manipulation of Antony and how he only seems to find the strength to do the right thing when he is away from her. But when he returns to her side he falls deeply in love again and stumbles over the same stone.

Shakespeare's inspiration for writing this play was Plutarch's Parallel Lives, specifically the Life of Mark Antony.

"Nay, but this dotage of our general's
O'erflows the measure; those his goodly eyes,
That o'er the files and musters of the war
Have glow'd like plated Mars, now bend, now turn
The office and devotion of their view
Upon a tawny front; his captain's heart,
Which in the scuffles of great fights hath burst
The buckles on his breast,
And is become the bellows and the fan
To cool a gipsy's lust. Look! where they come".