Antony and Cleopatra Act One – “Eternity was in our lips and eyes.”

Antony and Cleopatra Act One – “Eternity was in our lips and eyes.”

Storms seemed to lash England for most of the first half of 1606. Floods and storm surges made it impossible to travel much out of London and food prices rose. Shakespeare was lucky with the extra land he had bought in Stratford-upon-Avon and the extra grain he had stored (hoarded more like) meant that he was able to make a pretty profit by waiting for April to offload much of his grain. He knew in the lead up to the summer season, he would need more than ‘Macbeth’ in the mix of plays. Some of his company, the King’s Men, probably thought a revival of the history plays might work or ‘Julius Caesar’ but Shakespeare knew that with the heads of the traitors of the Gunpowder Plot still openly displayed in metal cages and not yet fully decomposed, that a tale of treachery might not prove tasteful.

As the rain continued to fall hard, Shakespeare probably took out his copy of Virgil’s ‘Aeneid’ and toyed with the idea a play using Virgil’s Dido and Aeneas. At some point he opened his copy of his Thomas North 1579 translation Plutarch’s ‘Lives of the Noble Grecians and Romans Compared Together’ and he turned specifically to ‘The Life of Marcus Antonius’ and was probably struck by the poetry and the potential of a play about Antony and Cleopatra. He could see that it could be a wonderful story about love and loss but also a story about moral and ethical ambiguity, egos, governance, waste and stupidity. The story still resonates even more strongly today.

By the time Shakespeare had finished Anthony and Cleopatra in about July of 1606, the plague numbers had risen again in London and the theatres were closed. Because the next time the theatres were reopened was for a brief time in April 1607 and because many plays from early 1607 onwards are influenced by this play, it is likely that Anthony and Cleopatra had its premiere by the King's men at a court performance sometime in October or November of 1606 when entertainments were vetted for court season for the holiday season.

‘Antony and Cleopatra’ opens in the court of Cleopatra in Alexandria in Egypt around 40BC. Antony's men talk loosely about how Antony seems to have lost his zest for leadership now that he dotes on Cleopatra. Antony and Cleopatra enter. Messages have arrive from Octavius Caesar, Julius Caesar's foster-son, but both Anthony and Cleopatra do not even hear the news from Rome. Cleopatra teases Antony about his marriage and demands to know how much he loves her. He declares his love and shows he is distracted from his duties:

“Let Rome in Tiber melt, and the wide arch

Of the ranged empire fall! Here is my space.

Kingdoms are clay: our dungy earth alike

Feeds beast as man: the nobleness of life

Is to do thus; when such a mutual pair

And such a twain can do't, in which I bind,

On pain of punishment, the world to weet

We stand up peerless…

But stirr'd by Cleopatra.

Now, for the love of Love and her soft hours,

Let's not confound the time with conference harsh:

There's not a minute of our lives should stretch

Without some pleasure now.”

Cleopatra continues to tease Anthony and calls him a liar in love before they leave. Demetrius and Philo are left to ponder where the great Antony has gone.

We cross to another room in Cleopatra’s palace where Cleopatra’s lady attendants Charmian and Iras are getting their fortunes told by a Soothsayer. Charmian is told that she will be “… yet far fairer than you are… more beloving than beloved…” and that she “… shall outlive the lady whom you serve.”  Iras is told that her fortune is similar to Charmian's.

Enobarbus enters and it becomes obvious that he has been able to get Antony talk to the messenger after all and that the news is not good. Cleopatra enters and then leaves before Antony enters with a messenger and we hear about the bad news from Rome. Firstly, Antony’s wife Fulvia and Antony’s brother Lucius, are arguing and they tried to attack Caesar’a forces and lost the battle. The second bad news is that Parthian forces have attempted to invade Roman territories in the Near East and have succeeded. Antony accepts some of the blame for this. Antony decides that he must distance himself from Cleopatra for his own good and that of Rome. Then a second messenger enters and tells Antony that his wife Fulvia is dead from some sickness. Antony mourns her death and again reinforces that he should leave Cleopatra:

“There's a great spirit gone! Thus did I desire it:

What our contempt doth often hurl from us,

We wish it ours again; the present pleasure,

By revolution lowering, does become

The opposite of itself: she's good, being gone;

The hand could pluck her back that shoved her on.

I must from this enchanting queen break off:

Ten thousand harms, more than the ills I know,

My idleness doth hatch.”

Antony tells Enobarbus that he'll have to make a trip to Rome. Enobarbus ironically jests that Cleopatra will be upset. They exit.

Cleopatra enters with her ladies and sends Alexis to find Antony and see what his mood is. Charmian suggests to Cleopatra that she should be more amiable to Antony but Cleopatra says that that is a sure way to lose a man and that to keep a man a woman has to hide her affections. Antony enters and tells Cleopatra that his wife Fulvia is dead and that he will have to leave soon. He also suggests that the other reasons he should leave are that Rome is losing territories and in a state of war. Cleopatra ridicules Antony, then uses flattery and self-pity, but eventually asks Antony’s forgiveness and allows him to go:

“Tis sweating labour

To bear such idleness so near the heart

As Cleopatra this. But, sir, forgive me;

Since my becomings kill me, when they do not

Eye well to you: your honour calls you hence;

Therefore be deaf to my unpitied folly.

And all the gods go with you! upon your sword

Sit laurel victory! and smooth success

Be strew'd before your feet!”

We cross to Rome, where the young Octavius Caesar is talking to Lepidus, the third triumvir about how Antony has abandoned his duties in the “bed of Ptolemy”. Lepidus defends Antony, suggesting that his weaknesses are merely for fishing, drinking, and partying. Caesar is dismissive and thinks that should not be himself in Egypt when such a crisis looms.

A messenger enters telling how Pompey’s forces are gathering strength and support from some factions. Caesar wishes he had Antony with him now since now he must raise an army against Pompey.

“Antony,

Leave thy lascivious wassails. When thou once

Wast beaten from Modena, where thou slew'st

Hirtius and Pansa, consuls, at thy heel

Did famine follow; whom thou fought'st against,

Though daintily brought up, with patience more

Than savages could suffer: thou didst drink

The stale of horses, and the gilded puddle

Which beasts would cough at: thy palate then did deign

The roughest berry on the rudest hedge;

Yea, like the stag, when snow the pasture sheets,

The barks of trees thou browsed'st; on the Alps

It is reported thou didst eat strange flesh,

Which some did die to look on: and all this--

It wounds thine honour that I speak it now--

Was borne so like a soldier, that thy cheek

So much as lank'd not.”

We cross back to Cleopatra’s Palace in Alexandria where Cleopatra is missing Antony and wondering if he is missing her. Alexas enters with a gift of a pearl from Antony. Cleopatra is told that Antony kissed this pearl before leaving Egypt and has sent it to Cleopatra as a symbol of his love for her. Cleopatra asks how Antony appeared when he left and Alexas states that Antony was neither sad nor merry. Cleopatra reveals that she has asked for twenty messengers, so that she can send a message to Antony each day of his absence and even says that she would make all the people of Egypt into her messengers:

“My salad days,

When I was green in judgment: cold in blood,

To say as I said then! But, come, away;

Get me ink and paper:

He shall have every day a several greeting,

Or I'll unpeople Egypt.”