Description

From Longman's Cultural Editions series, Antony and Cleopatra, edited by David Quint, presents William Shakespeare's classic work along with a critical introduction and contextual materials on and from the period.

Handsomely produced and affordably priced, the Longman Cultural Editions series presents classic works in provocative and illuminating contexts—cultural, critical, and literary. Each Cultural Edition consists of the complete text of an important literary work, reliably edited, headed by an inviting introduction, and supplemented by helpful annotations; a table of dates to track its composition, publication, and public reception in relation to biographical, cultural and historical events; and a guide for further inquiry and study.

See all the Longman Cultural Editions at www.ablongman.com/longmanculturaleditions.

Features

The Contexts sections invite readers to assess Shakespeare's imagination of Antony and Cleopatra in relation to the historical record, classical sources, and dramatic tradition.

• Presents an overview of events and key figures in Roman history from 60 to 30 B.C.E. along with maps and portraits of its lead characters from antiquity and in the Renaissance imagination.
• Includes samples form the ancient authors who wrote about and commented on the play's events.
• Includes three passages of Roman poetry from the play's historical period that testifies to the varying degress of sympathy excited by the doomed lovers.
• Shows Shakespeare's departure from neoclassical norms by comparing his version of Cleopatra's death with that of more classically minded playwrights. 

 

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations

About Longman Cultural Editions About This Edition Introduction

Introduction

 

Antony and Cleopatra

 

The Historical Background

 

Classical Writers on Mark Antony and Cleopatra

The Historians: Plutarch and Dio Cassius

Plutarch, Life of Marcus Antonius

Dio Cassius, Roman History, Book 51

Three Augustan Poets: Virgil, Horace, Propertius

Virgil, Aeneid 8.675-828

Horace, Odes 1.37

Propertius, Elegies 2.16

Antony and Cleopatra on the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Century Stage

Giovan Battista Giraldi Cinzio, Cleopatra (1541-43)

Etienne Jodelle, Cleopatra captive (1553)

Mary Sidney, Countess of Pembroke, Antonius (1590)

Robert Garnier, Marc Antoine (1578)

Samuel Daniel, The Tragedy of Cleopatra, 1594 and 1607

Fulke Greville, A lost Antony and Cleopatra

Charles Sedley, Antony and Cleopatra (1677)

John Dryden, All for Love or the World Well Lost (1678)

The Great Critics on Antony and Cleopatra from Schlegel to Bradley

August Wilhelm Schlegel, Lectures on Dramatic Literature

William Hazlitt, Characters of Shakespeare's Plays

Mrs. Anna Jameson, Characteristics of Women, Moral, Poetical, Historical

A.C. Bradley, Oxford Lectures on Poetry

Further Reading

Back Cover

William Shakespeare
Antony and Cleopatra
A Longman Cultural Edition
0-321-19874-3

Editor: David Quint
Series Editor: Susan J. Wolfson

Affordably priced, Longman Cultural Editions present classic works in provocative and illuminating contexts–cultural, critical, and literary. Each Longman Cultural Edition consists of the complete text of a key literary work, supplemented by helpful annotations and followed by contextual materials that reveal the conversations and controversies of its historical moment.

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Author

David Quint is Sterling Professor of Comparative Literature and English at Yale University.  He is a specialist in the literature of the European Renaissance.   Among his books are Origin and Originality in Renaissance Literature (Yale, 1983), Epic and Empire (Princeton, 1993), Montaigne and the Quality of Mercy (Princeton, 1998), and Cervantes's Novel of Modern Times: A New reading of Don Quijote (Princeton, 2003).  He has translated The Stanze of Angelo Poliziano (University of Masachusetts, 1978) and (with Alexander Sheers) Ludovico Ariosto's Cinque Canti (University of California, 1996).