title: Antony and Cleopatra (Arden Shakespeare: Third Series)
author:  William Shakespeare 
description: William Shakespeare (1564-1616) was an English dramatist, poet, and actor, generally regarded as the greatest playwright of all time.
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  ![cover](resources/_cover_.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  * * *
  
  # Hamlet, Antony and Cleopatra, King Lear, Othello, Macbeth
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ### William Shakepeare
  
  
  # Antony and Cleopatra
  
  
  ## Act 1, Scene 1
  
  
    
  Alexandria. A room in CLEOPATRA's palace.
  
  
  
  
  
  _Enter DEMETRIUS and PHILO_
  
  
    
  
  
  
  
  
  ### PHILO
  
  
  
  
  
  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, reneges all temper,  
  
  
  And is become the bellows and the fan  
  
  
  To cool a gipsy's lust.  
    
   _Flourish. Enter ANTONY, CLEOPATRA, her Ladies, the Train, with Eunuchs
  fanning her_
  
  
  
  
  
  Look, where they come:  
  
  
  Take but good note, and you shall see in him.  
  
  
  The triple pillar of the world transform'd  
  
  
  Into a strumpet's fool: behold an