The play Anthony and Cleopatra belongs to one group of Shakespeare's plays, along with Othello, King Lear, Macbeth and Timon of Athens, which were written at approximately the same time, and deal with the same basic topic: what happens when "great" and "noble" minds give way under the assault of personal emotion. One of the greatest playwrights of all times has used the most widely known love legend from antiquity as a basis for his universal tale about the relationship between love and political power and between the public and the private, as well as about the conflict between two ages with differing political concepts.

This is one of the most complex and most challenging of Shakespeare’s plays which on the one hand portrays a dark and intimate analysis of “the fatal attraction” and individual sexuality, located in the mysterious and sensuous world of ancient Egypt, and on the other, an analysis of public responsibility and the tragedy which ensues from fatal political division. The issue of the conflict between the private and the public, duty and feeling – the favourite Shakespearean idea originating from his earlier historical plays – has been perfected in Anthony and Cleopatra. This is a timeless literary piece which is endlessly inspiring, not only in terms of dramaturgy, but also in terms of the world we currently live in.

Anja Susa