• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

Then yield thee, coward,

And live to be the show and gaze o' the time.

We'll have thee, as our rarer monsters are,

Painted upon a pole, and underwrit,

"Here may you see the tyrant."

MACBETH.

I will not yield,

To kiss the ground before young Malcolm's feet,

And to be baited with the rabble's curse.

Though Birnam Wood be come to Dunsinane,

And thou opposed, being of no woman born,

Yet I will try the last. Before my body

I throw my warlike shield! Lay on, Macduff,

And damn'd be him that first cries, "Hold, enough!"

Exeunt fighting. Alarums.

SCENE IX.

Retreat. Flourish. Enter, with drum and colors, Malcolm, old Siward, Ross, the other Thanes, and Soldiers.

MALCOLM.

I would the friends we miss were safe arrived.

SIWARD.

Some must go off, and yet, by these I see,

So great a day as this is cheaply bought.

MALCOLM.

Macduff is missing, and your noble son.

ROSS.

Your son, my lord, has paid a soldier's debt.

He only lived but till he was a man,

The which no sooner had his prowess confirm'd

In the unshrinking station where he fought,

But like a man he died.

SIWARD.

Then he is dead?

ROSS.

Ay, and brought off the field. Your cause of sorrow

Must not be measured by his worth, for then

It hath no end.

SIWARD.

Had he his hurts before?

ROSS.

Ay, on the front.

SIWARD.

Why then, God's soldier be he!

Had I as many sons as I have hairs,

I would not wish them to a fairer death.

And so his knell is knoll'd.

MALCOLM.

He's worth more sorrow,

And that I'll spend for him.

SIWARD.

He's worth no more:

They say he parted well and paid his score,

And so God be with him! Here comes newer comfort.

Re-enter Macduff, with Macbeth's head.

MACDUFF.

Hail, King, for so thou art. Behold where stands

The usurper's cursed head. The time is free.

I see thee compass'd with thy kingdom's pearl

That speak my salutation in their minds,

Whose voices I desire aloud with mine-

Hail, King of Scotland!

ALL.

Hail, King of Scotland! Flourish.

MALCOLM.

We shall not spend a large expense of time

Before we reckon with your several loves

And make us even with you. My Thanes and kinsmen,

Henceforth be Earls, the first that ever Scotland

In such an honor named. What's more to do,

Which would be planted newly with the time,

As calling home our exiled friends abroad

That fled the snares of watchful tyranny,

Producing forth the cruel ministers

Of this dead butcher and his fiend-like queen,

Who, as 'tis thought, by self and violent hands

Took off her life; this, and what needful else

That calls upon us, by the grace of Grace

We will perform in measure, time, and place.

So thanks to all at once and to each one,

Whom we invite to see us crown'd at Scone.

Flourish. Exeunt.

ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA

Believed to have been written between 1603 and 1607, this tragedy is based on Thomas North's translation of Plutarch's Lives and follows the relationship between Cleopatra and Mark Antony from the time of the Parthian War to Cleopatra's suicide. The major antagonist is Octavius Caesar, one of Antony's fellow triumviri and the future first emperor of Rome. The tragedy is a Roman play featuring swift, panoramic shifts in locations and moods, alternating between sensual, imaginative Alexandria and the more pragmatic, austere Rome.

Shakespeare's main source text for this play is available via this link.

The tragic real life couple

‘Cleopatra’ by John William Waterhouse, 1888

CONTENTS

DRAMATIS PERSONAE

SCENE II. Alexandria. CLEOPATRA'S palace

SCENE III. Alexandria. CLEOPATRA'S palace

SCENE IV. Rome. CAESAR'S house

SCENE V. Alexandria. CLEOPATRA'S palace

ACT II. SCENE I. Messina. POMPEY'S house

SCENE II. Rome. The house of LEPIDUS

SCENE III. Rome. CAESAR'S house

SCENE IV. Rome. A street

SCENE V. Alexandria. CLEOPATRA'S palace

SCENE VI. Near Misenum

SCENE VII.

ACT III. SCENE I.

SCENE I.

SCENE II. Rome. CAESAR'S house

SCENE III.

SCENE IV.

SCENE V.

SCENE VI.

SCENE VII.

SCENE VIII.

SCENE IX.

SCENE X.

SCENE XI.

SCENE XI.

SCENE XII.

SCENE