Grows weary of his long-loved mistress, Rime.
Passion’s too fierce to be in fetters bound,
And Nature flies him like enchanted ground.
His next play, All for Love, or The World well Lost (1678), is in blank verse, and is considered to be his dramatic masterpiece. For subject he chose that of Shakespeare’s Antony and Cleopatra. It was a daring thing to attempt what Shakespeare had already done; but Dryden, while following the earlier play somewhat closely, never actually copies it. He produces a play of a distinctly different nature, and of a high merit. The characters are well drawn and animated, and the style, though lacking the daimonic force of Shakespeare’s at his best, is noble and restrained. We give Dryden’s handling of the death of Cleopatra, a passage which should be compared with that of Shakespeare given on p. [121].
(Antony is lying dead on the stage; Charmion and Iras, the Queen’s two handmaidens, are in attendance on her.)
Charmion.To what end
These ensigns of your pomp and royalty?
Cleopatra. Dull that thou art! Why, ’tis to meet my love;
As when I saw him first, on Cydnos’ bank,
All sparkling, like a goddess....