CLEOPATRA But come, come, Antony.—
Help me, my women.—We must draw thee up.
Assist, good friends.
[They begin to draw him up]
ANTONY O quick, or I am gone!
CLEOPATRA Here’s sport indeed. How heavy weighs my lord!
Our strength is all gone into heaviness,
That makes the weight. Had I great Juno’s power
The strong-winged Mercury should fetch thee up
And set thee by Jove’s side. Yet come a little.
Wishers were ever fools. O come, come, come! (4.16.30-38)
Action, and tricky on stage—there’s space for pauses, repetition, improvisation to cover the action: but come, come, Antony. Time for doing, not talking. Help me, my women. (Worth remembering that this was written for three teenage boys, managing the weight of a middle-aged man.) We must draw thee up. Assist, good friends. (The friendscan be both Iras and Charmian and also, in particular, the guards below, who can help to manage the action but also take a good deal of Antony’s weight, lifting up as the women heave.) O quick, or I am gone! The urgency increases—what if Antony loses consciousness, or dies, before he’s reunited with Cleopatra? Hurry hurry hurry, he says. As soon as the tension is ramped up, however, Cleopatra—sort of—defuses it with ironic humour. Here’s sport indeed! Well, this is fun! But sport also has a sexual sense, which the next line brings out: how heavy weighs my lord! This glances back at Cleopatra’s bawdy imagining of herself as Antony’s happy horse, which seems more than half a play and a world ago. Typically she continues to play with words, explaining that our strength is all gone into heaviness; it’s their sadness, the seriousness and sorrow of the situation that is weighing them all down and making the lifting such hard work, that makes the weight. Then she shifts in idiom yet again, reaching once more for the epic and divine: had I great Juno’s power, were I the queen not simply of Egypt but of the gods (notably the Roman gods) the strong-winged Mercury should fetch thee up (I’d send the divine messenger of the gods to bring you up to me, I wouldn’t have to do the hard work myself!) and set thee by Jove’s side. Sly and wry as ever, Cleopatra imagines herself as the goddess with two lovers, Antony and her husband Jove, rather than the notoriously unfaithful Jove—when, after all, Antony has both a wife (as Cleopatra has just observed) and a lover. Yet come a little; come on, it’s being difficult, slow (again, more scope for pauses, improvisation, even comedy if Cleopatra is getting side-tracked into wit and Iras and Charmian are taking the strain)—wishers were ever fools! We can’t just wish you up here, alas, we have to put muscle into it. Heave! O come, come, come!