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How was All for Love connected to Shakespeare’s Antony and Cleopatra?

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Poet John Dryden — John Dryden John Dryden, oil painting by Sir Godfrey Kneller, 1693; in the National Portrait Gallery, London.

John Dryden’s 1677 tragedy All for Love is directly based on William Shakespeare’s Antony and Cleopatra.1

While Shakespeare’s original work served as the foundation for the narrative, Dryden adapted the story during his Neoclassical period, moving away from the "rant and extravagance" of his earlier heroic plays. In All for Love, Dryden utilized a flowing but controlled blank verse to structure the drama, ensuring the action developed naturally from the characters and their situations.1

Thematically, the play reflects the period's focus on moral instruction. Whereas Shakespeare’s work is expansive, Dryden’s version presents a more dogmatic moral conflict: Antony must choose between the path of honor and his illicit passion for Cleopatra. By choosing Cleopatra, both characters face destruction, a narrative arc that Dryden used to illustrate a clear moral precept. Despite this moral bias, Dryden’s poetic style is credited with capturing human complexity, making the play a significant production of the Restoration era.2