The play, The Tragedy of Julius Caesar is well known for its many occurrences of Rhetoric; such as betrayal, deception & exaggeration. It also includes many cultural means that help advance the plot of the story. These occurrences can range from talking about someone behind their back, stabbing someone in the back, or literally stabbing someone in the back. The round characters develop in the story, and we find out who is truly loyal to Rome, and who are doing these things for their own personal gain.
In Act I Scene I, we can see that the play start off with betrayal, because the citizens of Rome are in the streets cheering for their new leader, Julius Caesar, as he parades around celebrating his victory over Pompey. We can see this as Betrayal from the quotes of Murellus,
“Wherefore rejoice? What conquest brings he home? What tributaries follow him to Rome? To grace in captive bonds his chariot wheels? You blocks, you stones, you worse than senseless things, o you hard hearts, you cruèl men of Rome, knew you not Pompey? Many a time and oft have you climbed up to walls and battlements, to towers and windows, yea, to chimney tops, your infants in your arms, and there have sat the livelong day with patient expectation to see great Pompey pass the streets of Rome. And when you saw his chariot but appear, have you not made an universal shout that Tiber - trembled underneath her banks. To hear the replication of your sounds, made in her concave shores?”(Shakespear 826-827)
In Act 1 Scene II, we find an example of the Cultural means when the soothsayer warns Caesar about the Ides of March. This is a good example because in ancient times there were many people who believed they could see the Future. Soothsayers we often well r...
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...mmer) In this story Brutus’s reason for killing Caesar was that it was for the good of Rome and he believes Caesar is a Serpent’s egg, meaning once hatched could be deadly. This doesn’t justify the killing because even though Caesar was a threat for being a tyrant, He wasn’t currently doing anything unlawful in order to deserve his death. Brutus realized this and his guilt started to eat him alive. This caused Brutus to commit suicide in order to give Caesar closure and to fix his wrongdoing.
Works Cited
Ammer, Christine. end justifies the means, the. 1997. 14 May 2014. .
Shakespeare, William. The Tragedy of Julius Caesar. London: Edward Blount and William Jaggard, 1623. Print.
Crowther, John, ed. “No Fear Julius Caesar.” SparkNotes.com. SparkNotes LLC. 2005. Web. 30 Apr. 2014.
Another theme that is prevalent in the play is betrayal. Julius Caesar is betrayed along with many other people. Love is another theme that appears many times throughout the play. The love that is demonstrated in this play ranges from love between a husband and wife to the love for a country. Trust is another common theme in this play.
Shakespeare’s complex play The Tragedy of Julius Caesar contains several tragic heroes; a tragic hero holds high political or social esteem yet possesses an obvious character flaw. This discernible hubris undoubtedly causes the character’s demise or a severe forfeiture, which forces the character to undergo an unfeigned moment of enlightenment and shear reconciliation. Brutus, one of these tragic heroes, is a devout friend of the great Julius Caesar, that is, until he makes many execrable decisions he will soon regret; he becomes involved in a plot to kill the omniscient ruler of Rome during 44 B.C. After committing the crime, Mark Antony, an avid, passionate follower of Caesar, is left alive under Brutus’s orders to take his revenge on the villains who killed his beloved Caesar. After Antony turns a rioting Rome on him and wages war against him and the conspirators, Brutus falls by his own hand, turning the very sword he slaughtered Caesar with against himself. Brutus is unquestionably the tragic hero in this play because he has an innumerable amount of character flaws, he falls because of these flaws, and then comes to grips with them as he bleeds on the planes of Philippi.
Shakespeare, William. "The Death and Life of Julius Caesar." www.shakespeare.mit.edu. N.P., n.d. Web. 22 Feb 2016. ;.
Throughout the play The Tragedy of Julius Caesar, the audience constantly sees Brutus, an honorable man, go against his own beliefs because of men filled with hatred and jealousy. Brutus
And let no one think this tale a myth or a lie, for it is vouched for by Cornelius Balbus, an intimate friend of Caesar. the second sign came when Spurinna warned him to beware of danger, which would come not later than the ides of March. The third sign came when a little bird called the king-bird flew into the Hall of Pompey with a sprig of laurel, pursued by others of various kinds from the grove hard by, which tore it to pieces in the hall. Caesar himself dreamed of being in the clouds and his wife Calpurnia thought that the pediment of their house [had] fel...
The Tragedy of Julius Caesar. Prentice Hall Literature: Grade ten. Ed. Kate Kinsella, et al. Upper Saddle River: Prentice Hall, 2007.
When Brutus betrayed Caesar for the good of Rome by killing him, he had no idea that he would regret it later on in his life. Brutus wanted to kill Caesar because he thought that if Caesar became king, he would forget who his real friends are and he would not pay attention to them. He also thought that Caesar would become too powerful and therefore did not want him to be king. This is shown when Portia says, “…Brutus hath a suit / that Caesar will not grant…” (2.4.41-42). Although Brutus had a clear conscience, the people of Rome did not. This eventually led to Brutus being driven out of Rome by the citizens. Not being associated with Rome anymore made Brutus’ life worse and he eventually took his own life as the only way to...
The Tragedy of Julius Caesar. N.d. Print.
William Shakespeare's The Tragedy of Julius Caesar is a tragic drama, set in Ancient Rome about the horrendous death of Julius Caesar. Brutus, leader of the conspiracy against Caesar, begins as Caesar’s friend. Cassius, instigator of the conspirator, manipulates Brutus into killing Caesar. Brutus agrees to this plan because of his plans for Rome. The bond between these two connects when Brutus agrees to Cassius about killing Caesar for the best of Rome. Cassius, very power hungry, comes up with a plan that will succeed in both of them killing Caesar. They both rely on each other because they want the power that Caesar has been requested to make the best of Rome. This dream of making Rome better was manipulated by Cassius to Brutus. However,
Julius Caesar, by William Shakespeare, is the story of a man trying his best to
Shakespeare, William. “The Tragedy of Julius Caesar.” Elements of Literature: Kylene Beers. Austin: Holt, 2009. 842-963. Print.
Alvin B. Kernan. The Tragedy of Julius Caesar. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2009. Print.
In William Shakespeare's play The Tragedy of Julius Caesar, two speeches are given to the people of Rome about Caesar's death. In Act 3, Scene 2 of this play Brutus and Antony both try to sway the minds of the Romans toward their views. Brutus tried to make the people believe he killed Caesar for a noble cause. Antony tried to persuade the people that the conspirators committed an act of brutality toward Caesar and were traitors. The effectiveness and ineffectiveness of both Antony's and Brutus's speech to the people are conveyed through tone and rhetorical devices.
In the play Julius Caesar, written and preformed by William Shakespeare, there are many characters, but two, Brutus and Cassius, stood out. The play begins in Rome where a celebration of Julius Caesar's victory over the former ruler of Rome, Pompeii. The victory leads to Caesar's betrayal by his jealous companions. Senators and other high status figures are jealous of Caesar's new and growing power, while others, like Brutus, fear the tyrannical rule Caesar could enforce. The conspirators, Brutus and Cassius being the most important, assassinate Julius Caesar and Marcus Antonius, better known as Antony, and Octavius Caesar, Caesar's heir to the thrown, revenge Caesar's death. Antony convinces the Roman populous to destroy the conspirators and eventually begins a war with Cassius and Brutus' armies. Both Cassius and Brutus commit suicide to save their honor and Antony and Octavius win the war. The characterizations of Brutus and Cassius show a distinct contrast in their character traits and motives for the assassination of Julius Caesar.
At first glance, historical literature may seem like mere retellings of repeated events. However, by analyzing the author and their intentions, one can understand the underlying message and its applications to society. The Tragedy of Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare is a rendition of Julius Caesar’s demise and the civil war sparked by it. Shakespeare uses his play as a political mouthpiece to voice his concern for the future of England’s government, since during Queen Elizabeth’s reign, the tensions were high due to the threat of a civil war. By examining events and occurrences associated with the Elizabethan time period, Julius Caesar, and the Roman Empire, one can understand William Shakespeare’s political motivations and historical influences.