Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar

1. Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar When beggars die, there are no comets seen; The heavens themselves blaze forth the death of princes. (2.2.30)

2. Type of Work • Julius Caesar is a stage play in the form of a tragedy centering on the death of Julius Caesar and the downfall of two of his Assassinators, Marcus Brutus and gaius cassius. • Because the drama recounts actual(although altered) historical events, it may also be referred to as a history play.

3. Key Dates • Date Written: 1598-1599. • First Performance: Probably 1599 at the Globe Theatre. • First Printing: 1623 as part of the First Folio, the first authorized collection of Shakespeare's plays.

4. Sources • ...Shakespeare based the play on “Caesar,” a chapter in Parallel Lives, by Plutarch (46?-120?), as translated by Sir Thomas North from Jacques Amyot’s French version. The French version was a translation of a Latin version of Plutarch’s original Greek version. • Shakespeare may also have borrowed ideas from Dante’s Divine Comedy (in which Brutus and Cassius occupy the lowest circle of hell) and Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales (in which “The Monk’s Tale” presents Caesar as a victim rather than a villain).

5. Settings • .......The play begins in Rome on February 15, 44 B.C., and ends in Philippi, Greece, in 42 B.C. when Cassius and Brutus commit suicide after battling the forces of Mark Antony and Octavian. Part of the action is also set in the camp of Brutus and Cassius near Sardis (in present-day Turkey).

6. Main Characters • Protagonist: Brutus • Antagonists: Antony, Caesar • Foil of Brutus: Cassius • A foil is a character who is used to contrast with another character. • Cassius and Brutus, the two main conspirators, differ from each other in many ways. For example, Cassius is manipulative, self-serving, and dishonorable, while Brutus is gullible, patriotic, and honorable.

7. Themes • Idealism exacts a high price • Pride leads to destruction • Great political ambition breeds great political enmity • Deceit wears the garb of innocence. • Words are powerful weapons • One man’s hero is another man’s villain

8. Irony in the funeral oration • Mark Antony's funeral oration in Act III, Scene II—beginning with "Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears"—is ironic throughout. Though Antony says that he comes to bury Caesar, not to praise him, he praises Caesar for swelling the treasuries of Rome, sympathizing with the poor, and three times refusing the crown Antony offered him. At the same time, Antony praises Brutus—one of Caesar's assassins—as an honorable man even though the his speech implies otherwise.

9. Ominous Number Three • The number three appears to symbolize baleful occurrences. Consider the following events involving the number three: • Mark Antony offers Caesar the crown three times. • The conspirators break up their meeting at three o'clock. • Calpurnia, Caesar's wife, cries out three times in her sleep Help, ho! they murder Caesar!