Julius Caesar (play)

The Tragedy of Julius Cæsar, more commonly known simply as Julius Caesar, is a tragedy by William Shakespeare probably written in 1599. It portrays the conspiracy against the Roman dictator, Julius Caesar, his assassination and its aftermath. It is the first of his Roman plays, based on true events from Roman history.

Julius Caesar is not the central character in the action of the play, appearing in only three scenes and dying at the beginning of the third Act. The central protagonist of the play is Marcus Brutus and the central psychological drama is his struggle between the conflicting demands of honour, patriotism, and friendship.

Most Shakespeare critics and historians agree that the play reflected the general anxiety of England due to worries over succession of leadership. At the time of its creation and first performance, Queen Elizabeth, a strong ruler, was elderly and had refused to name a successor, leading to worries that a civil war similar to that of Rome's might break out after her death.

Date

Act 1 took place during the feast of Lupercal, February 15. Act 2 took place on March 14. Act 3 took place on March 15, the ides of March. Acts 4 and 5 took place a few months later.

Allusions in three contemporaneous works support a date of 1599 for Julius Caesar.

1. Ben Jonson's play Every Man Out of His Humour (acted 1599, published 1600) paraphrases Shakespeare's line "O judgment, thou art fled to brutish beasts" (Julius Caesar, III,ii,104) as "reason long since is fled to animals" in III,i. Jonson's play also includes "Et tu, Brute" in V,iv.
2. The anonymous play The Wisdom of Dr. Dodipoll (published in 1600) gives its own paraphrase, "Then reason's fled to animals, I see."
3. A passage in John Weever's Mirror of Martyrs, published in 1601, makes clear reference to the speeches of Brutus and Mark Antony in Julius Caesar. John Weever stated that he'd written his poem two years earlier, which (presumably) fixes the date as 1599.

Performance history

The play was performed in the Globe Theatre.

Thomas Patter, a Swiss traveller, saw a tragedy about Julius Caesar at a Bankside theatre on September 21, 1599. This was most likely Shakespeare's play. There is no immediately obvious alternative candidate. (While the story of Julius Caesar was dramatized repeatedly in the Elizabethan/Jacobean period, none of the other plays known is as good a match with Patter's description as Shakespeare's play.)

After the theatres re-opened at the start of the Restoration era, the play was revived by Thomas Killigrew's King's Company in 1672. Charles Hart initially played Brutus, as did Thomas Betterton in later productions. Julius Caesar was one of the very few Shakespearean plays that was not adapted during the Restoration period or the eighteenth century.

Text of the play

Julius Caesar was first published in the First Folio in 1623, that text being the sole authority for the play. The Folio text is notable for its quality and consistency; scholars judge it to have been set into type from a theatrical promptbook. The play's source was Sir Thomas North's translation of Plutarch's Life of Brutus and Life of Caesar.

The plot

Marcus Brutus is Caesar's close friend; his ancestors were famed for driving the tyrannical King Tarquin from Rome (described in Shakespeare's earlier The Rape of Lucrece). Brutus allows himself to be cajoled into joining a group of conspiring senators because of a growing suspicion—implanted by Caius Cassius—that Caesar intends to turn republican Rome into a monarchy under his own rule. Traditional readings of the play maintain that Cassius and the other conspirators are motivated largely by envy and ambition, whereas Brutus is motivated by the demands of honour and patriotism; other commentators, such as Isaac Asimov, suggest that the text shows Brutus is no less moved by envy and flattery. One of the central strengths of the play is that it resists categorising its characters as either simple heroes or villains.

The early scenes deal mainly with Brutus' arguments with Cassius and his struggle with his own conscience. The growing tide of public support soon turns Brutus against Caesar (This public support was actually faked. Cassius wrote letters in different handwritings over the next month and hid them in different places for Brutus to find in order to get Brutus to join the conspiracy). A soothsayer warns Caesar to "beware the Ides of March," which he ignores, culminating in his assassination at the Capitol by the conspirators that day.

Caesar's assassination is perhaps the most famous part of the play, about halfway through. After ignoring the soothsayer as well as his wife's own premonitions, Caesar comes to the Senate. The conspirators create a superficial motive for the assassination by means of a petition brought by Metellus Cimber, pleading on behalf of his banished brother. As Caesar, predictably, rejects the petition, Casca grazes Caesar in the back of his neck, and the others follow in stabbing him; Brutus is last. At this point, Caesar utters the famous line "Et tu, Brute?" ("And you, Brutus?", i.e. "You too, Brutus?"). Shakespeare has him add, "Then fall, Caesar," suggesting that Caesar did not want to survive such treachery. The conspirators make clear that they did this act for Rome, not for their own purposes and do not attempt to flee the scene but act victorious..

After Caesar's death, however, Mark Antony, with a subtle and eloquent speech over Caesar's corpse—the much-quoted Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears...—deftly turns public opinion against the assassins by manipulating the emotions of the common people, in contrast to the rational tone of Brutus's speech. Antony rouses the mob to drive the conspirators from Rome.

The beginning of Act Four is marked by the quarrel scene, where Brutus attacks Cassius for soiling the noble act of regicide by accepting bribes ("Did not great Julius bleed for justice' sake? / What villain touch'd his body, that did stab, / And not for justice?", IV.iii,19-21). The two are reconciled, but as they prepare for war with Mark Antony and Caesar's adopted son, Octavian (Shakespeare's spelling: Octavius), Caesar's ghost appears to Brutus with a warning of defeat ("thou shalt see me at Philippi", IV.iii,283). Events go badly for the conspirators during the battle; both Brutus and Cassius choose to commit suicide rather than to be captured. The play ends with a tribute to Brutus by Antony, who has remained "the noblest Roman of them all" (V.v,68) and hints at the friction between Mark Antony and Octavius which will characterise another of Shakespeare's Roman plays, Antony and Cleopatra.

In Detail:

Act I, scene 1 The Commoners are taking a holiday and taking off from work in order to observe Caesar’s triumph. They wanted to see his procession through the city, which will include the captives won in a recent battle against Pompey. This angers them for two reasons. First because the crowd turns their back against Pompey, when the followed him so. Secondly, they are jealous of Caesar both politically and personally. Flavius instructs Murellus to go to the Capitol (a hill on which rests a temple on whose altars victorious generals offer sacrifice) and remove any crowns placed on statues of Caesar. It is revealed that the mob can be swayed any way, due to certain conditions. They can also be easily swayed by strong emotions and drama.

Act I, scene 2 In this scene Caesar seems very powerful, as he orders everyone what to do. Shakespeare makes it very simple to see why Cassius and Brutus would think that Caesar is gaining to much power, as he could almost be seen as a god-like figure. Caesar can also be seen to care about the future, as he see’s it important to have an heir. It seems that his relationship with his wife lacks love and that the point of the relationship is to make an heir. His relationship with Antony is very much based on a social structure. Antony says on line 12 and 13, “I shall remember. When Caesar says, ‘Do this,’ it is performed,” meaning that Caesar is the master and supports the fact that Caesar is rising to power. Caesar views himself as a god-like figure, which can be shown on line 221 and 222, “ I rather tell thee what is to be feared Than what I fear; for always I am Caesar.” Caesar means that Cassius has a hunger for more, just as a skinny person would not be satisfied; Cassius is not the type that would be willing to settle for less. Caesar fears his ambition. The impression of Caesar that is given when he rejects the crown is that Caesar is a noble man who wants the best for his state, which he believes is a republic. According to Casca Casear acted as if he would never do such a thing and acted negatively towards it. The crowd respondes with screams and shouts. Casca even goes on to exaggerate that there were so many screams, that the air was filled with bad breath and he would not even think of opening his mouth. When Cassius attacks Caesars image, he attacks him by calling him weak and compares him to a sick girl. Caesar’s “weakness” does not really have anything to do with Caesar’s ability to lead, because political leaders ,like a king, would not need these skills to carry out their job to the best it can be performed. Hence, these weaknesses have more to do with Cassius’s jealousy of Caesar. Cassius persuades Brutus onto his side, by convincing him that Caesar is a threat to the well-being of Rome and that he must be stopped in order for Rome to continue in its glory. Cassius’s tactics are to flatter Brutus and to manipulate Brutus’s love for Rome in order to consider a conspiracy against his other love, Caesar. Brutus does accept what Cassius is saying because it turns out that his love for Rome is greater than his love for Caesar. He even goes on to say that he has thought of such things and that he would rather talk of these things later.

Act I, scene 3

Cassius believes the terrible storm is trying to scare and warn the people. He believes it is an omen or message warns them of a monstrous state and it is caused by Caesar. He believes the omen is warning them of a monstrous state if Caesar becomes king. Cassius uses a different approach on Casca to join his conspiracy. This approach is reverse psychology. I believe he uses this approach instead of flattering him because of the circumstances and because Casca and Brutus may have different weak point where they are vulnerable to being swayed to a side.

Act II, scene 1

Brutus believes that if Caesar is crowned he will change and then yearn for more power. Cassius on the other hand would think that Caesar already non-deservant of power and must be stopped from getting power. Brutus seems to be a very honorable man who might be the only one who is not jealous of Caesar and wants the best for Rome. He does not want to swear an oath, because it is nothing to swear an oath about. There is no need for an oath because their cause is so great. He feels an oath would devalue the greatness of their cause rather than strengthen it. He does not want to recruit Cicero because “he will never follow anything that other men begin.” The interesting thing the way they respond to them is that they follow them with devotion. I think Shakespeare closes the scene with Brutus and Portia because they can seem to symbolize Rome being “one”, but now they seem to be “two” because Brutus does not share his secrets. This can be seen as a civil war which can be a parallel to what is happening in Rome, as Caesar and the people are on one side and Brutus and the conspirators are on the other creating a split or “two” in Rome.

Act II, scene 3 and 4 Shakespeare includes the two very short scenes to close out the act because these two scenes are on different settings, hence must be different scenes. The reason they are short is because they are important but are not complicated and do not need to be long. These last two scenes can be seen to symbolize as Caesar’s last hope to stay alive. His chances of survival are very slim just as the scenes are short.

Act III, scene 1 Shakespeare builds suspence by making the opportunity for life for Caesar present. This gives the reader a type of hope and it is suspenseful because it is going to turn around. Also the argument is suspenseful because Caesar does not see it coming and arguing about something that has nothing to do with what will come. When Caesar refers to himself as the “Northern Star,” it is a metaphor for his stand on things. It’s a statement he is making that he could never be swayed, unlike the crowd and the other stars, just as the North Star will never sway and will always remain in its position. He takes a very powerful stand. Brutus thinks it is advisable to have Mark Antony speak, so it can be seen that there is nothing to hide about the murder of Julius Caesar. He was one of few who loved Caesar Julius dearly and well known for it. If he was shown to be on the conspirators side, it would be hard to see wrong in it from the crowd’s point of view. Antony gives off the impression that he loved Caesar dearly, but is sure that the conspirators had a good reason for killing him. he gives the impression that he is on their side as he shakes each of the man’s hand. He leads them on by shaking each of their hand and manipulates their trust When he is left alone the reader finds out that he plans to sway the crowd against the conspirators in his speech at Caesar’s funeral. He has to tell the speech in a way that won’t bend the rules of Brutus but will be interpreted by the crowd to go against the conspirators.

Act III, scene 2 Brutus’s speech sways the crowd of plebeians on to his side from being against him to being for him. They even put him on a pedestal Antony reads Caesar’s will as part of his scheme to sway the crowd against the conspirators. The will serves as the last straw to the people and throws their tempers off the edge. They then go and riot in the city against the conspirators. His speech sways the Plebeians against the conspirators.

Act III, scene 3 Cinna the poet is murdered simply because his name is Cinna and that is the name of one of the conspirators. This exemplifies the crowd’s hate towards the conspirators that they do not even want the name of one of the conspirators present. They also kill him because he writes bad poetry which shows how inhuman and unjust the crowd can be.

Act IV, scene 1 Antony’s attitude towards Lepidus is very demanding as he orders him to go to Caesar’s house. He tells him to fetch the will. He plans to reduce some of the will’s bequests. There seems to be some tension between Octavius and Antony. Antony seems to claim some superiority over Octavius as he says he is older and thus wiser. They seem to be arguing, but come together against their enemies

Act IV, scene 2 and 3 Lucillius tells that Cassius is becoming more and more displeased with Brutus, and Brutus worries that their ties may be weakening. Brutus means that Cassius is greedy and wants wealth, as an itching palm had a want for money. Portia “ate fire” which is a very ambiguous statement. The reason she did this is because she could not bear the stress that she was put under because of the conspiracy. Brutus acts are tries to act very stoic. Cassius thinks its better to be on defense because they could stand their ground and the troops will get more tired because they are on the offense. Brutus feels that they should be on the offense because they will only decline in power, and the longer they wait the more power the enemy gets. Also if on offense, the enemies lose the capability to be able to recruit soldiers from the villages. When Brutus puts on the nightgown, he acts very nice to his servants. This is different because he was never as nice as this. Caesar’s ghost makes the prophecy that he will see him at Philippi. Because it is a ghost which is caused by death, Brutus himself could die at Philippi and become a ghost himself. If not that he may have to face death and at least come near death.

Act V

Antony accuses Brutus of being a flatterer to Caesar because he seemed like he loved him but he ended up killing him. In other words, being a back stabber because he was nice to Caesar in words but when it came to the end he stabbed Caesar in the back. Cassius interprets the omens as a bad sign for his side. He then shows to believe in fate, as in the beginning he did not, when he says farewell to Brutus just incase they lose. Brutus is opposed to suicide because he sees it as cowardly because it is killing oneself to prevent one to see their fear. Cassius says what if Brutus were to be captured and most likely ridiculed. Brutus responds by saying that, under those conditions he has too great of a mind and is too great of a person to be ridiculed like that. Cassius makes an error when he thinks they are losing the battle, when in fact they are winning. He commits suicide because he does not want to be captured and does not want to deal with the loss. His mistake was error because of early judgment. Cassius asks his servant to kill his with the sword that killed Caesar. Brutus asks Volumnis to kill him and Volumnius responds by saying no. His reasons are because it would not be right to kill him because he is his friend. Octavius makes an proposal of peace to the men of Brutus. He entertains them. According to Antony, Brutus was the only righteous conspirator because he cared for the well being of Rome as the others did it for greed of power.

Deviations From Plutarch

• Shakespeare makes Caesar's triumph take place on the day of lupercalia instead of six months earlier
• For greater dramatic effect he has made the Capitol the venue of Caesar's death and not Curia Pomperiana (Pompey's House).
• Caesar's murder, the funeral, Antony's oration, the reading of the will and Octavius' arrival all take place on the same day in the play. However, historically, the assassination took place on March 15 (The ides of March), the will was published three days later on March 18, the funeral took place on March 20 and Octavius arrived only in May.
• Shakespeare makes the Triumvirs meet in Rome instead of near Bolonia, so as to avoid a third locale.
  
• He has combined the two Battles of Phillipi although there was a twenty day interval between them.
• Shakespeare gives Caesar's last words as "Et tu, Brute? Then fall, Caesar!" ("And you, Brutus? Then fall, Caesar."). Plutarch says he said nothing, pulling his toga over his head when he saw Brutus among the conspirators.. However, Suetonius reports his last words, spoken in Greek, as "καί σύ τέκνον" (transliterated as "Kai su, teknon?"; "You too, child?" in English).

Shakespeare deviated from these historical facts in order to curtail time and compress the facts so that the play could be staged without any kind of difficulty. The tragic force is condensed into a few scenes for the heightened effect.

Dramatis Personae

• Julius Caesar
• Octavius Caesar, Marcus Antonius, M. Aemilius Lepidus, Triumvirs after the death of Julius Caesar
• Cicero, Publius, Popilius Lena, Senators
• Marcus Brutus, Cassius, Casca, Trebonius, Ligarius, Decius Brutus, Metellus Cimber, Cinna, Conspirators against Julius Caesar
• Flavius and Murellus, Tribunes
• Artemidorus, a Sophist of Cnidos
• A Soothsayer (Also called Fortuneteller)
• Cinna, a poet
• Another poet
• Lucilius, Titinius, Messala, Young Cato, Volumnius, Friends to Brutus and Cassius
• Varro, Clitus, Claudius, Strato, Lucius, Dardanius, Servants to Brutus
• Pindarus, Servant to Cassius
• Calpurnia, wife to Caesar
• Portia, wife to Brutus

Notable performances

Screen Performances

See also Shakespeare on screen (Julius Caesar)

• Julius Caesar (1950), starring Charlton Heston as Antony and Harold Tasker as Caesar.
• Julius Caesar (1953), starring Marlon Brando as Antony and Louis Calhern as Caesar.
• Julius Caesar (1970), starring Charlton Heston as Antony and John Gielgud as Caesar.

Stage performances

John Wilkes Booth, Edwin Booth and Junius Brutus Booth, Jr. in Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar in 1864.

• 1864: Junius, Jr., Edwin and John Wilkes Booth made their only appearance onstage together in a benefit performance of Julius Caesar on November 25, 1864. Junius, Jr. played Cassius, Edwin played Brutus and John Wilkes played Marc Antony.
• 1926: By far the most elaborate performance of the play was staged as a benefit for the Actors' Fund of America at the Hollywood Bowl. Caesar arrived for the Lupercal in a chariot drawn by four white horses. The stage was the size of a city block and dominated by a central tower eighty feet in height. The event was mainly aimed at creating work for unemployed actors. Three hundred gladiators appeared in an arena scene not featured in Shakespeare's play; a similar number of girls danced as Caesar's captives; a total of three thousand soldiers took part in the battle sequences.
• 1937: Orson Welles' famous production at the Mercury Theatre drew fervoured comment as the director dressed his protagonists in uniforms reminiscent of those common at the time in Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany, as well as drawing a specific analogy between Caesar and Mussolini. Opinions vary on the artistic value of the resulting production: some see Welles' mercilessly pared-down script (the running time was around 90 minutes without an interval, several characters were eliminated, dialogue was moved around and borrowed from other plays, and the final two acts were reduced to a single scene) as a radical and innovative way of cutting away the unnecessary elements of Shakespeare's tale; others thought Welles' version was a mangled and lobotomised version of Shakespeare's tragedy which lacked the psychological depth of the original. Most agreed that the production owed more to Welles than it did to Shakespeare. However, Welles's innovations have been echoed in many subsequent modern productions, which have seen parallels between Caesar's fall and the downfalls of various governments in the twentieth century. The production was most noted for its portrayal of the slaughter of Cinna (Norman Lloyd). It is the longest-running Broadway production at 157 performances.
• 1950: John Gielgud played Cassius at the Shakespeare Memorial Theatre under the direction of Michael Langham and Anthony Quayle. The production was considered one of the highlights of a remarkable Stratford season, and led to Gielgud (who had done little film work to that time) playing Cassius in Joseph L. Mankiewicz' 1953 film version.
• 1977: John Gielgud made his final appearance in a Shakespearean role on stage as Julius Caesar in John Schlesinger's production at the Royal National Theatre.

Parodies

The Canadian comedy duo Wayne and Shuster parodied Julius Caesar in their 1958 sketch Rinse the Blood off My Toga. Flavius Maximus, Private Roman I, is hired by Brutus to investigate the death of Caesar. The police procedural combines Shakespeare, Dragnet, and vaudeville jokes and was first broadcast on the Ed Sullivan Show.

See also

• Assassinations in fiction
• Mark Antony's Funeral Speech

External links

• All Julius Caesar Provides a summary of the play; and background on Shakespeare and Julius Caesar including historical background on Julius Caesar and a character analysis of Caesar.
• Julius Caesar - searchable, indexed e-text
• Julius Caesar - Full text play by William Shakespeare.
• Julius Caesar - plain vanilla text from Project Gutenberg
• Julius Caesar - by The Tech
• http://nfs.sparknotes.com/juliuscaesar/
• Lesson plans for Julius Caesar at Web English Teacher

References

• Chambers, E. K. The Elizabethan Stage. 4 Volumes, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1923.
• Halliday, F. E. A Shakespeare Companion 1564–1964. Balyimore, Penguin, 1964.