Dynamics Between Characters as Major Mean of Plot Construction

Even though the characters of The Tragedy of Julius Caesar can not be very easily classified since of their emotional depth and mental complexity, one can draw particular conclusions about them primarily based on the attributes that they possess. Shakespeare uses the intricacy of the characters’ personalities to create the plot. The motives of some characters are frequently fairly clear, although other characters intentionally or subconsciously mask their intent to sustain an look of loyalty or to deceive their adversary. Few of the characters match perfectly a single of the 4 character descriptions protagonist, antagonist, anti-hero, or heroic anti-hero, but rather are a composite of different elements of each.

Mark Antony is probably the easiest of the characters to classify. He is quite clearly an antagonist. Just before the assassination Antony tends to make only 4 brief appearances and speaks as several lines. Three occasions, twice at the games and when at Caesar’s home, Antony affirms his allegiance to Caesar as a ruler and as a buddy. Following the assassination nevertheless, Antony hastens to fill the void produced by Caesar’s absence and he becomes a prominent player in the struggle for power. Beginning with Antony’s use of his servant to flatter Brutus prior to Antony’s arrival at the Capitol, Antony attempts to appeal to Brutus’s self-perceived senses of honor and nobility. He successfully convinces Brutus that he would be able to agree with the conspirators if their lead to was explained to him. He shakes hands with all of them to prove the integrity of his claim. He gains the appropriate to speak at Caesar’s funeral by playing on Brutus’s sense of righteousness. At the funeral Antony effects his strategy by turning the mob of fickle plebeians against the conspirators, forcing them to flee Rome. Antony gains the help of Octavius, and with each other they pursue Brutus and Cassius to Philippi where Antony skillfully directs his army against them. The defeat resulted in the suicides of Brutus and Cassius.

Caesar plays the component of a heroic anti-hero. Even though he had attained military triumphs prior to the starting of the play, he was not satisfied with them. He craved absolute energy but his inclination to be easily flattered and his disregard of the omens led to his demise. From the initial glimpse of Caesar at the Lupercal in Act I Scene II it is very clear that he is a man to be revered and would have it no other way. When he tells Antony to touch Calpurnia, Antony replies, “When Caesar says, ëDo this,’ it is performed.” Caesar foolishly dismissed the soothsayer who warns him to “beware the Ides of March” as a “dreamer.” Caesar considers himself to be a single with the gods and believes himself to be invincible against mere humans. The night prior to the Ides of March Caesar is given several indications of his impending doom, but he heeds none of them. Amongst other factors Calpurnia told Caesar that she had envisioned a lioness whelping in the streets, graves that unearthed their dead, and “fierce fiery warriors” that “fought upon the clouds.” Caesar also ignored the meteor shower and scorned the guidance of the augurers who failed to discover a heart inside a slaughtered beast. When Calpurnia insisted that it would be hazardous to venture to the Capitol, Caesar said that he and danger were “two lions littered in 1 day, / And I the elder and much more terrible.” He permitted Decius Brutus to appeal to his Achilles heel, egotism and honor. Decius told Caesar that the Senate was going to crown him, and they would perceive his absence as cowardice. On the way to the Capitol, Caesar once again ignores the soothsayer and he disregards Artemidorus’s letter. When in the Senate House, Brutus and the other conspirators plead with Caesar to repeal the banishment of Metellus Cimber’s brother. While they are kissing his feet and fawning over him, Casca stabs him in the back and the rest comply with suit. Even until the very last Caesar permitted himself to be deceived by flattery and by his personal perceived invulnerability.

Cassius is the definitive anti-hero. He fails in practically almost everything he undertakes and has a enormous inferiority complicated. Caesar recognizes this in Act I Scene II when he says, “Such men as he (Cassius) in no way be at heart’s ease / Whiles they behold a higher than themselves.” Cassius makes undesirable decisions and consistently permits Brutus to persuade him into agreeing with courses of actions that are based on faulty logic. Cassius yields to Brutus three times in the course of the preparing of the murder. Brutus overrules Cassius on the matter of swearing an oath, whether to kill Antony as well as Caesar, and no matter whether or not they need to incorporate Cicero in the conspiracy. Cassius deeply resents getting subservient to Caesar. He fails to comprehend why Caesar, not he, is the a single in power. In Act I Scene II Cassius says to Brutus, “I was born as totally free as CaesarÖ / We each have fed as nicely, and we can both / Endure the winter’s cold as nicely as he (Caesar).” He is engulfed with feelings of loathing and animosity, and he is frustrated due to the fact there is little he can do about them. The most grievous of his many errors was to bow to Brutus’s will that they need to fight at Philippi rather than holding their defensive position on elevated terrain. Cassius became so accustomed to failing that he did not query Pindarus when he mistakenly reported that the enemy had captured Titinius. Believing that he had brought on the death of Titinius and lost the battle, Cassius beseeched Pindarus to kill him.

In spite of the a variety of poor choices Brutus created throughout the course of the play, he is the hero. He has strong moral convictions and an unwavering sense of nobility. He is the only character in the play who governs his life according to these principles. The other characters in the play recognize these traits and they are the primary reason that Cassius recruits him. In Act II Scene I Cauis Ligarius says, “I am not sick if Brutus have in hand / Any exploit worthy the name of honor.” In the same scene Cassius states, “no man right here / But honors you and every person doth want / You had but that opinion of yourself / Which each and every noble Roman bears of you.” Cassius believes that Brutus will give an honorable front for his own selfish deeds. Brutus measures all of his actions on his personal scale of ethics and righteousness. He is slow and deliberate when making moral choices, but quick to respond to concerns about the conspiracy. Brutus contemplates the necessity of an assassination for over a month. He is forced to weigh his unbending values against his really like and friendship for Caesar. He realizes that it is needed to rid Rome of Caesar in order to prevent his energy from expanding too excellent, but he finds himself wrestling with the emotional anxiety of condoning the murder of a good pal. In Act II Scene I Brutus wishes that they could “come by Caesar’s spirit / and not dismember Caesar.” Brutus desires to “carve him (Caesar) as a dish match for the gods, / Not hew him as a carcass match for hounds.” To Brutus’s dismay this does not prove to be the case. When Antony petitions Brutus to let him to speak at Caesar’s funeral, Brutus consents against the will of Cassius. Brutus sees it match that someone must recount the constructive side of Caesar’s life due to the fact he by no means regarded as Caesar to be a poor person, only a threat to freedom. Following the assassination, Brutus second-guesses his motives and confronts the reality that he participated in a murder. He can no longer justify it to himself. He lives by his sense of honor until the quite finish when he commits suicide to stop the disgrace of becoming taken “bound to Rome.”