Analysis Of Speech In Julius Caesar

Two Speeches In Scene 1 of Act 3 of The Tragedy of Julius Caesar, Julius Caesar was assassinated by the Roman Senators. At the time of the crime, Mark Antony was led away by Trebonius so he would not be able to interfere and aid Caesar. While this was occurring, the conspirators conversed in short, clipped, monosyllabic words as a result of their nervousness about the situation they had put themselves in. When the signal was given, they drew their swords and slew the ruler. Caesar, upon looking at the faces of the men surrounding him, found his 'friend ' Brutus among the traitors, and thus gave up the fight and died. After his return to the scene, Mark Antony requested he be able to speak to the people of Rome at Caesar 's funeral. Brutus …show more content…
With his words, he showed the people everything that was wrong with the way Caesar had ruled them. Brutus expressed that Caesar was ambitious and untrustworthy. He also declared that the deceased head of state was a tyrant who only cared for his own life and goals rather than about what was in the public 's interest and what was in line with the public 's goals. On the flip side of the coin, Mark Antony used the rhetorical device epimone to show that Caesar was not as ambitious as Brutus made him sound. ". . . Brutus says he was ambitious, / And Brutus is an honorable man,"(3.2, Pages 3-4). Although the word before "Brutus" changes, the meaning of the phrase still has the same impact on the group gathered; they began to doubt what Brutus had said to them as it conflicted with what they had seen. If Caesar was ambitious, they reasoned, then why had he not taken the crown the first, second, or third time it was offered to him. They began to wonder, as Antony had undoubtedly wanted them to, if perhaps Brutus and Cassius were the ones who were ambitious for they had killed Caesar and told the public they wanted what was best for Rome, knowing that as they said this, the plebeians would wish them to become the new leaders. Mark Antony had the Romans see the metaphorical light he wanted them to see because it suited his purposes. Consequently, everything Brutus and Cassius had set into place was taken apart when Mark Antony covertly told the citizens under the guise of eulogizing Caesar, the wrongs that were done to him and them as his subjects. After both men speak, the outcome which was desired and received by both stays with Mark Antony, who later becomes part of the Second Triumvirate that ruled