Julius Caesar Study Guide

Scholars generally agree that Julius Caesar was first written and performed in 1599. The drama was apparently quite popular among Elizabethan audiences, most of whom were familiar with Caear's assassination from numerous other literary sources. For the dramatic events of the play, Shakespeare chiefly drew on the biographies of Brutus, Caesar, and Antony in Plutarch's Parallel Lives, translated by Thomas North as The Lives of the Noble Grecianes and Romans in 1579. Plutarch was a Greek biographer and essayist whose work constitutes a faithful record of the historical tradition, moral views, and ethical judgments of second century A. D. Greek and Roman cultures.

While the action of Julius Caesar closely follows the events described by Plutarch, Shakespeare greatly modifies their significance. By Elizabethan times two sharply contrasting views of this period in Roman history had emerged. One held that Brutus and the other conspirators were ruthless murderers who unjustly killed their would-be emperor; the other interpreted their actions as the rightful deposing of a tyrant. Shakespeare carefully deigned his play in such a way that it seems to support both views. As a result, critics have long debated whether Brutus or Caesar is the chief protagonist of Julius Caesar and whether either qualifies as a tragic hero. (In drama, a tragedy recounts the significant events or actions in a protagonist's life which, taken together, bring about the catastrophe.) This fundamental ambiguity in the play is further complicated by the different political motivations of the characters: Cassius assassinates Caesar ostensibly because the leader is an alleged tyrant, but also out of personal envy; Brutus joins the conspiracy because he wants to preserve the Roman republic; Mark Antony rouses the Roman populace against the traitors out of loyalty to Caear, but later benefits from the leader's death when he becomes a co-ruler of the empire. The circumtances surrounding Caesar's assassination reveal that although the major characters strive to attain different political ends, the means by which they achieve their aims are often quite similar. Furthermore, despite the supposed good intentions of all these men, they all become corrupted in some way and their actions lead only to violence and civil strife.