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Julius Caesar: Two Views of the PlayFrom Julius Caesar. Ed. Frances Andrew Purcell and Lucius Michael Somers. Chicago: Scott, Foresman and Co.(a) As a Political Play The central idea of the play, considered politically, is the decay of republicanism in Rome and the rise of Caesarism. In the First Scene the populace give unconscious evidence of the growing spirit of monarchy. This they manifest when they cry out in the Third Act: Let him be Caesar.The nation is calling for a representative in whom it may put supreme and unlimited confidence. Roman imperialism began under Julius Caesar, and assumed definite form in the absolute military monarchy of his grand-nephew, Octavius Augustus. "Nothing did so much to set the people in love with royalty, both name and thing, as the reflection that their beloved Caesar, the greatest of their national heroes, the crown and consummation of Roman genius and character, had been murdered for aspiring to it .... We can all now see, what he alone saw then, that the great social and political forces of the Roman world had long been moving and converging irresistibly to that end .... The great danger of the time lay in struggling to keep up a republic in show, when they already had an empire in fact." — Hudson. 1 (b) As a Tragedy of Character The central idea of the play considered as a tragedy is that Good cannot come out of Evil. "Brutus is noble, wise, valiant, and honest," but he made shipwreck of his life by one great error. He committed a crime to prevent, as he thought, a greater crime, and by so doing he brought upon himself and his country greater evils than those he had sought to avert. "The stain of assassination adheres to Brutus, a crime which no political duty, no apposite duty whatever, can outweigh. This stain cleaves closer to the 'lover' of Caesar than to Caesar's personal enemy, Cassius, and to him, therefore, to Caesar's good angel, the spirit of the murdered man subsequently appears, as his evil and revenge-announcing genius." Gervinus 2 Notes 1. Hudson, Henry Norman, born at Cornwall, Vermont, 1814; died 1886. An American Shakespearean scholar. 2. Gervinus, Georg Gottfried, born at Darmstadt, Germany, 1805; died 1871. A German critic and Shakespearean writer. ______ How to cite this article: ________ More Resources  The Chronology of Shakespeare's Plays
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