Julius Caesar Rhetorical Analysis

Is Shakespeare overrated? Is the mind behind the rhetorically brilliant pieces of art that have withstood over 400 years, nothing but smoke and mirrors? For every question there is, the answer lies within the work itself. Revolutions don’t come in a dozen, especially not in the magnitude of Shakespeare’s groundbreaking franchises. Speaking of such masterful work, one specific play written by him called, “The Tragedy of Julius Caesar” about the fictional portrayal of the Roman leader and a group of conspirators, holds within a lot of the traditional Shakespeare rhetoric that all people in the world of literature (and other worlds) have come to know and respect. The play began in the streets of Rome, focused on two tribunes named Flavius and

Marullus that were helping disperse a crowd that were celebrating the return of their beloved king, Julius Caesar. The plot in basic terms goes like this: a group of “conspirators” in the city of Rome are concerned for Caesar’s thirst for power, and are afraid he will turn Rome into a dictatorship. Their plan is to kill him to prevent these events from occurring for the sake of Rome. The conspirators go through with their plan and end up in court where Brutus, Caesar’s close friend that agreed to help kill him, has to stand trial against Marc Antony, who has some tricks up his sleeve for Brutus and his allies. In the play, “The Tragedy of Julius Caesar” William Shakespeare utilizes rhetoric in a speech from Marc Antony, to persuade people to buy into what he saying, and make them think in his favor.
To begin with, early on Shakespeare establishes that rhetoric is possessed by the powerful people of Rome, and is used to influence the commoners and to control their behavior. This idea is proven true in the Marc Antony speech. It is clear that Antony has a knack for speaking and persuading, and very often does he go out of his way to make the crowd side with his claims against Brutus. This is an example of a sender/receiver relationship. The senders in this case would be Antony, and also Brutus, because they are the ones in the spotlight, and they have to persuade the people to agree with them so they either don’t face punishment or they give the punishment to the ones they think deserve it. With that being said the receivers are clearly the audience that is present at the hearing. “Receiving” the information and deciding on who is more justified. The reason they do this is because they have to rightfully determine if the defendant is worthy of a punishment or what he did was justified. If Brutus is able to persuade the jury in his favor, they won’t have him killed, but if Antony comes out on top then Brutus and all the other conspirators will be taken to death row. The motivation of these gentlemen is to get what they want out of the trial, but it will be no easy task on both ends. So in order to win the love of the crowd they must use any strategies necessary to claim victory and achieve their goal.
To proceed, Antony has some brilliant strategies he uses against the defendants.

His utilization of rhetoric in this play is the finest that will be seen throughout this it’s entirety, and really flushes out his intentions in the speech. One example of a strategy that stands out is his use of pity against the audience or also known as pathos. Going on a tangent about how terribly sad he was about Caesar’s death, and how much it hurt him that the conspirators would do something like this, making the people feel bad for him and hate the conspirators even more for sending Caesar to his grave. This is a smart move on Antony’s part, because as seen in previous acts the people of Rome loved Caesar, and to play up that fact as the wounds of his death are still bleeding is a really smart way of becoming the voice of the people in the trial. He even threw shade at the conspirators when he said, “Who else must be let blood, who else is rank” implicably expressing hate against them but leaving the emotions to the jury. Antony decides to further twist the blade by referring to their swords they killed Caesar with and how they were, “made rich with the most noble blood of all this world” really making it known how they’ve wronged Rome instead of saving it with their devious crimes. Brutus is unevenly matched when it comes to Antony in this situation. With all that being said, Antony is good at putting thoughts and ideas into people’s

minds.
To add onto that, when it comes to the real nitty gritty of the slew of tricks Antony uses on Brutus in his speech, one of the more popular forms of rhetoric used is around the first and second part of the speech is ethos. Ethos refers to a writer’s credibility, and how much they could be trusted. Antony uses ethos pretty blatantly to throw Brutus’ credibility into the air. After Brutus goes on about his love for Caesar, and how he didn’t kill Caesar because he didn’t love him but because he, “loved Rome more” (III iii, 20) Antony took over the stage with a trick up his sleeve. He probably got the idea from seeing how much people liked Brutus, and figured that if he demilitarized his credibility with his own arguments his side would be taken. Antony says that if Caesar was too ambitious, and was thirsty for power, the how come when he, “thrice presented him a kingly crown which he did thrice refused”(III iii, 93-94). Everytime he would propose a counterargument, he would always say that Brutus, “is an honorable man,” and, “Yet Brutus says he was ambitious” he’s doing here seems to be maybe a bit sarcastic. Like for example, if someone said that a grocery store was poorly taken care of, the workers have no experience, and the temperature is off in the places where food need specific temperatures, then they would end off their topic by saying, “Yeah but the food is top quality right?” So by saying that Brutus is honorable, he’s really trying to portray that he isn’t. This is also known as an indirect suggestion. One of many rhetoric examples there are in the world, and in Shakespeare.
Furthermore, in the events following the previous in the Julius Caesar play, another main rhetorical weapon if you will, was used.

He took the strategy of pathos to a whole new level. Antony brought Caesar's will, and with it the gown he wore when he was stabbed. This was a hard hit to the audience. At this point Antony had their hearts in the palm of his hand. He began pointing out the holes the conspirators left in the gown, saying stuff like, “See what a rent the envious Casca made” and “Through this the well beloved Brutus stabbed” (III, iii, 172-173). The tides are starting to turn here. No longer is Antony hiding his feelings toward the gentleman. He stopped calling them honorable, and is now calling them out for what they have done. And the crowd is following suit. Once Antony turned, they turned as well. Like a barrel in a revolver they all turned at once. This might've been a visible plot point towards the beginning of the scene, in order to win the support of the people there's no better way then hitting them in the feels. Individuals in the audience begin crying out, “O piteous spectacle!” “O noble Caesar!” and most importantly, “O traitors, villains!” (III, iii, 195-198) Antony should be getting a lot of praise for how good of a job that was done, or Shakespeare

should.
Additionally, Antony portrays himself as the NEW man of the people. After dazzling readers with his impressive speech, Antony continues on while taking over the mantle of the man of the people. The justification for this, is how at the beginning of the scene where Brutus took the stage to try and get his point across on why he did what he did, he was treated with a kind and respectful response. But everything turned on it's head when Antony spoke his mind. He found a way to take over the mantle, and not only that, but turn the crowd on Brutus. And what this means is that another strategy that Antony used was embracing the crowd against Caesar. This is the point really where all of Antony’s strategies kind of weave together, this is the result of all of his work. And to make sure his plan comes together perfectly, he takes the torch he took from Brutus and ran with it. Scorching the crowd to be on his side permanently. It's really impressive what Antony accomplished. Countering the great rhetorical skills of Brutus with his own, and showcasing his brilliance as a speaker without saying a word about what he was trying to do. A true masterclass of dialogue, commends to Shakespeare, if only the man got to see his work thrive and inspire generations to come.
In conclusion, this speech embodies the mind and vision of shakespeare. People need to pay more attention, even though a lot of his work is famous worldwide, it's smaller stuff like this that need to be appreciated. A lot could be learned from this, or nothing could be learned because someone couldn't understand what he was saying. Work like this comes once in a lifetime, actually more than a lifetime. Nothing has matched the brilliance of Shakespeare in the last 400 years. This art will never be topped, it will only be glorified through the vision of others who seek to pay respect to him for setting the bar so high.