Julius Caesar

Abstract

Ambivalence in literature is a much cherished modern virtue, but many of the ambiguities of Julius Caesar Shakespeare inherited from his classical and Renaissance sources. There was no single tradition of interpreting the events leading up to and following the assassination of Caesar, no one orthodox evaluation, moral or political. Scholars have documented in detail the varying attitude towards Caesar himself, Brutus, Cassius and the rest of the conspirators.¹ In Shakespeare’s main source, Plutarch, the movement from Republic to Empire is regarded with very mixed feelings. It is seen as inevitable — ‘the state of Rome … could no more abide to be governed by many Lordes, but required one only absolute Governor’ — and Caesar is described at one point as ‘a mercifull Phisition, whom God had ordeyned of special grace to be Governor of the Empire of Rome’ (Bullough, V, 127, 133). Yet Plutarch can also be markedly anti-Caesarian, moralising on his death,