Brutus As A Tragic Hero

Brutus was a wise and intelligent Roman citizen, who claimed that he was Caesar’s friend. Yet, he was quickly swayed to the conspirators side by some anonymous letters and a bit of flattering.

In 1599 Shakespeare wrote the play Julius Caesar. The main character of the play Brutus as he represents a tragic hero. being a tragic hero means. He is above us but human And he falls from a high place, He struggles against his own fate, he is guilty of a fatal flaw (honor), he has an epiphany, and by the end of the play, he is dead

In tragedy plays, there is always a tragic hero who has a tragic flaw in his personality may it be excessive pride, poor judgement, or both which eventually leads to the hero’s downfall where the hero can perform no action to prevent it. In Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare, Marcus Brutus is the tragic hero of the play due to his tragic flaw which is his naïve and over-trusting personality, which he eventually realizes too late and performs an action to prevent his loss of dignity.

Similarly, by not destroying Mark Antony along with Caesar, let alone allowing him to speak in Caesar’s funeral, Brutus engineers his future’s demise. “‘. . . Antony is but a limb of Caesar. Let’s be sacrificers, but not butchers . . . let’s kill him boldly, but not wrathfully . . . and for Mark Antony, think not of him; for he can do no more than Caesar’s arm when Caesar’s head is off’”(916). This is an even greater fallacy than the first. Antony’s rage and passion is enough force alone to drive him and the Roman army to kill every last conspirator, gossiper, and senator who was set against his great Caesar. The fiery drive behind Antony was an imminent threat to Brutus and the conspirators, yet because of Brutus’s flawed logic, Antony lived and they died. Another illustration of this is when Brutus makes the decision to allow the silver tongued Antony to speak in Caesar’s funeral. After a weak, unconvincing speech given by Brutus to the public, Antony takes center stage, capturing the hearts, minds, and attention of the people, essentially turning them on their former leader. “‘Oh most bloody sight!’ ‘We will be revenged.’ ‘Revenge! About! Seek! Burn! Fire! Kill! Slay! Let not a traitor live!’”(954). Brutus’s most prominent, fatal flaw is his lack of sound judgment.

As noble and great as Brutus might be, all tragic heroes have some tragic flaws and make some errors of judgment, which leads them to their downfall. In this case Brutus's great flaw is that he is too honorable, and he's too naïve when he is dealing with people. An example of an error of judgment is when Brutus underestimates Antony, and thinks him incapable of being dangerous after Caesar's death, "For Antony is but a limb of Caesar...he can do no more than Caesar's arm When Caesar's head is off."  This turns out not to be the case. One example of Brutus's excessive honor being damaging to him, is when he decides that only Caesar should die and no one else even if they seem to threaten his cause, as Cassius warns repeatedly that Antony does.

He states that Brutus is just as noble and worthy as Caesar. (Act 1, scene ii). He says that Brutus cannot see what everyone else does and recognize his worthiness. Cassius and the other senators do not want Caesar to be king because they would lose all their power. Cassius is slowly luring Brutus in to do his dirty work. He builds Brutus’s confidence up to make him thing that killing Caesar is the right thing to do. Cassius is basically playing with Brutus’s head because he knows Brutus will listen. So, Brutus joins the conspirators in killing Caesar. Cassius tells Brutus that it is for the good of Rome, and that he is saving them from a dictatorship. Cassius is going for Brutus’s weakest point, his care and concern for Rome. He knows that if Brutus believes the people distrust Caesar, then he will be convinced that Caesar must be thwarted. Brutus knew that if Caesar was crowned, he would never have a chance, and he was power hungry. This is what ultimately leads to the tragedy of Julius Caesar. After Brutus kills Caesar off, he starts to feel guilty for killing his friend, thus creating an internal conflict. Brutus was so confident that the plan would go exactly as planned that he fell apart when they encountered problems. If Brutus and the other conspirators had taken more time to think things through, they probably would have been more prepared for the situation that was handed to them.

After the king to be, Caesar was killed by Brutus and others, Brutus gives a speech to explain why he had killed Caesar and what they should do after. After he gives his speech, he allows a close friend of Caesar to speak as well, named Antony. While Brutus had appealed to their logic and cultural beliefs, Antony mostly appeals to emotions, with barely any logic or culture.

A tragic hero in Shakespearean literature is understood as a noble and heroic character who makes a series of bad decisions based on his bad judgment that leads to his downfall and eventually death. In William Shakespeare’s play Julius Caesar, the tragic hero is Marcus Brutus, a powerful Roman senator who joins a conspiracy to assassinate the Roman ruler, Julius Caesar. Marcus Brutus is a tragic hero because of his noble reputation, his moral personality, the cathartic experience that the audience feels from his life and his tragic flaw: idealism.

Indeed, Brutus was a honorable man. His honor was his greatest strength, but it was also his weakness. He murdered and betrayed his closest and only friend, due to the fact that he was so focused on doing the most honorable thing. Brutus focused more on principles, than the one person who truly cared about him. Consequently he also cared more about principle, than his own common sense. Therefore, his main focus was on honor and principle, which caused him to kill Caesar. He murdered Caesar because he thought it would solve the problem, but it only caused pandemonium.Consequently, his actions produced an angry mob, ready to avenge Caesar's death. If Brutus never took matters into his own hands, he would not have created a vicious crowd of citizens filled with hatred. He never solved the problem. When it got out of control, he resorted to killing himself. Cowardly, when things got tough, he ran away from it. He

“Julius Caesar is a play about people who make mistakes-costly ones, for themselves and their country” (Julius Caesar, Introduction line 1). This quote is from the first line of the introduction to the play of “Julius Caesar” and I think that this line is the best way to start off this essay. If we took a look at each main character in this play, except for Antony, we can see how their mistakes usually would lead to their downfalls. For example, Caesar mistake of not listening to the warnings, the omens, or even his wife telling him to stay home because she had a nightmare about him, led to his death at the Senate. Another example would be Cassius. His mistake of listening to Brutus when it came to marching down to Philippi to face Antony and Octavius’s army led to the defeat of his army and Cassius committing suicide. Now we come to the main focus of this essay which is Brutus. Some people argue that Brutus is a tragic hero and a sympathetic figure. Others argue the opposite. I believe that Brutus noble qualities led to his ignoble downfall which included failure, loss, and shame. While we read through this play we can see many examples of Brutus failures. Different occasions where he was manipulated by people he called his friends, Brutus being too trusting of others, and his sense of honor blocking his common sense. It’s safe to say that he is simple minded and in a way a coward. In this essay I am going to first do an inspection of Brutus, a breakdown his

In Julius Caesar Brutus displays the traits of a tragic hero through out this play. His tragic flaw is his being too naive. He makes an error in judgment, and when this error occurred it causes his own downfall. But Brutus causes his own downfall when after killing Caesar all of Rome turns against the conspirators. And all these events cause his death. However, the factors that have made him a tragic hero are discussed below:

A tragic hero is a great or virtuous hero often seen in a tragedy who is destined for defeat or downfall. The tragedy of Julius Caesar written by William Shakespeare is about the great emperor Julius Caesar. Caesar is murdered by his closest friends and followers who are either just jealous or fear caesar could get too powerful. Brutus can be considered as a tragic hero, because he is presented as a noble and sincere man who is led into the act of betraying a friend, and as a result he suffers many consequences. Brutus can be considered as a tragic hero because he's an honorable man whos just getting convinced by his friend cassius which seems kind of jealous because he thinks he could be at caesar position too and that it was just luck that caesar is the great emperor right now.

While Julius Caesar has been considered a tragic hero, in the play Julius Caesar, Brutus is the true tragic hero. Fitting all of the requirements, Brutus is fitted to be the tragic hero. In order to be considered a tragic hero; he/she needs to be in a high position or rank, have some kind of talent, a major flaw, and they need to deal with their downfall with honor and dignity. He shows these characteristics very clearly in the text. Being in the majority of the play, Julius Caesar, Caesar is only in a fraction. Brutus being in the majority of the play helps with him being the tragic hero.

The play, The Tragedy of Julius Caesar, by William Shakespeare, has two main tragic heroes. Set in Rome and spanning from forty- four to forty-two B.C., the play tells of Brutus and Caesar whom both fall from the highest positions to the lowest of misfortune and then are enlightened on their mistakes. Brutus is the stronger example of a tragic hero in this story. Throughout this play, Brutus commits many faults, falls more drastically than all other characters, and regrets his previous actions by the end of the play.

In Julius Caesar, it would make sense to assume Julius Caesar is the tragic hero being that the title of the play is Julius Caesar; however Brutus is arguably the real tragic hero due to several reasons: he remains for the entirety of the story unlike Caesar, he possesses a character flaw that brings about his downfall and also learns something about himself. Before any argument is made, it is important to define tragic hero: A man or woman who was a respected royal or noble person who possessed some character flaw that would eventually bring about his/her downfall; the flaw was often pride, anger, or just rash behavior which causes him to suffer and learn something important about himself. This definition is important as it will determine why Brutus is or isn’t the tragic hero of the play. Although Caesar dies because of one of his own flaws it is not hard to argue against him being the tragic hero. He dies so quickly, the audience hardly has a chance to form