Julius Caesar Rhetorical Analysis

In William Shakespeare's play The Tragedy of Julius Caesar, two speeches are given to the people of Rome about Caesar's death. In Act 3, Scene 2 of this play Brutus and Antony both try to sway the minds of the Romans toward their views. Brutus tried to make the people believe he killed Caesar for a noble cause. Antony tried to persuade the people that the conspirators committed an act of brutality toward Caesar and were traitors. The effectiveness and ineffectiveness of both Antony's and Brutus's speech to the people are conveyed through tone and rhetorical devices.

Shakespeare, the writer of Julius Caesar, portrays the characters of having very persuasive abilities. He shows that many characters have a talented tongue that makes convincing others to join the plot, simple. The conspirators need an honorable mouth to justify the killing of Caesar. The power of persuasion helps to convince Brutus to join the plan and convinces the Romans that what they have done is justified. Cassius is very persuasive and has a way with words that can convince anyone to join the plot. He has “a lean and hungry look”(1.2.194) as if he is not satisfied with who is in the capitol. In the play Julius Caesar, the power of persuasion and rhetoric is used to convince characters to do things they would not normally do; Cassius

“The broad masses of a population are more amenable to the appeal of rhetoric than to any other force” according to Adolf Hitler, a master in rhetoric, who was able to sway the people of Germany into electing him as chancellor, and who was able to brain wash an army into creating the biggest mass genocide on the planet. This type of strategy is mimicked by Mark Antony in William Shakespeare’s The Tragedy of Julius Caesar. Mark Antony’s extensive knowledge of rhetorical strategies, such as appeal to the emotions of the commoners, knowledge of topic and reputation, and syntactical devices eclipse Brutus’ reasoning for killing Julius Caesar and wins over the Roman commoners.

Antony, another Julius Caesar character, employs three Machiavellian skills: using fickleness to his advantage,“...while you treat them well, they are yours” (Prince 3), and ruling by fear. Antony’s objective was revenge toward the conspirators for killing Caesar. Antony also successfully used the fickleness of the Roman people to his advantage. After Brutus explained why the conspirators had killed Caesar, the crowd was understanding and agreed with the conspirator’s actions. The Roman peasants are convinced; they even want Brutus as their new emperor, with better qualities than Caesar. The plebians say, “Caesar’s better parts / Shall be crowned in Brutus” (3.2.54-55). But the level of the masses’ support for Brutus did not deter Antony’s opinion of the wrongdoing of the conspirators. In Antony’s speech, he spoke both confidently and assertively, which led to Antony convincing the crowd to support his cause and fight against the conspirators. Additionally, in Machiavellian style, Antony understands the crowd’s perspective; they need praise to believe in Antony’s cause. Antony appeased the Roman masses when Antony

re was lots of safety in numbers and the conspirators needed to find a way to convince them that Julius Caesar was a bad emperor. So the conspirators used persuasion. Persuasion is one of the easiest ways to convince people to do the wrong thing. The conspirators went to each civilian one by one and persuaded them saying that Caesar is a bad ruler.

Hitler told many people lies so that they could believe he was doing the right thing,

The Most despicable character in Julius caesar Cassius in the play of Julius caesar to me is the most despicable character in the play because he manipulates a lot of people and basically lies and cheats his way to get the things he wants and he does even more things to show that he’s the most despicable character. One of the reasons that Cassius is a despicable characters is that he manipulated brutus and it took time to manipulate him because in the play brutus is a stoic and a stoic is a person who shows no emotions so throughout the play you can see cassius manipulating brutus time and time again (“Brutus,” and “Caesar”/what should be in that “Caesar”?/why should than name be sounded more than yours,) (1,2,142) this is just one example

How does an induivaul know if he is being convinced, or manipulated. When an individual tries to convince a crowd, it is obvious because the speaker is trying to get the crowd to believe what he is saying; however, when an individual tries to manipulate a crowd, the speaker is discrete and will not say exactly what they mean, but will suggest ideas that will lead the crowd to what the speaker wants them to believe. Within The Tragedy of Julius Caesar, characters try to manipulate or convince the crowd at Julius Caesar’s funeral due to their loyalties.

Cassius hatches a plan to fool the honorable yet naive Brutus into joining the conspirators.

Because Antony knows his audience better than Brutus, he is able to appeal to the crowd’s emotions and win them over. Brutus tries to get the people on his side by telling them that it was for the greater good, but he has no evidence. Antony disproves Brutus when he says “Yet Brutus says he was ambitious.” The audience is won over by the evidence of Brutus and Caesar’s faults which allows Antony to gain the people's favor. He knows that evidence will convince the people of his sincerity and show them how Brutus’s explanation is flawed.

Cassius applied this skill in his push to incorporate Brutus into his plot. Cassius identified Brutus as having the flaw of possessing an overpowering sense of obligation to abide by the will of the Roman people. Consequently, Cassius appeals to this quality of Brutus in his recitation of the praise for Brutus that has been spoken by “many of the best [respected people] in Rome” who “Have wished that noble Brutus had his eyes”(Shakespeare 1.2.61,64). Cassius is suggesting that Brutus would make a better leader than Caesar if only he could see his own merits as the Roman people do. These deceitful words are used by Cassius to bend a good natured, noble Roman to ensure that his conspiracy has an air of legitimacy as Brutus is revered by

The power of persuasion is important because when someone’s persuaded to do something that gives them clarity to go ahead and attempt that action that someone’s instilled in their mind to try. Throughout Julius Caesar the power of persuasion was important because the conspirators help to overthrow Caesar. There are many reasons for why the conspirators helped to overthrow. They thought that he was too prideful, too ambitious and to arrogant.

These same people were all praising the conspirators moments ago, but at some words from Antony, they all changed their minds, killing even those sharing the same name of the now-criminals. This exemplifies how compelling words can be, how they mobilize people to cause more damage than any weapon. Had Antony used weapons to force the Romans to find and kill Brutus and the conspirators, the citizens likely would see Antony as a dictator and not follow his orders. Another example of how speech can persuade people to take action is from ancient Greece. Philip II of Macedon, a king on a military campaign, was threatening the safety of Athens, but the Athenians were hesitant to clash with him. Demosthenes, a statesman and orator, delivered an exceptional speech calling the Athenians to arms, and they had a complete change of mind. This example demonstrates the capability of words to incite an entire

Imagine being betrayed by the person you trusted most and only because of what someone else told them, someone who loved you is turned against you because of the words of someone else. This is exactly what happened in Shakespeare’s play Julius Caesar, a tragedy about the death and betrayal of the historical Roman leader, Julius Caesar. The characters of the play are all influenced by each other because most of them are leaders or have the qualities and characteristics to be one; they also use certain strategies in the way they address the people they plan to lead and manipulate language to express themselves to the people. Three characters can be seen using these strategies most effectively in the play and they are Cassius, Antony, and Brutus

To accomplish their plan, the conspirators needed a noble man of high stature to justify their actions. The best man for the job was Brutus. Brutus was Caesar’s best friend, loved by the people, and he loved the people back. Therefore, it only made sense for the conspirators to recruit Brutus guarantees the support of the Roman people. Cassius admits this too, “Brutus shall lead, and we will grace his heels / With the most boldest and best hearts of Rome” (3.1.135-136). Cassius himself says that Brutus’s credibility will lead to the success of the plan. If Brutus leads the way, then the people will assume that maybe Caesar’s death was not that terrible since this noble man killed Caesar. Brutus’s nobility in the conspiracy not only convinced the