What Are The Similarities Between Julius Caesar And The Tragedy Of Macbeth

For several centuries, tragedy is one of the many popular genres of literature. In every tragedy, there is a tragic hero who makes an error that leads to their own downfall. William Shakespeare is known to have written many tragedies, which includes Julius Caesar. Due to the many downfalls of numerous characters during the play, it consequently led to arguments about who the tragic hero is. Some critics argued that Julius Caesar, who the play is named after, is the tragic hero while others reason that Marcus Brutus is the tragic hero. However, through the analysis of two essays “Julius Caesar- A Tragic Hero” and Toby Le’s “The Tragic Hero of Julius Caesar”, it became evident that Marcus Brutus is the tragic hero of the play because he demonstrates several characteristics: a tragic dilemma, tragic flaw, downfall, and an epiphany. Considering the main points explained in both of these essays, I am also persuaded that Brutus’s character best fits the standards of a tragic hero.

Centuries after the murder of a rising dictator, students, historians, and linguists alike continue to study the death of Julius Caesar as immortalized by William Shakespeare’s play, The Tragedy of Julius Caesar. In this tragedy, Shakespeare examines the days preceding Caesar’s downfall, and the aftermath that ensues. The tragedy describes Marcus Brutus, a character with noble and honorable intentions, influenced by Cassius to support a conspiracy against an ambitious politician, Julius Caesar. Brutus, Cassius, and other conspirators succeed in ending Caesar’s life, but are forced to flee when Rome turns against them. Much controversy has arisen over who is the tragic hero of the play. A tragic hero is a noble character who, despite his greatness, is led to destruction by his own fatal flaw. Although many argue Brutus is the tragic hero due to his prominent role in the play and his heroic, yet flawed, character, Shakespeare remains justified in the naming of his play. In Shakespeare’s accurately titled tragedy, Julius Caesar, rather than Brutus, remains the tragic hero of the play due to his heroic qualities, his fatal flaw, and Brutus’ ineligibility as the tragic hero.

Shakespeare's tragedy, Macbeth, is a play that transcends time due to its timeless and universal themes. The themes presented in this play are just as relevant to modern audiences as they would have been to contemporary Elizabethan audiences. The play has been able to maintain its textual integrity, withstanding the fact that it is now performed out of its original context to remain a successful play for modern audiences. The issues of heroism, abuse of power and the deceptiveness of appearances are all key within the play, conveyed through the use of dramatic and literary techniques, are issues which still resonate with contemporary audiences. Shakespeare has tested the parameters of the conventional tragedy that was extremely popular during his lifetime and in doing so has created text, which is still relevant today.

By using these guidelines, Shakespeare created one of his greatest Aristotelian tragedies. This is because he applied the Poetics’ guidelines to complex plot, the tragic hero, and the establishment of pity, fear, and catharsis of the audience’s emotions. The complex plot follows Othello and his transformation from nobleman to monster through the exploitation of his tragic flaw. As the plot moves from exposition, complication, challenge, conflict, climax, and finally to dénouement, Othello goes through a recognition scene which leads to a reversal in his fortune and his scene of suffering.

Shakespeare's shortest play, Macbeth, is also, consequently, his most shocking and intense. We see the essence of tragedy: in this case, the protagonist transforms himself from a noble warrior who is loyal to his king and fights for his county to a reduced tyrant by the play's end. Macbeth's divided soul which is in turmoil is the cause of his deterioration from a respected warrior to a despised tyrant.

Brutus from Julius Caesar and Macbeth, the protagonist from the play Macbeth by Shakespeare, are both Tragic Heros that died tragic deaths, having fallen from great heights, and having made irreversible mistakes, which made them that have significant outcomes to both of their lives, with both leading into consequences. This is shown for both of the Tragic Heroes throughout their story.

In tragedies, characters often serve to act as instruments of the suffering of others. This is particularly true in the play Macbeth, in which the main character’s actions lead to the subsequent distress and woe of other characters. In the play, the main character, Macbeth, directly contributes to the anguish of other characters, succumbing to his own bloodthirstiness as he ruthlessly removes threats to his desired power. Macbeth brings great suffering upon others, and the subsequent violence and carnage adds to the distress and tragedy of the play as a whole; the tragic vision of the play is consequently exemplified.

The qualities a tragic hero, in Shakespeare's plays, normally displays consists of the hero falling from a place of glory, or rank, or happiness. We are astounded by the extent to which they fall, or allow themselves to stoop. The resulting catastrophe from the hero's mistake is of monumental proportions. With the discussed play Julius Caesar, Cassius exhibits Jealousy, Rashness, and Impulsive behaviour. Cassius makes mistakes, each with a disastrous effect.

One may claim that mistakes are caused by faults in the stars, but this is untrue. Faults are caused by the choices and actions taken by an individual, and only those decisions can be blamed for unavoidable blunders and tragedies. This idea is analyzed in William Shakespeare’s eminent play, Julius Caesar. Readers interpret the decisions taken by close friends among rivals to extract power from a person who could have been an extremely dangerous leader. In this play, Julius Caesar was an authority figure venerated by others, but was murdered by enemies as well as dear ones because of the tyranny that could have led from his power. The slaying of Caesar, which was meant to prevent chaos before it ensued, led to immense destruction, in which a singular man lasted as the tragic hero - Marcus Brutus. Brutus made a choice to kill Caesar in order to save the people of Rome, who he loved dearly, from corruption and abuse of power. Marcus Brutus was the tragic hero in the drama “Julius Caesar” because of the honorable attempts made at protecting Rome. However, his errors in judgment from his choices caused him to experience affliction and inevitably led to his downfall.

The play Julius Caesar, by William Shakespeare, entails the rise and fall of Julius Caesar and Brutus, the man plotting against him. At the opening of the play Julius is being celebrated for his victory over Pompey. Later, he is offered kingship; but Caesar refuses the crown. On the ides of March Brutus and some other men come before Caesar to plead a case; except, their only motive is to kill Caesar. Antony, Caesar’s right hand man, pretends to side with the conspirators after Caesar is killed, while he gathers an army to defeat Brutus. Antony and Octavius’ army defeats Brutus’ troops; forcing Brutus and many others to commit suicide. The tragic character, Brutus, is usually the protagonist that has a tragic flaw and this causes his defeat. A tragic flaw is the cause of their downfall, usually an action or belief. Brutus’ tragic flaws are his nobility, trust and the inability to wrong people. Brutus is the tragic character in Julius Caesar because of his nobility and because he does all his deeds for the good of Rome.

William Shakespeare is the world’s pre-eminent dramatist whose plays range from tragedies to tragic comedies, etc. His general style of writing is often comparable to several of his contemporaries, like Romeo and Juliet is based on Arthur Brooke’s narrative poem, “The tragical history of Romeo and Juliet”. But Shakespeare’s works express a different range of human experience where his characters command the sympathy of audiences and also are complex as well as human in nature. Shakespeare makes the protagonist’s character development central to the plot.

There is no denying that Shakespeare is a definitive playwright. He has presented us with classic works that have set the precedent for drama and the theatre. Among Shakespeare’s more notable plays are his tragedies. In the tragedy his protagonists are often given flaws in their character and hence, are suitably named tragic heroes. The downfall of these protagonists is often a result of their own character flaws and unfortunately, they suffer a doomed and unhappy ending. While the tragic hero is flawed they must also be honorable and worthy of the audience’s understanding and sympathy. On a quest for righteousness the tragic hero often goes through immense suffering which is why the audience can feel bad for him. For the most

The play “Macbeth” is a tragedy, because of Macbeth; the hero aspect in the play is brought to ruin. Although he is not an idealistic hero, he’s the main character and suffers great loss, even death; the witches had caused him to bring it upon himself, by misleading his blind ambition.

Most readers are aware of the many famous deaths or acts of death within the Shakespearean plays. And when the main characters die in Shakespeare’s plays, indeed, the readers would categorize the play as a tragedy. The problem with any tragedy definition is that most tragic plays do not define the tragedy conditions explained or outlined by Aristotle. According to Telford (1961), a tragedy is a literary

‘Othello’ was written between 1601 and 1603. It was first performed in the Elizabethan courts during the Christmas season. The idea of a ‘perfect’ tragedy is the idea that the tragedy is faultless; it does what is expected; so makes the audience feel empathy and sympathy for the characters who suffer. There are two different types of tragedy: classical tragedy and Shakespearean tragedy. The tragic hero in this play is the main character, Othello. Othello's misfortune comes about because of his jealousy, trust, and his pride. This essay aims to look at, and compare, how Shakespeare wrote his tragedy, and how other tragedies are written. I will mainly compare ‘Othello’, for Shakespearean tragedy, and ‘Oedipus Rex’, by Sophocles, for