In William Shakespeare’s play Julius Caesar, Mark Antony is recognized for his early life and allegiance with Caesar. His character was crucial in this story since he was elected a tribune and was a passionate advocate of Caesar. Throughout the play, Caesar trusted Mark Antony and treated him as a friend. Even though Mark Antony was seen as noble, he was not without defects. Mark Antony exhibited manipulative, clever, and loyal characteristics. Mark Antony manipulated the conspirators in ways that would help him achieve his goals in the end. Antony sent Lepidus, who was a good friend of Caesar when he was alive, to obtain Caesar's will so he could reduce some of the benefits. Lepidus joined forces with Antony to avenge Caesar's death. Antony used Lepidus in battle only to assume his power he held for himself. Speaking to Octavius, Antony says “he is a scrawny worthless man, fit only for running our errands. Is it appropriate that we divide the roman world in thirds?” (Shakespear,59) Letting Lepidus believe he will be …show more content…
“Will you be patient? Will you stay awhile? I have o’ershot myself to tell you of it. I fear I wrong the honorable man whose daggers have stabbed. I do fear it.” (Shakespeare, 51) By making the conspirators think he is on their side Antony was able to fulfill his plan by speaking at Caesar's funeral. He turned the Romans against the conspirators for killing Caesar without them expecting it. Antony was able to persuade the Romans to side with him on Caesar's death by his smooth words. “He was my friend, faithful and just to me. But Brutus says he is an honorable man… when that the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept… yet Brutus says he was ambitious, and Brutus is an honorable man...” (Shakespeare, 49) by repeating that Brutus is an honorable man, made the Romans start to question and disagree with his
In the play, Mark Antony is seen attending the great Julius Caesar’s funeral along with the Romans. After finding out the conspirators murdered his noble friend, Julius Caesar, he attempts to sway the crowd without the conspirators noticing. In The Tragedy of Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare, Shakespeare uses logos, pathos, and irony to persuade the Romans to acknowledge that Caesar was honorable. Firstly, Shakespeare relies upon logos in order to persuade the Romans that Caesar was honorable.
Julius Caesar was a powerful general and politician of Rome. He had many friends and many enemies as well. One of his closest friends goes by the name of Marc Antony who was not only the lover of Cleopatra, but another Roman general that worked under Caesar. As history states, Brutus, a senator of Rome, was frightened that Caesar would become too powerful and become King of Rome. In order to prevent this from happening, 60 conspirators, all led by Brutus, stabbed Caesar to death.
By asking this rhetorical question after instances of Caesar’s good doings for Rome, Antony perpetuates the idea that Caesar was not ambitious and his murder was unjust. By the end of his reasoning, Antony has supplied his audience with multiple counts of Caesar’s benevolence and ensured their agreement. This agreement is strengthened by Antony’s emotional appeals; he creates these through his utilization of both imagery and a visual aid. In utilizing imagery, Antony discusses the conspirators’ relationships with Caesar and notes that Brutus, their leader, was “Caesar’s angel” (Shakespeare). In mentioning this, Antony creates a visual of pureness and good in association to Brutus and then overturns it by discussing how Brutus brutally murdered Caesar, his closest friend.
The motivation behind Antony’s actions was completely selfish as he wanted to defend and avenge Caesar, gain power by giving himself credibility as Caesar’s right hand man, and unleash utter chaos in Rome by invoking civil war. Antony’s speech was able to completely reverse the effects that Brutus’ speech had simply because people care more about what agitates their emotions, rather than what logically makes more sense to
Marissa Gill Mr. McNulty G4 Mark Antony used numerous rhetorical strategies to take control of the Plebeian crowd’s minds and lead them into a furious frenzy. In the book Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare, Mark Antony attempted to undo the idea of an ambitious Caesar that was painted in their heads by Brutus in his previous speech. Mark Antony did this in his own speech to persuade the crowd that Caesar shouldn't have been murdered and that Brutus was deceiving them for his own gain. Antony used pathos, metaphors, and repetition to prove that Caesar was a good man who loved his people, held himself to the same standards as them, and implied that the men who killed him were not honorable.
Mark Antony proved that he was a supportive and loyal friend to Caesar. Mark Antony showed courage talking in favor of Caesar when everyone was against him due to Brutus saying how ambitious Caesar was. The thing that persuaded people to believe in what Mark Antony said was the facts to back up what he was saying because he had evidence of what he was saying and Brutus only spoke by his own opinions and feelings. Mark Antony is a great example of a well-informed person due to all the reasons he gave in his speech in order to defend
This shows Antony's loyalty as he says he loves and is faithful to Caesar. Although he teams with Brutus in the assassination of Caesar he says he would love Caesar even more when Brutus explains why Caesar had to be killed and defeated. Shakespeare also displays Antony as a skilled politician. In Act II it is stated that they would “send Mark
Antony’s manipulative mindset allows him to easily play mind games with the conspirators and emotionally manipulate plebeians to fall right into his traps. His manipulative mindset gives Antony a substantial upper hand against the conspirators. When encountering the conspirators with bloody hands near Caesar's dead body and listening to Brutus's explanation of why they had killed Caesar, Antony states that “[He] doubt[s] not of [the conspirators] wisdom. Let each man render [him] [their] bloody hand.” (III.i.183-184).
Antony uses rhetorical appeals and techniques in his speech to turn the people of Rome against those conspiring against Caesar. As a result, the people see Antony as a persuasive and strong leader of Rome. Antony opens his speech at Caesar’s funeral by using ethos to present himself as a credible source and a friend of Caesar. Antony states his purpose in the beginning of his speech by starting with “I come to bury
By refusing to read the will several times and admitting that what it contains will cause the people to have such a great love for Caesar that knowing he is now dead will be unbearable, Antony ignites curiosity in the people and furthermore, a subconscious feeling of respect and graciousness toward Caesar. Basically, Antony uses Caesar’s will to convince the people that Caesar was a selfless, kind-hearted man and those who killed him should be ashamed and punished for killing an innocent man. Through Antony’s use of paralipsis, he is able to plant a seed of admiration for Caesar and one of hate for the conspirators in the hearts of the plebeians. In his speech to the citizens, Antony also asks many rhetorical questions to cause his audience to pause and reflect on how they really feel, or how Antony wants them to feel, about certain people and events that have recently become important. In one instance.
Antony was able to deceive Brutus, making him think he was going to give a speech about Caesar’s achievements (125). Instead, he used his speech to turn the Romans against the conspirators by talking about Caesar's great achievements and goodwill. Antony was able to come up with the plan to sway the Romans because of his high intelligence. He had the brains to gain Brutus trust and use it to his advantage. Antony was victorious in the war because of his ability to strategize well (215).
Antony uses this strategy to persuade the people to go against the conspirators, but needs a strong attention grabber that lets everybody with different tiers of wealth within Rome to be interested in what Marc Antony must say. This act of parallelism that grabs the audience’s attention lets the speech fluently flow into the next part that focuses more on how it was wrong to kill such a brave and selfless leader of
However, Brutus was honorable in a way because he let Marc Antony speak
Mark Antony was a great friend and trusted general to Caesar, and he had a key role in Caesar's rise to power. Antony had been against the conspirators that had assassinated Caesar. After the assassination he had become a key figure in the struggle for power aligning himself with Octavius. He, Octavius, and Lepidu had eventually formed the Second Triumvirate, which had led Rome during the aftermath of the assassination until Octavius had become emperor. Like Caesar, Antony was a skilled orator and general which had earned the admiration of many Romans.
Anthony is most loyal to you, Caesar, but is also very loyal to himself. He, like a good number of other politicians, also formed temporary ‘loyalties’ with Octavius and Lepidus. However, these bonds were only temporary and Antony only aimed to benefit from them. Antony treated Octavius like a businessman would treat his colleague; maintaining an arms-length partnership. Antony looked down on Lepidus, though.