Julius Caesar
William Shakespeare (1599)
“The man who stabbed Caesar for the sake of Rome became the instrument of everything he feared — and his friend's funeral speech destroyed him in twelve minutes.”
Character Analysis
The most principled man in the play and the most consequentially wrong. His tragedy is not that he is bad but that honor, sincerity, and philosophical seriousness are insufficient protection against intelligent manipulation. He is the ideal person to have at your dinner table and the worst possible person to lead a political conspiracy. He means every word he says, and his words are always the ones that get people killed.
Philosophical verse in soliloquy — long, subordinate-clause-heavy, self-interrogating. Clear, almost legalistic prose in public address. No rhetorical ornament.