Brutus intends that this should show the conspirators in a good light unfortunately for Brutus and the rest, it gives Antony an opening to elaborate upon them in what will evolve into a most unflattering refrain. Antony, according to his agreement with Brutus, must acknowledge that he is speaking by permission ( under leave) of the conspirators. Here, under leave of Brutus and the rest-Īside from a trochaic inversion to begin this line, the meter is regularly iambic. Answer'd here denotes "atoned," while there is an understood "for" omitted from the clause for the sake of the meter. / - / - /Īlthough the traditional reading of grievously in context is "painfully or heavily," it's an interesting play upon meaning to read Antony's meaning as akin to "it was a criminal fault that was criminally dealt with." This illustrates a rhetorical figure of speech known as polyptoton (also known as metabole), in which the same root word is repeated for effect with different cases or inflection ( e.g., grievous and grievously). Grievous here denotes "deserving of censure or punishment" in context, but sets up a play upon the word in the line that follows. All Antony has to do is introduce that four-word qualifier, "if it were so," to form the crux of his argument to come. / - / - / - /īuilding upon the previous thought, Antony continues eroding the base upon which Brutus's argument is founded. You don't want it to come out as, "The noble Brututh hash told you." Nobody said Shakespeare doesn't take some practice. Notice how Antony subtly plugs in the language of doubt "Brutus tells you Caesar was ambitious" is a lot different than "Caesar was ambitious." By the way, ambition originally derives from the Middle English word ambicioun, which comes from French via the Latin stem ambire, meaning "to solicit for votes." Also, for the novice orator who may have to recite this, be very wary of this line. The regularity of the meter and the nine syllables leads one to believe Shakespeare's intent was that ambitious be pronounced am-BI-shee-US rather eliding the end to SHUS as we do now. The irregular meter could be a way of subtly reinforcing that shift. Although it's probably overanalyzing Shakespeare's intent, the line marks the point where Antony, satisfied that he has placated the crowd, begins the whittling away at the reasoning behind Caesar's assassination. This line is a bit of an oddity, in that it's 12 syllables and doesn't read as an alexandrine or even particularly iambic. Here, only two lines after Antony say he hasn't come to praise Caesar, he already slips in the backhanded implication that some good died with Caesar. The marked pronunciation of interréd (Middle English enteren, via French enterrer, which derives from Medieval Latin interrare meaning "within earth") is another trick to keep the meter strict in this line otherwise, he would have written it as interr'd. Oft is a common Elizabethan contraction for often Shakespeare often uses oft to avoid the extra unstressed syllable in his verse. Here is a case where the regular iambic rhythm following the more varied rhythm of the line above aids the contrast that Antony conveys. The good is oft interréd with their bones Also, while Antony is clearly referring to Caesar in the line and the one that follows, it's not hard to imagine him making a subtle innuendo here about the conspirators. Besides, the real subject of Antony's rhetorical parallelism is good and evil, not living and dying. While that isn't completely out of the realm of possibility, it's a bit of a stretch. The hardest word to scan is lives if you scan it as stressed, you have four consecutive stresses in a row, and the line scans iamb/ pyrrhic/ spondee/ spondee/ iamb. This is a line harder to scan than it might seem at first. This is a calculated tactic to disarm a crowd firmly on the side of Brutus when Antony takes the pulpit. Here's the first irony of Antony's speech, in that he is unequivocally here to praise Caesar. I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.Īntony follows with a line of straight iambic pentameter punctuated with a feminine ending. Remember also that Antony has entered the Forum with Caesar's body in tow and will use the corpse as a prop throughout his oration. Antony also echoes the opening line that Brutus uses ("Romans, countrymen, and lovers!"), but conspicuously rearranges it where Brutus begins with "Romans" to reflect his appeal to their reason, Antony begins with "friends," which reflects the more emotional tact he will take throughout the rest of his speech. The succession of hard stresses is also Shakespeare's way of using the verse to help Antony cut through the din of the crowd. "Friends, Romans, countrymen." / / - / - / - /įriends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears įrom a rhythmic perspective, the trochaic feel of this opening immediately commands attention.
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