Hello everyone, this year at school,one of the plays my class studied in class was Julius Caesar.
I found exam questions that asked "how does superstition,fate vs freewill,etc... increase the dramatic action in the play? "quite difficult to answer. Sometimes it seems that there isn't much to talk about in one whole essay
I am not asking for an essay or anything
Can anyone shed some light or share their opinions?
I think you should discuss the different elements of the play like the plot, characters, setting, etc. You can't write an essay on just the drama. All these elements are part of it. My class is actually reading this book and we got the same question to write an essay on. Something you can put in your essay is that people in the play that were not superstitious before later become this way, like Calpurnia, Caesar's wife. The weather makes the play more dramatic because it is dark and there is thunder and lightening. The weather is perfect for what the conspirators are plotting. The fate vs. free will theme is of course dramatic because it leads to Caesar's murder. If he had heeded the warnings that were being given to him, he might have lived. I believe it was free will on Caesar's part.
Well, this might be too late to help, but maybe it will spark a bit of discussion anyway. It seems to me that Brutus, Caesar and Cassius all face omens, portents and prophecies that cause each of them at some point to examine the justness of their cause or the probability of their success. Cassius famously rejects the idea of fate in act one when he states that "men at some time are masters of their fates. The fault, dear Brutus, lies not in our stars but in ourselves that we are underlings." This immediately creates a great deal of dramatic tension regarding the conspiracy. It is no longer simply a question of whether Cassius will succeed or fail in killing Caesar. Now, the audience also questions whether or not Cassius will succeed in "mastering his fate." Does he truly have free will? Is he doomed to fail before he even begins his plot? Or will he succeed only because fate wills it? The tension only becomes more intense and complex as more characters consider their fates and ponder other omens and portents.
Although Cassius appears to reject the idea of fate, the omens at first seem to favor him. Caesar is told to beware the Ides of March, and a foreboding storm rages in Rome. Caesar, seems to reject the idea that a soothsayer can know his fate and that such a violent storm could foretell his death, but the audience is led to seriously question his assessment. The audience therefore worries that Caesar is showing arrogance in renouncing these omens and fears that his death is immanent. This prophecy creates a heightened sense of anxiety, urgency and even fatalism that would otherwise be absent from the play. In many ways, this is highly ironic, as the Cassius, who is so scornful of destiny, seems to be acting an instrument of fate. Very dramatic, I think!
Near the end of the play, after the prophecy of the Ides of March has been fulfilled, Cassius begins to question his previous beliefs. He sees portents of doom everywhere, and rejects the teachings of Epicurus. Shakespeare, however, is not ready to resolve the questions he has raised regarding fate, so he poses another question to the audience through the words of Brutus. Brutus states that “there is a tide in the affairs of men, which taken at the flood leads on to victory.” This infuses the upcoming battle with an enormous amount of dramatic tension: it can be viewed as a final test of free will and fate.
Now, I have a question of my own. It would seem that because all of these prophecies and omens throughout the play prove to be reliable predictors of the future, that Shakespeare is advocating the position that free will is an illusion. I wonder, however, if the concept of a self fulfilling prophecy can apply here. For example, Brutus hears the soothsayer warn Caesar about the Ides of March. Later, he asks his servant the date and discovers that it is indeed March 15th. This appears to comfort him. I wonder if it had been March 10th, if Brutus would have decided to wait. Similarly, would Cassius have killed himself if he had not become so superstitious? Brutus had just defeated Octavian, and there was still hope of victory. Perhaps Cassius jumped to the wrong conclusion because he had become superstitious. Therefore, I wonder, is fate truly deterministic in Julius Caesar?
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