Julius Caesar Essay: The Conspirator Brutus

Argument In William Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, the conspirator Brutus seems like a sympathetic character to both the readers, the other characters in the play, and even himself. But his actions throughout the play show that he is in fact arrogant, disloyal, and downright dishonorable, despite the fact that he is called the “noblest” of the conspirators, or even any roman (5.5.68). In an article by Mildred E. Hartsock, entitled The Complexity of “Julius Caesar” she states that “Brutus, mistaken and doomed, never forfeits our sympathy, we are told. Are we, then, to admire cold-blooded murder with no clear-cut evidence for its necessity? Surely we cannot admire the cold pride of [Brutus]” (Hartsock 60). Throughout Shakespeare’s play, Brutus

Brutus betrays his leader and friend, to whom he owes his loyalty to, one the grounds of the possibility of him becoming a tyrant, viewing him as a “serpent’s egg, which, hatch’d, would as his kind grow mischievous” (2.1.32). This shows the lack of trust that he has in his “friend” and how he evidently only regards him as a possible threat. The minuscule amount of convincing that it takes to persuade Brutus to betray Julius Caesar is almost laughable, when considering that Caesar is his friend, and continues to show just how disloyal Brutus is. Just a few forged letters from Cassius and some whispered talk is all it takes. But what shows his disloyalty still more than his betrayal of Julius Caesar is his treatment of his “Beloved” wife Portia. While he is having his so-called crisis over his decision, she notices and understands that something is troubling him, and tries to comfort him (2.1.237). She repeatedly asks what is wrong, and he continues to ignore her questions and tell her nothing (2.1.257-290). Eventually to prove her strength and trustworthiness, Portia stabs herself in her leg (2.1.300). Would someone who drove their wife to self-harm to secure their attention be called an honorable or loyal spouse? Once more regarding Portia, near the end of the play, Brutus speaks of her death in an emotionless, stone-cold way (4.3.150). He also uses

A summary of what Brutus is saying here is that He is too noble to extort money from the poor, but considering that Cassius is not so noble, he should have done it for him (Bowden 57). This yet again shows to total dishonorable nature of Brutus, and just how undeserving of sympathy he is. There may be arguments made against this, saying that how can he be called dishonorable if every character in the play believes hat he is a virtuous person, and an honorable man? But the few times that this is actually said by any of the supporting characters when they are not trying to appeal to his ego is after he is dead. People almost always think of and describe a person to be better than they were after their death, due to a certain layer of guilt that is often