Marc Antony's Funeral Speech Rhetorical Analysis Essay

Rhetorical Analysis: Marc Antony’s Funeral Speech in The Tragedy of Julius Caesar William Shakespeare, the author of The Tragedy of Julius Caesar, had exceptional use of rhetoric when composing Marc Antony’s funeral speech for Julius Caesar. Ethos, pathos, and logos are the three main components of rhetoric, and were all portrayed to us within Antony’s speech. Shakespeare allowed Antony to pour intense emotion into this thoughtful speech, and it clearly resulted in great success. The main purpose or point of said speech was to persuade Antony’s audience to go against the conspirators and inform the Roman’s about Caesar’s tragic death. We can now see that Antony succeeded in his role while still staying faithful to Brutus’ request of shading the truth from those in the audience. Antony is evidently a selfless friend to Caesar while he uses positive rhetoric to fully persuade his audience to recognize the importance of this situation.

He establishes his authority by referring to his personal relations with Caesar and also his position within the group of conspirators. He begins his speech by saying “I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.” This shows that Antony didn’t feel the need to place him on a pedestal, as many Roman’s often did, but that he wasn’t trying to reiterate false doctrine. Antony’s strategic words allowed him to undermine the credibility of his opponents by consistently repeating the phrase “Brutus is an honorable man” which appealed to the audience’s emotions. Overall, this thoughtful use of ethos is an important factor in Antony’ success in persuading the citizens to his side and against the