Julius Caesar (Oxford Shakespeare) - Softcover

Shakespeare, William

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0192814451 ISBN 13: 9780192814456

Publisher: Oxford Paperbacks, 1984

Synopsis

Julius Caesar 's exciting plot, brilliant rhetoric, and searching characterisation have made it one of Shakespeare's most popular plays with both readers and theatre-goers. Introducing this thoroughly reconsidered edition, Arthur Humphreys provides a fresh look at the play's date and its place in the Shakespeare canon and examines Shakespeare's transmutation of history into drama. He investigates the play's ethical and moral concerns in a section on Roman values and analyses its fortunes in performance, from its immediately successful first staging to modern productions for cinema, television, and stage. This book is intended for students from A-level up to postgraduate of English literature, Shakespeare, Elizabethan drama, drama and politics; playgoers, actors, directors.

About this title

Review:

One of Shakespeare's most political plays, Julius Caesar continued Shakespeare's interest in Roman history, first developed in Titus Andronicus. Drawing on Plutarch, the great historian of Rome, Shakespeare dramatises one of the most crucial moments in Roman history--the assassination of Julius Caesar. Loved by the Roman crowd but increasingly feared by the Senators, Caesar increasingly shows signs of his desire to abolish the Republic and crown himself emperor. A conspiracy is hatched, led by Cassius and Brutus, who murder Caesar on the steps of the Capitol. Mourning over his dead friend's body, Mark Antony gives one of the famous rhetorical speeches in literature, asking "Friends, Romans, Countrymen" to lament Caesar's death, privately vowing to "let slip the dogs of war" against those who have shed Caesar's blood. Antony joins forces with Caesar's son Octavius to defeat Cassius and Brutus in battle, and establish an uneasy alliance whose collapse is dramatised in Shakespeare's later play Antony and Cleopatra. Written at the end of Queen Elizabeth's reign, Julius Caesar has been seen by many as a radically pro-Republican play which sailed close to the political wind of the time. --Jerry Brotton

Review:

"Daniell's edition is a hefty piece of serious scholarship that makes a genuine contribution."--Eric Rasmussen, University of Nevada at Reno, "Shakespeare Survey" "This is a stimulating new look at a play which is too often exhibited in a critical museum."--Paul Dean, "Review of English Studies"

Daniell's edition is a hefty piece of serious scholarship that makes a genuine contribution. "Eric Rasmussen, University of Nevada at Reno, Shakespeare Survey"

This is a stimulating new look at a play which is too often exhibited in a critical museum. "Paul Dean, Review of English Studies""

Daniell's edition is a hefty piece of serious scholarship that makes a genuine contribution. Eric Rasmussen, University of Nevada at Reno, Shakespeare Survey

This is a stimulating new look at a play which is too often exhibited in a critical museum. Paul Dean, Review of English Studies

"

"Daniell's edition is a hefty piece of serious scholarship that makes a genuine contribution." --Eric Rasmussen, University of Nevada at Reno, Shakespeare Survey

"This is a stimulating new look at a play which is too often exhibited in a critical museum." --Paul Dean, Review of English Studies

About this edition

• Publisher: Oxford Paperbacks
• Publication date: 1984
• ISBN 10: 0192814451
• ISBN 13: 9780192814456
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 340