Speech Analysis Essay

Brandon Ruff

In the play Julius Caesar, by William Shakespeare, there are many important speeches
that affect the outcome of the plot. One of these speeches is Mark Antonys funeral speech, at
Caesars funeral. The speech affected all of Acts IV and V, and the war between Brutus army
and Antonys would have never occurred if not for this speech.
According to the speech Antony gave, a large theme of it is Brutus thinking Caesar was
unhonourable and in fact, ambitious. Brutus thought he was doing well for Rome by killing
Caesar since he wouldve been powerful and since Caesar was ambitious. But, Antony
manipulated the crowd into thinking Caesar was a good person to the people. Another big theme
in the speech are the words citizen and wrong. Citizen is used in the play to describe how Antony
stated how Caesar treated the citizens. Caesar treated them moderately and he was an adored
leader by many. Citizen is also used a lot to describe how people in Rome loved Caesar as
Caesar loved them. The word wrong is used to describe the actions of the conspirators. They
killed a popular leader of Rome and one of the most powerful people in the world during that
period of time. That wouldnt have gone well for them, and it did not as a war began against
Brutus and Cassius versus Antony and Octavius, Caesars nephew. Names are used a lot during
the course of this speech. They are most likely describing the characters and their actions or
emotions during the course of the speech in Antonys perspective. The minor words which are
adjectives and nouns are used to describe these characters. For example, the word bloody is used
to describe Brutus because he was a major conspirator who was a big part in the killing of
Caesar. Traitor is another minor word which is used a fair bit in this speech. The conspirators

were traitors to Caesar, people he mostly could trust, with the exception of Cassius. Brutus was
the biggest traitor among the conspirators because he was the person the Caesar trusted the most.
A real friend to Caesar who backstabbed him for the good of Rome. A person who did bad things
for good reasons. Lastly, the numbers one to four are used quite a great amount in the speech.
This was because at least four plebians, or peasants, were witnessing Mark Antonys oration
during Caesars funeral. The four plebians were also influenced by Antony that the conspirators
were malicious people, and by the time the speech ended, the peasants wanted to burn houses,
murder, and start chaos. The speech delivered by Mark Antony is one of the most important in
the entire play. It is a speech that influenced the events that happen for the remainder of the play.
It also is a speech that described why the conspirators are bad people and how they are bad
people.