

Examine how superstitious beliefs and omens affect the actions of the conspirators.Analyze the rhetoric found in Mark Antony’s speech in Act III, scene ii.Discuss the ways in which characters use language to manipulate or deceive others.Define tragic hero and explore to what extent Brutus can be considered one.

Potential Student Struggles With Julius Caesar The exciting historical context in which the play is set.What Your Students Will Love About Julius Caesar His friends Brutus and Cassius believe Caesar’s rise to power may not be in Rome’s best interests, and they conspire to overthrow him and have Brutus reign instead.Įventually, the conspirators succeed with their plot to assassinate Caesar, but in the end, neither Brutus nor Cassius ends up in power. Julius Caesar has just returned to Rome after defeating the sons of Pompey in a battle to rule the empire. Length: 96 pages ( Literary Touchstone Classics edition).Publication Date: 2005 ( Literary Touchstone Classics edition).Each book is a value-priced, high-quality trade paperback, which you will receive for at least 50% off retail. Our Literary Touchstone Classics are unabridged, complete texts, and come with unbelievable prices. Keep reading to learn more about the tragedy of Julius Caesar. You can also have your students perform the speech in class for further immersion. For a closer reading of this scene, have your students identify key instances where Mark Antony uses rhetorical devices, including parallelism and repetition, to sway the crowd’s opinion of Caesar’s assailants. Following Brutus’ address explaining his patriotic reasoning for killing Caesar, Mark Antony speaks to the crowd, inciting a riot. Decius’s persuasive words encourage Caesar to visit the Senate, where he is ultimately killed.Īside from its memorable characters and plot, Julius Caesar contains one of the most famous pieces of rhetoric Shakespeare ever devised: the speech Mark Antony delivers to the citizens of Rome after Caesar’s assassination. While Calpurnia believes her dream is a warning, the conspirator Decius convinces Caesar that it really signifies he will be a successful ruler. For instance, not everyone reacts the same to Calpurnia’s bloody dream in Act II, scene ii. Examining the seemingly supernatural elements found throughout the play can help your students thoroughly analyze each character’s actions and motivations. Providing background information on this era may help students better understand the appeal of this play to an Elizabethan audience.įrom the soothsayer’s iconic warning, “Beware the ides of March,” to the strange phenomena witnessed around Rome before Caesar’s death, omens and superstition play a large role in Julius Caesar. Like Julius Caesar, the elderly Queen Elizabeth had yet to name a successor, leaving many English citizens concerned about what might happen upon her death. ( Avatar may have been a gamechanging film for 3D, but “unobtainium”? Really?!?) We’re confident, however, that there’s a place in the canon for these relative latecomers.Based on true events in Roman history, William Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar is a play that highlights the conflicting demands of honor, patriotism, and friendship.Īt the time of the play’s first performance (approximately 1599 CE), England was experiencing much of same political uncertainty faced by the Romans centuries before. Some noteworthy favorites of ours just barely missed the cut (very sorry, Alex Rivera’s Sleep Dealer) or some major titles were dinged on quality-control issues. We’ve now expanded our list to 40 titles, to better highlight the best and brightest SF films of our still-new–ish millennium.

More than a few major science-fiction flicks, however – from franchise-expanding blockbusters to arthouse headscratchers – have dropped since then, so it was time for an overhaul and an update. In 2014, we concocted a list of the Best Sci-Fi Movies of the 21st Century - a quick and dirty survey of the best the genre has had to offer since the millennium’s beginning. Great sci-fi movies didn’t decide to party like it’s 1999 then call it a day a host of thrilling, intelligent, offbeat, funny and frightening SF films have hit art houses and multiplexes since Y2K. But let’s face it – those answers are so last century. Ask any science-fiction movie fanatic what their go-to films are, and you’ll get a lot of great answers back: Metropolis, Blade Runner, 2001, The Day the Earth Stood Still, the original Godzilla, The Thing etc.
