Admiring Antony

“Pardon me Julius! Here was thou bay’d, brave hart; Here dist thou fall; and here thy hunters stand”.

In William Shakespeare’s, Julius Caesar, Mark Antony is portrayed as a loyal and worshipping friend of the mighty Caesar. When Caesar is in power, Antony is his follower, a man who highly respects him and looks up on him in loving admiration. However, because his loyalty is all towards Caesar and no one else, he unintentionally overshadows and loses his ability to make a critical assessment of the environment around him. That is why when Caesar is assassinated, Antony feels, as showed in the passage above, that he is guilty, like he let Caesar down in the last minutes of his life. In this play, Mark Antony undergoes a progressive change in his morality. His conflict is his endless admiration and loyalty towards Julius Caesar, the realization that he could not protect Caesar and that he thinks that he has failed him. Through experiencing the trauma of Julius Caesar’s death and choosing the path of revenge, he can liberate himself and become a leader from the follower he was before.

Mark Antony’s journey is about experiencing impact of loyalty and admiration toward Caesar and what that can do to himself, as a person. Mark Antony never actually made a choice to act loyal but it is driven by his passion and appreciation towards Caesar that makes him the character that he is. He IS a loyal and moral person. However, because he loved and appreciated Caesar so much and concentrated all the apprecitaion on him, it took away his ability to find out what was going on in the background, what plan was slowly forming in the conspirators minds. In one part of the play Caesar orders Antony to put ”men about me that are fat…Cassius has a lean and hungry look , He thinks too much: such men are dangerous.” Because Antony is rather worshiping him and not thinking outside the box, he just replies ”Fear him not, Caesar, he’s not dangerous. He is a noble Roman, and well given.”

So, after Caesars sudden assassination he realizes that he should have been more aware and apologizes, feeling guilty for leaving his idol in the hands of these murderers. “O pardon me thou bleeding piece of earth, that I am meek and gentle with these butchers! Thou art the ruins of the most noblest man that ever lived in the tide of times.” This passage shows how highly Antony respected Caesar and how he looked upon him as a king, a God. He was truly loyal and kind towards him, presenting him with the crown three times, and never leaving his side, giving his opinion to help Caesar. He loved Caesar so much that when he comes in after the assassination, and sees Caesar dead at the base of Pompey’s statue, he even wants the conspirators to take is life as well, “I shall find myself so apt to die. No place will please me so, no men of death as here by Caesar”. Loyalty like that of Antony, is what a person should have towards someone important in their life. He is so shocked and sad when he sees Caesar dead, an event that is so unexpected. This also shows that Antony was a follower, someone who would do anything for the leader, with their leader. He was a reactive yet moral person. But such high loyalty is also what changed and motivated him to seek revenge against the cruel conspirators, for the horrible deed that they have done.

Mark Antony loved Caesar with all his heart, and after the tragic death of his leader Antony will not only seek revenge against the conspirators, but will also change from being a reactive person, to a proactive person. Antony feels as if he has failed Julius Caesar not only because he was not aware about the conspiracy that was slowly forming but also because he wasn’t there to protect Caesar or be with him in the last moments of his life. And because he feels so guilty, he decides to kill the conspirators for Caesar. He wants to protect the legacy of Julius Caesar. So he takes action. When he is alone in the Senate house with Caesars corpse he cries: “Woe to the hands that shed this costly blood. Over they wounds do I prophesy…a curse shall light upon the limbs of men.” In this passage Antony not only decides to take revenge but also foreshadows Civil war, destruction and blood. Since Caesar is now fallen, Rome will be chaos. Antony’s goal is not to have a war but he also wouldn’t mind if it would turn into a civil war. All he wants is the conspirators dead. However, as predicted, civil war does break out and Antony and Octavius are fighting against Cassius and Brutus. Antony thinks that “Caesars spirit will range for revenge, with Ate by his side com hot from hell, shall in the confines with a monarch’s voice cry havoc and let slip the dogs of war.” In this passage Antony believes that Caesar will be in his heart and will want revenge against the conspirators. He will help and be a leader in war. Antony’s motivation was loyalty to Caesar, didn’t matter if he was dead or alive. Antony predicted war, took action and eventually won the civil war, and made Brutus and Cassius, the leaders of the conspiracy, take their own lives. All of this proves that Antony has transformed from being a follower into being a leader, a progressive change. Only when Caesar was murderer, did Antony who used to be reactive, become proactive. The death enabled him to become a different person and for once take charge and take revenge.

During the play, Mark Antony was motivated by loyalty and revenge thriving him to become a better person. His main conflict was experiencing the feeling of having let Caesar down and by taking action and changing his character, but still being moral, Antony has basically overcome his conflict. He was always a loyal supporter to Julius Caesar, which is one of the main reasons why he later wanted revenge. That was the only way a person with so much loyalty could express his goal. I think that Antony has achieved his goal. Even if he went and killed a lot of Romans who were against Caesar, he still stayed a loyal supporter to Caesar. He felt guilty and bad for having let Caesar down and I think that only way to project that is by doing what one feels is the right thing to do.