I don't really feel up to posting the topic sentences or anything like that, I could post a rough rough draft, but I want to keep this short for now.
How many people here have heard of or even read some works of John Milton? Most that have are likely familiar with Paradise Lost. Moving beyond that, and possibly ignoring it completely, much and many of his works have involved the overthrow of tyrants, or basically giving justification for kicking out inept leaders. There are three particular works/letters that I was reading for another class, but I want to bring focus to Samson Agonistes. We don't as much see the overthrow of a leader as much as we see one simply fail.
To put everything into context, Milton was born near the end of Shakespeare's life. Milton, though, lived much of his life in a tumultuous time that included the downfall of an English King, the rise of a commonwealth, and the fall of the commonwealth. In short, much of his life and works were focused on the fall of kings.
Julius Caesar was a king, of sorts. The name Caesar was turned into a title after his death.
Quick interruption- I have been reading about Roman Emperors for the past hour and a half now.
Anyway, on the one hand we have Caesar, a king figure who was assassinated and lamented by some powerful main characters (in the play obviously since I use the word character). Milton, on the other hand, if living in Caesar's time, would be the very person supporting the actions of Brutus.
Enough of my ramblings, I have to rethink how to write my paper now.
That's pretty interesting your connection with Milton. Are you thinking about writing about that or were you just musing about it?
ReplyDeleteWell, I actually think that your point about Shakespeare writing to support Monarchy is kind of debatable. In the play, while the rest of Caesar's assassins are power-hungry Brutus becomes a hero because he was trying to protect the Republic, and this sort of villainizes Octavian and Antony. The monarchy itself in Shakespeare's day was kind of unstable(that's what I'm writing my paper on), so maybe Shakespeare was trying to show both sides of the issue? Or maybe it he was trying to say that good government has more to do with virtue than the rights of kings (I'm trying to argue the same thing about legitimacy)? Food for thought.
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