The Oxford Dictionary of Plays

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Julius Caesar

Julius Caesar (The Tragedie of Julius Caesar)

Author: William Shakespeare

First Performance: 1599, London

Published: 1623

Genre: Trag. in 5 acts; blank verse and prose

Setting: Rome, Sardis, and near Philippi, 45–42 BC

Cast: 33m, 2f, extras

Flushed with his success in the foreign wars, Caesar returns to Rome, cheered by the crowds and virtually assuming the role of dictator. A group of idealistic conspirators, led by Cassius and Brutus, Caesar's friend, decide that Caesar must be assassinated. Despite warnings from a soothsayer and his wife, Caesar goes to the Senate, where he is stabbed to death. Mark Antony persuades the conspirators to let him give Caesar's funeral oration and succeeds in turning the mob against Cassius and Brutus. Caesar's nephew Octavius returns to Rome and forms a triumvirate with...

[The entire page is 338 words long]

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