Julius Caesar II: Beware the Ides of March

    In the second half of the Shakespeare play Julius Caesar, Brutus has already aided in Caesar’s death. Now what? Soon after Marc Anthony’s speech, Brutus is working in a tent by candlelight, and sees his old friend Caesar in the flames.

Underworld Journey (Freytag's Triangle)

     Brutus went through the underworld journey and didn’t get to a better end game. But Brutus was a good guy. That’s what he was known for in Rome. How do others avoid Brutus’ path? Brutus didn’t complete a “character arc.” Most characters fit into one of three archetypes: the fool, the trickster, or the savior. Brutus was always a fool. He never grew enough within the confines of the story. A fool is what everyone is in the beginning. Teenagers and young adults can be very intelligent, but to some extent we’re all little idiots, until we learn more from life’s obstacles.

    Brutus was a good fool. Even a fool bears a conscience. Brutus was seeking what was right and what was true. However, he didn’t know how to do it, so he followed Cassius’ lead, and Cassius was not seeking truth. He was just being political, whereas Brutus was trying to be moral. Guilt is a very human way to learn. Being the fool is not having enough experience and knowledge to aim right the first time you try aiming for the truth. Brutus’ guilt is the learning process of re-calculating your aim. However, you have to re-calculate and adjust all the way through life. Brutus felt guilty, and never re-calculated, so in the end, he never got to a better end game.

    What Brutus did was get stuck in the learning process. In this dialogue, there is no good example of a character who was a fool and did not remain one. There is no savior type in the play. Bilbo Baggins from The Hobbit is, however, a great example. Prior to the story, he stayed in his hobbit hole never knowing anything, but by the time he got back to his hobbit hole he was far better off and a more intellectual person for his ability to adapt and willingness to learn on his adventures. “There and back again,” Bilbo went there, and came back again. There is the learning process (the climax of the story) but Brutus never “came back” again.

     Alongside the character types of the fool, trickster, and savior, the masculine and feminine archetypes are also heavily in play. The positive masculine includes tradition, safety, and order. The negative masculine includes tyranny, stagnation, and willful blindness. Part of why Brutus is such a fool is that he exhibits traits from both sides. He never knows enough to correct his “negative” traits. Julius Caesar almost exclusively exhibits the negative masculine, which is why it was so easy to rationalize his murder. Caesar was never stagnated in his actions. However, there is no denying that in both the historical and the fictional adaptation of Julius Caesar, he was a tyrant. Despite being warned of the ides of March, and his wife asking him not to go out that day, Caesar was willfully blind every time he was given an inconvenient obstacle, which ultimately got him killed.

     Brutus did everything he did to keep the republic. He wanted to find safety in order and tradition, which is all positive. However, as naive as he was, he was willfully blind to the reality around him. He wanted order. He wanted old traditions, and he was going to reach for any solution that came to him.

Portia (Brutus' Wife)

     Along with the masculine archetype, there is the feminine archetype. There were only two female characters in this particular play, and they had minor roles, but they were certainly significant. Brutus and Caesar both had smart wives, who embodied the positive feminine: Creation, rejuvenation, and to treasure life. Women also are often more neurotic and anxious. They are more cautious creatures. Julius Caesar's wife, Calpurnia, told Caesar to listen, begged him to “beware the ides of March,” but Julius was blind and was quickly killed. Brutus’ wife, Portia, pleaded with him to talk to her, but Brutus never confided in his wife. He was too busy being the fool to stop and speak with his wife about his plan to aid in the murder of his best friend.

Calpurnia (Caesar's Wife)

     In most old stories and in plenty of classics, by the end, the guy gets the treasure; the guy gets the girl. In this story both men already had the treasure, but by failing to make some course correction, and listen to the ladies, they both lost the treasure. Caesar left his wife a widow by not heading her, and Brutus’ wife tragically died in the uproar caused by Marc Anthony’s speech. In order to not stay the fool, in order to steer clear from Brutus’ path, take criticism from others, especially your wives, and when you feel guilt over something, stop validating your actions and learn from them.