A Probable Italian Source of Shakespeare's "Julius Cæsar". Alexander Boecker

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       Alexander Boecker

      A Probable Italian Source of Shakespeare's "Julius Cæsar"

      Published by Good Press, 2019

       [email protected]

      EAN 4064066123727

Table of Contents

       INTRODUCTION

       THE PLOT OF “CESARE”

       Act I

       Act II

       Act III

       Act IV

       Act V

       THE INFLUENCE OF APPIAN

       THE HANDLING OF THE SUPERNATURAL ELEMENT

       THE BRUTUS-CASSIUS SCENES

       THE CHARACTER OF CAESAR

       BRUTUS

       THE OTHER CHARACTERS

       I

       II

       III

       IV

       V

       “CESARE” IN ENGLAND

       CONCLUSION

       BIBLIOGRAPHY

INTRODUCTION

       Table of Contents

      I intend in this monograph to demonstrate the probability of Shakespeare’s indebtedness in the composition of the first three acts of his “Julius Caesar,” to the “Cesare” of Orlando Pescetti, an Italian tragedy on the same theme, first published at Verona in 1594.^[1]

      This connection has never yet been demonstrated. The work seems almost totally unknown to the English literary world.^[2] Shakespearean criticism, eager to investigate the smallest matters in regard to the great poet, is silent on Pescetti. I know of no French or German^[3] references. In Italy, Pescetti has received scant notice; few writers have so much as mentioned “Cesare,” while not one has made any suggestion as to a possible connection between this play and “Julius Caesar.”^[4]

      The inscription upon the title page of the 1594 edition is as follows:

      Il Cesare

      Tragedia

      d’Orlando Pescetti

      Dedicata

      al Sereniss. Principe

      Donno Alfonso II. d’Este

      Duca di Ferrara, etc.

      (Device)

      In Verona

      Nella stamparia di Girolamo Discepolo

      MDXCIIII

      Pescetti’s work is in quarto, and consists of six pages of dedicatory matter, and one hundred and fifty pages of verse, for the most part hendecasyllabic varied with septenarians. In the tragedy proper there are nearly four thousand lines.

      The author in his dedication establishes, to his own satisfaction at least, the descent of the family of Este from the mighty Julius, and ventures the belief that Brutus and Cassius, though they could not abide Caesar’s rule, would rejoice in Alfonso’s. At the end of several pages of this sort of flattery we read: “Di Verona il dì 19 di Febraio 1594. Di V.A.S. Divotiss. et umiliss. Servitore Orlando Pescetti.”

THE PLOT OF “CESARE”

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      The following is a list of the persons in the drama, called by Pescetti, “Interlocutori.”

      Marte }

      Venere } Fanno il Prologo

      Giove }

      Bruto

      Cassio

      Sacerdote

      Porzia moglie di Bruto

      Calpurnia moglie di Cesare

      Cameriera di Calpurnia

      Cesare

      Marc’Antonio Consolo

      Decimo Bruto

      Lenate

      Messo primo

      Messo secondo

      Coro di Matrone Romane

      Coro di Donne di Corte

      Coro di Cittadini

      Coro di Soldati

      The tragedy proper is preceded by a prologue in which Mars, Venus, and Jove are the actors. Pescetti, probably following Ovid’s account in Book XV. of the “Metamorphoses,” represents Venus as bewailing the destined death of Caesar, the last of her earthly descendants. Mars extends his consolation and proffers his aid. She informs him that Jove is responsible, and indulges in a denunciation of the Thunderer that must have made his celestial ears tingle. All further discussion of the matter is terminated by the appearance of the Father of the gods, who reproves Venus for her blasphemous utterances, assures her that his ways are inscrutable, and consoles her by promising Caesar immortality among the gods, and the infliction of dire punishment upon his assassins. Venus bows to his will, and impatient Mars hurries at Jove’s command to sow the seeds of civil strife throughout the Roman world.

      This Prologue is a literary curiosity. Its style is at times more reminiscent of the madrigal than of tragedy, while the very earthly flavor which clings to the celestial personages is decidedly humorous to the modern reader. Pescetti undoubtedly was in grim earnest when he wrote the Prologue,