Friends, Romans, Countrymen, Lend Me Your Ears
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

"Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears" is the first line of a speech by
Mark Antony Marcus Antonius (14 January 1 August 30 BC), commonly known in English as Mark Antony, was a Roman people, Roman politician and general who played a critical role in the Crisis of the Roman Republic, transformation of the Roman Republic ...
in the play ''Julius Caesar'', by
William Shakespeare William Shakespeare ( 23 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's nation ...
. Occurring in Act III, scene II, it is one of the most famous lines in all of Shakespeare's works.


Summary

Antony has been allowed by Brutus and the other conspirators to make a funeral
oration Public speaking, is the practice of delivering speeches to a live audience. Throughout history, public speaking has held significant cultural, religious, and political importance, emphasizing the necessity of effective rhetorical skills. It all ...
for Caesar on condition that he will not blame them for Caesar's death; however, while Antony's speech outwardly begins by justifying the actions of Brutus and the assassins, Antony uses rhetoric and genuine reminders to ultimately portray Caesar in such a positive light that the crowd is enraged against the conspirators. Throughout his speech, Antony calls the conspirators "honourable men" his implied sarcasm becoming increasingly obvious. He begins by carefully rebutting the notion that his friend, Caesar, deserved to die because he was ambitious, instead claiming that his actions were for the good of the Roman people, whom he cared for deeply ("When that the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept: / Ambition should be made of sterner stuff"). He denies that Caesar wanted to make himself king, for there were many who witnessed the latter's denying the crown three times. As Antony reflects on Caesar's death and the injustice that nobody will be blamed for it, he becomes overwhelmed with emotion and deliberately pauses ("My heart is in the coffin there with Caesar, / And I must pause till it come back to me"). As he does this, the crowd begins to turn against the conspirators. Antony then teases the crowd with Caesar's will, which they beg him to read, but he refuses. Antony tells the crowd to "have patience" and expresses his feeling that he will "wrong the honourable men / Whose daggers have stabb'd Caesar" if he is to read the will. The crowd, increasingly agitated, calls the conspirators "traitors" and demands that Antony read out the will. Instead of reading the will immediately, however, he focuses the crowd's attention on Caesar's body, pointing out his wounds and stressing the conspirators' betrayal of a man who trusted them, in particular the betrayal of Brutus ("Judge, O you gods, how dearly Caesar loved him!"). In response to the passion of the crowd, Antony denies that he is trying to agitate them ("I come not, friends, to steal away your hearts"), and he contrasts Brutus, "an orator", with himself, "a plain, blunt man", implying that Brutus has manipulated them through deceitful rhetoric. He claims that if he were as eloquent as Brutus, he could give a voice to each of Caesar's wounds ("... that should move / The stones of Rome to rise and mutiny"). After that, Antony deals his final blow by revealing Caesar's will, in which "To every Roman citizen he gives, / To every several man, seventy-five
drachma Drachma may refer to: * Ancient drachma, an ancient Greek currency * Modern drachma The drachma ( ) was the official currency of modern Greece from 1832 until the launch of the euro in 2001. First modern drachma The drachma was reintroduce ...
s" as well as land, to the crowd. He ends his speech with a dramatic flourish: "Here was a Caesar! When comes such another?", at which point the crowd begins to riot and search out the assassins with the intention of killing them. Antony then utters to himself: "Now let it work. Mischief, thou art afoot, / Take thou what course thou wilt!"


As an icon of rhetoric

The speech is a famous example of the use of emotionally charged
rhetoric Rhetoric is the art of persuasion. It is one of the three ancient arts of discourse ( trivium) along with grammar and logic/ dialectic. As an academic discipline within the humanities, rhetoric aims to study the techniques that speakers or w ...
. Comparisons have been drawn between this speech and political speeches throughout history in terms of the rhetorical devices employed to win over a crowd.


In popular media

The lyrics of
Bob Dylan Bob Dylan (legally Robert Dylan; born Robert Allen Zimmerman, May 24, 1941) is an American singer-songwriter. Described as one of the greatest songwriters of all time, Dylan has been a major figure in popular culture over his nearly 70-year ...
's "Pay in Blood" on his 2012 album '' Tempest'' include the line, "I came to bury not to praise."
The Beatles The Beatles were an English Rock music, rock band formed in Liverpool in 1960. The core lineup of the band comprised John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr. They are widely regarded as the Cultural impact of the Beatle ...
song With a Little Help from My Friends contains the lyric, "Lend me your ears." The line is referenced in the Ernest P. Worrell movie '' Ernest Scared Stupid''. During a scene where Ernest tries to help give advice to his young friend Kenny after he gets bullied while looking for a place to build a tree house, Ernest recounts a fictional story of
Botswana Botswana, officially the Republic of Botswana, is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. Botswana is topographically flat, with approximately 70 percent of its territory part of the Kalahari Desert. It is bordered by South Africa to the sou ...
rebelling against the
Ottoman Empire The Ottoman Empire (), also called the Turkish Empire, was an empire, imperial realm that controlled much of Southeast Europe, West Asia, and North Africa from the 14th to early 20th centuries; it also controlled parts of southeastern Centr ...
, wherein he portrays a Julius Caesar-like figure and at one point recites a paraphrased version of the line; "Friends, Romans, Botswanians, lend me your trees!"


References


External links


''Julius Caesar'', Act 3, Scene 2, Line 73.
{{Julius Caesar (play) Literature of England Julius Caesar (play) Shakespearean phrases Speeches 16th-century neologisms