Theme Of Suicide In Julius Caesar

William Shakespeare is a master writer who discusses sensitive and controversial subjects within his plays. He touches on timeless social issues such as suicide. In his plays Julius Caesar and Hamlet, William Shakespeare tackles suicide and the weight it carries with different individuals within different cultures. Julius Caesar depicts suicide in regards to Brutus and Cassius, the leading conspirators in the murder of Julius Caesar. Taking place in Rome when honor, valor, and triumph were the most important values; Brutus, Cassius, and other Romans considered suicide as an honorable way to die. However, Hamlet takes place in more conservative late Medieval Denmark. Hamlet is also a gruesome story of death and deceit; however, the discussion of an afterlife and God is more prevalent and therefore Hamlet and others from his time view suicide as a sin unlike, the early Romans. Hamlet, Ophelia, Brutus, and Cassius all contemplate suicide in these two plays, but for different reasons.
Both Hamlet and Brutus were …show more content…
Suicide is related to an individual’s and societies’ values and morals and religion or lack thereof. Rome during the time of Julius Caesar can be interpreted from Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar as a society without a religion guiding its morals, but instead the need for achievement and display of strength guiding men’s decisions. Hamlet allows God to guide some of his decisions, which is most likely a societal value he is following, however, his anger and own judgment cause him to break God’s commandments not to kill and commit murder to seek revenge for his father’s death and mother’s and uncle’s deceit. Denmark and Rome were very different at this time, and Shakespeare makes that