Download Notes for The Tragedy of Julius Caesar

Notes for The Tragedy of Julius Caesar
Political Terms:
 Triumvirs: (THREE) rulers share power
o Senators: Ruling body subordinate to Caesar as dictator (In Ancient Rome,
dictators were appointed in an emergency.) Senators represented nobility
& landowners.
 Tribunes [of the people]: had limited power & represented the
common people
Julius Caesar:
 Roman general (& military hero) & politician who lived from ~100-44 B.C.
 Was so successful that Roman Senate feared he would try to control the gov’t &
ordered him to disband his army. He refused & fought former ally Pompey &
was victorious in 46 B.C.
Literary Terms:
 Ellipsis: the omission of speech or writing indicated by three dots…
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Conventions of drama:
o Aside
o Soliloquy
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Conventions of poetry:
o Blank verse
o Iambic pentameter
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Irony
o Dramatic Irony
o Verbal irony- a contrast between what is said and what is meant (sarcasm)
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Puns – play on words
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Rhetorical devices
o Parallelism
o Repetition
o Rhetorical questions
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Tragedy
Tragic hero – main character with a tragic flaw that leads to his/her downfall