2023/08/15

Julius Caesar from Memory


Soothsayer
Beware the ides of March.
Caesar
How now! I wouldst thou couldst.
Soothsayer 
Beware the ides of March.
Caesar
Prithee, a tide in the lives of men, which taken at the flood, slings them on to outrageous fortune.
Soothsayer
Beware the ides of March.
Caesar 
Come now, Cassius, a Rome by any other name hath fewer tramps and more Caesar.

(then on 15 Mar)

Caesar 
Forsooth! What sayst thou now? The ides of March are come, and methinks I be still here.
Soothsayer
Aye, they are come, but not gone.

(later at the Senate steps)

Cassius 
Speak, hands for me! [Everyone stabs.]
Caesar 
Et tu, Brute? Then fall Caesar. [Dies.]

(later)

Antony
Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears.
I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.
And I sully not Brutus' name, for Brutus is an honourable man.
All the world's a stage, and we merely players, but
To be or not to be, that is the question.
Caesar, Caesar, wherefore art thou Caesar?
How do I not praise thee? Let me count the ways.
The fault, Brutus, lies not in our stars,
But mum's the word, for Brutus is an honourable man.
Get thee to a nunnery, for all that glisters is not gold,
And jealousy is a green-eyed monster.
Marry, hell hath no fury like a Roman scorned,
Nigh uneasy lies the head that wears the crown.
His kingdom for a horse! There are more things in heaven and earth,
Octavius, than nothing that will come of nothing.
But Brutus is an honourable man.
O Caesar! Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Nay, now is the winter of our discontent.
Frailty, thy name is Mark Antony, woe is me,
How sharper than a serpent's tooth is a thankless child!
The Senate doth protest too much, methinks,
For Caesar was an honourable man,
For Caesar is an honourable man!
Aye, aye, away, away!