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The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 12.2879  Saturday, 22 December 2001

From:           John Velz <jvelz@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu>
Date:           Thursday, 20 Dec 2001 15:03:13 -0600
Subject:        Great Caesar's Ghost

And Caesar's spirit, ranging for revenge,
With Ate by his side come hot from hell
Shall in these confines with a monarch's voice
Cry havoc and let slip the dogs of war,
That this foul deed shall smell above the earth
With carrion men, groaning for burial.

The concluding six lines of Mark Antony's soliloquy over Caesar's body
late in 3.1

“But above all, the ghost that apeared unto Brutus shewed plainly, that
the gods were offended with the murther of Caesar.”  North’s Tr. of
Plutarch,  “Marcus Brutus”

Also relevant is the ultimately Greek idea that every man has a daimon
or spirit.  Brutus himself discusses this spirit under the Roman name
“genius” in 2.1 in his soliloquy in JC

Between the acting of a dreadful thing
And the first motion, all the interim is
Like a phantasma, or a hideous dream:
The genius and the mortal instruments
Are then in council; and the state of a man,
Like to a little kingdom, suffers then
The nature of an insurrection.

Yours for evil spirits,
John

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