In Act 3, Scene 2, when Antony is addressing the mob he
shows them the torn and bloody cloak covering Caesar's body in order to stir them up
even further than he already has done. Antony, of course, has no idea which of the many
holes and tears in the cloak was made by which conspirator, but he pretends to know who
was responsible for each of them. At one place he
says:
Look, in this place ran Cassius' dagger
through:
See what a rent the envious Casca
made:
Through this the well-beloved Brutus
stabb'd;
No doubt Shakespeare
needed an adjective to make an iambic pentameter line out of the reference to Casca and
he chose the word "envious" more or less at random. Casca was probably no more or less
envious than the other assassins, but by calling Casca envious Antony can suggest the
idea of envy as applying to all of them. Evidently Antony is pointing to an especially
large tear in the fabric when he mentions Casca. The "rent" could be made to symbolize
an unusually vicious intention based on some especially reprehensible motive such as
envy.
Antony was showing the mob Caesar's torn and bloody
cloak rather than the body itself. There was probably no body under the cloak, because
it would have been awkward for Antony to carry it in and difficult for the audience to
see, since it was in a coffin and surrounded by the members of the mob. When the stage
directions state:
Enter ANTONY and others, with CAESAR's
body
they
are probably carrying a dummy covered with a bloody cloak. They then place the dummy in
the coffin still concealed by the cloak.
What Shakespeare
actually did was to have two identical cloaks as regular properties for the performances
of this play--except that one was in good condition and the other was all shredded and
bloodstained.
In Act 2, Scene 2, Caesar decides to go to
the Senate house in spite of his wife's warnings. He
says:
How
foolish do your fears seem now, Calpurnia!
I am ashamed I did yield to
them.
Give me my robe, for I will
go.
The scene does not end
there. Caesar has considerable additional conversation with his visitors while the good
robe is brought to him and the audience can see him putting it on. Then when Antony
holds up the other robe (or cloak or mantle) to supposedly reveal Caesar's body, it
appears to be the same robe the audience saw in Act 2, Scene 2, but now all torn and
covered with dirt and blood. The audience never sees the body because it isn't
there--but the mob supposedly gazes at the body in the coffin and reacts accordingly to
the sight of the mutilated Julius Caesar.
The bloody robe
is effective because Antony can hold it up for everyone in the theater to see, whereas
the body, if Shakespeare had tried to show an actual body, would have been horizontal,
hidden inside a coffin, and concealed from view by all the members of the
mob.
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