“When they had begun to honour Julius Caesar (now Dictator), it was with the idea, of course, that he would be reasonable; but as they went on and saw that he was delighted with what they voted, — indeed he accepted all but a very few of their decrees, — different men at different times kept proposing various extravagant honours, some in a spirit of exaggerated flattery and others by way of ridicule.”
” At any rate, some actually ventured to suggest permitting him to have intercourse with as many women as he pleased, because even at this time, though fifty years old, he still had numerous mistresses. Others, and they were the majority, followed this course because they wished to make him envied and hated as quickly as possible, that he might the sooner perish.”
Both of these quotes are close and similar to each other and they symbolize Julius to me because they are also speaking about him from the perspective of the people that witnessed him rule. The impressions that were made about him are important because it was the reason for his downfall. I chose both of these passages because I thought that they gave me the best idea of what the public thought of Julius Caesar. They speak about how he’s envied, hated and addresses his numerous mistresses. It opens my eyes to see Julius Caesar as flawed because the opinions about him were so mixed.
The first passage also talks about how he was also flattered and honored. These two opposing views gave me a great, unbiased idea of Julius Caesar and I really appreciated that. I feel like I have a better idea of Caesar’s arrogance, and I could understand the frustration of the people. These two passages are similar because they are both talking about how people felt about Julius’ acts. They are different because the second seems to be talking more about rumors about him while the first is discussing the way people felt about the way that he ruled.
The image in my blog post is a photo of me and my best friend Julius. We were just at the subway heading to my apartment. I asked him where his name came from and what he knew about Julius Caesar. He said that he thinks that the name Julius comes from the month Jupiter and admitted to not knowing much about Julius Caesar. I think that his name is similar to Julius Caesar because of his parent’s Roman background. They are very ambitious and I feel like by giving their son a big name, they are subconsciously willing him to want to do great things.
This relates to my readings because Julius Caesar, although he had an unfortunate ending, accomplished a lot and is such an important figure in world history despite being called arrogant and having numerous people have negative opinions about him.
-Mckensi Pascall, Team Aphrodite