A Foucauldian View on William Shakespeare's Julius ... - Gjset.org

Global Journal of Science, Engineering and Technology (ISSN : 2322-2441) 

Issue 5, 2013 , pp. 9-14 

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A <strong>Foucauldian</strong> <strong>View</strong> on William Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar 

Ahmad Reza Rahimi 

M.A. English Literature 

Abstract 

This study aims to look at William Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar from a <strong>Foucauldian</strong> point of view; it 

applies the ideas of the French philosopher Michel Foucault concerning discourse and episteme to 

Shakespeare’s Roman historical play. The study provides a theoretical background concerning the ideas 

of Foucault and then applies those ideas and concepts to the play to show how the <strong>Foucauldian</strong> concepts 

can be detected in the Renaissance works of art. The study will show that Shakespeare, in writing his 

play, attempted to create a Roman discourse while being influenced by the discourse of his time – that of 

the Elizabethan England, as the result of which both discourses are fairly represented in a play. 

Key Words 

Foucault, Shakespeare, discourse, episteme, Roman culture, Elizabethan England 

Introduction 

The French philosopher, Michel Foucault, is 

considered as one of the most important scholars in 

the twentieth century. His ideas have been used in 

different fields of knowledge such as philosophy or 

history. He brought a new insight into the human 

society and its constituents, and the relationship 

between the people and those in power. The 

revolutionary ideas of Foucault have been proved 

useful not only in different sociological studies, but 

also in the literary critical approaches as well, 

influencing the New Historicism approach. Besides 

it, his ideas themselves can be applied to literary 

works in order to find the sociological aspects in 

the world of the work or its author. 

One of his main concerns was the idea of 

power. Power is defined by Max Webber as “the 

opportunity existing within a social relationship 

which permits one to carry out one’s own will” 

(Webber 51). He draws our attention to two 

characteristics of power; its manifesting itself in 

relation between two parties like husband and wife, 

employer and employee, and so on and its being 

reciprocal with both sides influential in this 

relationship. For Foucault, power is dispersed and 

penetrated into every corner of the society, taken 

from the family to the governmental body. He 

believes that “Power relations are rooted deep in 

the social nexus, not reconstituted ‘above’ society 

as a supplementary structure” (qtd. in During 131). 

Concerning the human communities, 

Foucault has a two-level concept of society. The 

first level, the macro-level, is the power at the level 

of administrative body while the second, called 

micro-level exists at the level of society and 

ordinary people. Here we are witness to the local 

power relations which refers to “men and women at 

the lowest levels of the social hierarchy … caught 

in the fine meshes of the power networks” (Hoy 

58). The micro-level is more emphasized in 

Foucault’s works. And this can be considered a 

great change from the previously works done in 

studying the power structure. 

But his main contribution is the concept of 

discourse. Discourse is not definitely a new term. 

There have been many different definitions for it in 

various fields of knowledge. Geoffrey Leech and 

Michael Short take is as a linguistic 

communication between a speaker and a hearer 

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(Hawthorne 189). Mikhail Bakhtin uses discourse 

to signify either a voice (like double-voiced 

discourse) or a method of using words which 

presumes authority. (Selden 129). The Marxist 

theorist Louis Althusser turns discourse into 

ideology, declaring that all human beings are 

subjects of ideology (Selden 130). Foucault gives a 

new meaning to the word. In his Archealogy of 

Knowledge considering discourse, he says, 

instead of gradually reducing 

the rather fluctuating meaning if the 

word ‘Discourse’, I believe I have in 

fact added to its meanings; treating it 

sometimes as the general domain of 

all statements, sometimes, as an 

individualizable group of statements, 

and sometimes as a regulated practice 

that accounts for a number of 

statements. 

(Archeology of Knowledge 80) 

By considering discourse as ‘the general 

domain of all statements’ he means that all the 

meaningful utterances or texts are called discourse. 

His declaration of ‘an individualizable group of 

statements’ refers to particular structures within 

discourse such as the feminine or masculine 

discourses. However the third definition puts 

emphasis on the rule-governed nature of discourse 

as discursive structures. His emphasis is on “the set 

of rules, the discursive formation that governs a 

discourse and holds it together” (Bertens 156). 

Foucault calls these unwritten rules and regulations 

‘discursive practices’ and defines them as a body of 

anonymous, historical rules, determined in the time 

and space of a given period, and for a given social, 

economic, geographical or linguistic area. 

(Archeology of Knowledge 86). 

For him, “each society has its regime of 

truth, its ‘general politics’ of truth; that is, the types 

of discourse which it accepts and makes function as 

true; the mechanisms and instances which enable 

one to distinguish true and false statements” 

(Power/Knowledge 131) So for him, truth is 

something produced by societies rather than 

something transcendental. He argues that the only 

way we understand reality is through discourse and 

discursive structures. During this process, “we lend 

these structures a solidity which is often difficult to 

think outside of” (Mehl 49). The fact is that the 

discourse is propagandized in different institutions 

called ‘discursive field’ such as the law, family and 

so on. 

Throughout a society, there is a unifying 

pattern or principle Foucault calls episteme which 

“controls how that era and its people will view 

reality” (Selden 131). Foucault believes that all of 

the historians are influenced by the episteme(s) in 

which they live; therefore, “their thoughts, 

customs, habits, and other actions are colored by 

their own epistemes, historians, Foucault argues, 

must realize that they can never be totally objective 

about their own or any other historical period” 

(Bressler 132). Therefore it can be concluded that 

the historians reflect their own discourses in their 

account of historical events. 

<strong>Foucauldian</strong> Ideas Applied to the Play 

William Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar is 

about the last hours of the life of Gaius Julius 

Caesar (100 - 44 B.C.), the great Roman general 

and statesman, beginning with a ceremony in honor 

of Caesar, progressing through his assassination in 

Senate and ending with his revenge taken on his 

murderers. The exact time of its writing is not clear 

but it was definitely written after Twelfth Night 

(1600-1) and before Hamlet (1602). Therefore it is 

placed between his great comedies and great 

tragedies. It can be appropriately called a historical 

play since the subject matter is taken from history 

and because Caesar is a Roman figure, the play is a 

Roman play as well. As his sources, Shakespeare 

used several books. His principal source was the 

well-known Plutarch’s history of the lives of 

Brutus, Caesar and Antonius in his Lives, translated 

by Sir Thomas North into English. He used two 

secondary sources as well: two anonymous plays 

called Caius Iulius Caesar and Caesar’s Revenge. 

In telling the story of Caesar, Shakespeare 

did not just report whatever happened. He has 

entered some new events and there are some 

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differences between his sources and his play. For 

example, Shakespeare does not mention wicked 

characteristics of Caesar. Also Plutarch says that he 

was hated by most of Romans while we have no 

mentioning of this in Shakespeare’s version of his 

life. Furthermore, in Plutarch, Brutus is said to 

having visited some unknown ghosts, which are 

recognized as Caesar’s ghost in Shakespeare’s 

masterpiece. Shakespeare also had Romans bathe 

their hands in Caesar’s blood, which was not 

mentioned in any historical documents. 

Additionally he pays too much attention to the Ides 

of March and the soothsayer. All of these point to 

the fact that Shakespeare gave some changes to his 

sources to make it fit his goals and aims (Dorsch 

xxviii – xxxv). Such details make the play a good 

one for the application of Foucault’s ideas. 

As it was mentioned above, for Foucault, all 

human beings are under influence of the discourse, 

and the writer(s) cannot be taken as exceptions. It 

simply declares that when the authors create works 

of art, they are influenced by the discourse of their 

own time. They also try to create, or rather recreate 

the discourse of the time they are writing about. 

Shakespeare, as any other playwright would do, 

gave his Roman play a Roman mask, to the extent 

that in Julius Caesar, ‘“Good” and “Evil” bear the 

names of ‘virtue’, ‘honor’, ‘nobility’ and their 

opposites (Mehl 137) which are truly Roman 

concerns. He consciously or unconsciously 

attempted to present a Roman discourse for his 

audience and the most obvious point was the 

Roman regard of the family and forefathers. 

Family played an important vital role in lives 

of all people in the ancient societies; everybody 

defined himself or herself according to his or her 

family or tribe (a larger group made of families 

related in blood). And this concept of family was 

based on a patriarchy as the result of which the 

father was endowed the importance. And as in any 

other culture, the father figure was incorporated 

into the forefathers as well. In Julius Caesar, the 

first time that a Roman alludes to his forefather is 

in the first act where Cassius, talking with Brutus 

about his swimming match with Caesar, compares 

himself to “Aeneas,” their “great ancestor” (I.ii.11). 

Not only does he allude to this legendary forefather 

but also he reminds Brutus of one of his forefather 

after whom he was named; 

O, you and I have heard our fathers say, 

There was a Brutus once that would have 

brook”d 

Th’eternal devil to keep his state in Rome 

As easily as a king. (I.ii.156 – 159) 

It was his forefather, Julius Brutus, who 

fought against Tarquin, the cruel Roman king, and 

drove him out of the city gates (Harding 25). By 

reminding Brutus of these two figures, Cassius 

wants to make him remember the past history and 

great works of their ancestors. Later, Brutus alludes 

to the same Brutus in his soliloquy. He almost 

repeats all Cassius’ words; “My ancestors did from 

the streets of Rome / The Tarquin drive, when he 

was call’d a king” (II.i.53 – 54). Cassius also 

makes a reference to all the dead fathers to use 

them as a tool of motivating Brutus to take actions. 

He believes that Romans are not like their fathers. 

Romans now 

Have thews and limbs like to their ancestor: 

But, woe the while! Our fathers’ minds are 

dead, 

And we are govern”d with our mothers’ 

spirit: 

Our yoke and sufferance show us womanish. 

(I.iii.80 – 84) 

The Romans are obsessed with their fathers 

even in the most troubled scenes. The best example 

is provided in the last act uttered by a young soldier 

who is recognized as Cato. The interesting point is 

that we are not given his full name, but he 

mentions his father’s name in complete. 

I will proclaim my name about the field. 

I am son of Marcus Cato, ho! 

A foe to tyrants, and my country’s friend. 

I am son of Marcus Cato, ho! (V.iv.3 – 6) 

In a society committed to the father / 

forefather, the women are not exception in 

accepting the general dominant discourse. Portia, 

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Brutus’s wife, seeing her husband pondering on 

some issues, implores him to talk. But upon seeing 

her husband reluctant, she uses the same patriarchal 

concepts, reminding her husband of himself and 

her father 

I grant I am a woman; but withal 

A woman that Lord Brutus took to wife: 

I grant I am a woman; but withal 

A woman well reputed, Cato’s daughter. 

Think you I am no stronger than my sex, 

Being so fahter’d, and so husbanded? 

(II.i.292 – 97) 

As if she discovers that the only way to 

make her husband confess what is in his mind is to 

speak like the men; referring to the fathers. She did 

according to the Roman discourse at the period, 

proving Foucault’s idea that the discourse 

penetrates into every corner of the society. 

This attitude towards the father / forefather 

in Rome is embodied in one aspect of the Roman 

culture; statuary. They used to make great statues 

either of their gods, their emperors or their 

forefathers, thus connecting two ideas of the 

ancestors and art of statuary. It is said that the 

Roman families, the aristocrats in particular, used 

to keep the statues of their ancestors in their homes 

to show their lineage and at the same time the 

respect they paid to the dead ones. In fact “the 

statue is the characteristic expressive form of 

Rome. It is hard, marble, and unrelenting assertion 

of self that one has to accept or overturn” (Berry 

78). 

As a Roman play, Julius Caesar includes 

several references to the statues. Cassius, compares 

Caesar to Colossus (I.ii.146), the great statue in 

ancient Greece. Later, he asks Cinna to put the 

letter which they had written to Brutus “upon old 

Brutus’ statue” (I.ii.146), which proves that Brutus 

used to keep a statue of his famous forefather in his 

home. It is also significant that when the Romans 

want to award Brutus for what he did, they suggest 

to “give him [Brutus] a statue with his ancestors” 

(III.ii.51). Additionally, in Shakespeare’s creation 

of the details of Calphurnia’s dream, not mentioned 

in his sources (Garber 65), the statue plays the 

main role, representing the person for whom it 

stands. 

She dreamt to-night she saw my [Caesar] 

statue, 

Which like a fountain with an hundred 

spouts 

Did run pure blood; and many lusty Romans 

Came smiling, and did bathe their hands in 

it. (II.ii.76 – 79) 

Calphurnia reminds the readers of another 

important aspect of both Roman culture and 

Renaissance England which is the inferior attitudes 

held toward the women in both societies. 

Throughout the history, for several nonscientific 

reasons, the women have been suppressed and 

oppressed. The conditions of the women in early 

modern England were not too much different from 

other parts of the world at their time. In fact, “early 

modern England was a patriarchal society that 

severely circumscribed women’s legal rights, 

access to education, and professional 

opportunities.”(Bevington xxxviii). The same thing 

can be told about the women’s status in Roman 

culture where “women held no public offices…., 

but as objects of exchange in marriage they were 

crucial to the weaving of political alliances and the 

continuity of the dynasties which formed the basis 

of the Roman power elite” (Kahn 98) 

The play has only two female characters: 

Portia, Brutus’ wife and Calphurnia, Caesar’s wife. 

Both women are portrayed as typical women can 

be shown; worried about their lives. And in case of 

Calphurnia, after dreaming about death of her 

husband, the men are provided with an opportunity 

to ignore the feminine worries and “act in 

accordance with ‘masculine’ virtue” (Kahn 99). 

The scene of Calphurnia’s imploring Caesar not to 

go to the Senate, Grene believes, tends to be a 

“psychological study of the wife’s protective 

anxieties” (29). 

These women are set either at their home or 

in public doing something related to their family 

life to prove that women were taken to be lords of 

their houses not outside it. And whenever the 

women want to enter into important matters of the 

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public interest, they must do it using the masculine 

ways. To know the cause of her husband’s pains, 

Portia, Brutus’ wife makes a ‘voluntary wound’. 

She wanted to declare that when she could tolerate 

the pain, she would be able to keep her husband’s 

secret in her heart as well. Her doing so is 

definitely a masculine act, not a feminine one since 

voluntary wounds are “cultural markers of the 

physical courage, autonomy, constancy that count 

as manly virtue” (Kahn 101). 

There is no doubt that Shakespeare was 

under the influence of his episteme when he makes 

Portia inferior in his version of her suicide report. 

His source, Plutarch pictures a heroine out of 

Portia, saying that “She, determining to kill herself 

… took hot burning coals and cast them into her 

mouth, and kept her mouth so close that she choked 

herself (Skeat 151 – 2). On the contrary, 

Shakespeare just “has Brutus say only that ‘she fell 

distract / And her attendants absent, swallowed 

fire." (IV. iii. 154 – 5), depriving her of dignity that 

she has in Plutarch (Dean 92). Therefore she is 

degraded easily. 

As it can be witnessed in case of the 

depiction of Portia’s death, there is no doubt that 

Shakespeare’s own episteme had strong effects on 

him. We have many Elizabethan elements and 

aspects from the very beginning of the play. 

Shakespeare begins his play with having two 

tribunes quarreling with common people, who 

“might be Londeners for all that is said and done as 

they are reprimanded for failing to wear the marks 

of their crafts in accordance with regulations like 

those in force among Shakespeare’s first audience” 

(Brown 109). 

Furthermore, Shakespeare refers at least two 

times to “clock” (II.i.193 and II.ii.114), although 

the clock was not invented until Renaissance. The 

term “watch” (II.i.16) refers to a person in the 

Elizabethan period whose duty was to take care of 

the city at night. It is also interesting that the 

Roman men in the play have to wear their craft 

marks in their work days (I.i. 3 – 8) as the 

Elizabethans were obliged to do. Moreover, the 

Romans in the play are wearing Elizabethan 

clothes rather than those of Rome; people use 

“night-caps’ (I.ii.241) and their lovely Caesar has a 

“doubet” (I.ii.263). The conspirators are presented 

as wearing hats and cloaks (II.i.73 – 74) and 

besides it, the only sick character in the play has 

put on a “kerchief” (II.i.315). 

Shakespeare cannot be blamed for entering 

so many elements of his own time into his play. 

The fact is that the Renaissance was too much 

similar to the Classical Rome. As the rebirth of the 

classics, Renaissance was a period influenced by 

the Classical era to the extent that in the art of the 

period, for example statuary or literature, the 

Classical impact can be obviously detected. 

Renaissance artists used classics as examples and 

attempted to imitate them. Additionally, 

Renaissance England had the same motifs, ideas, 

verbal images, gods, customs and political offices 

as the Classic time. Royal entries and coronation 

pageants, Elizabeth’s victory over the Armada, and 

the annual Lord Mayor’s pageants used Roman 

motifs (Kahn 5). In the words of Hunter, “a set of 

virtues thought of as characterizing Roman 

civilization – solidarity, severe, self-controlled, 

self-disciplined… - transmitted to the Tudors … 

held up as models or secular mirabilia” (94). 

Conclusion 

The study successfully applies the ideas of 

the French philosopher, Michel Foucault, to an 

English Renaissance play by William Shakespeare, 

Julius Caesar. After explaining about some of the 

most important contributions of Foucault to the 

literary criticism, the study applies those terms to 

the play. It detects some Roman features in the play 

such as the respect for the father / forefather which 

is embodied in the form of an art – statuary. It also 

mentions the way how Shakespeare depicted the 

Roman attitude to the women, while being under 

the effects of his own discourse. Despite his efforts 

to represent the Romans as Roman as possible, 

Shakespeare, nonetheless, is influenced by the 

episteme and the discourse of the Elizabethan 

England which had him enter some purely English 

elements into the play and degrade the importance 

and heroic status of a woman character. In general, 

and as a conclusion it must be said that both 

discourses (that of Rome and Elizabethan England) 

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have been portrayed along each other in this master 

piece of Shakespeare, proving the possibility of 

doing more of the same researches on his works. 

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