"Julius Caesar" and Elizabethan England

Paper Summary:

This paper reviews William Shakespeare's play "Julius Caesar" and examines how it was accepted and performed at the time in Elizabethan England. It provides a history of the Globe theater where many of Shakespeare's plays were performed beginning with "Julius Caesar" and examines life in the theater district of London at the time. It attempts to analyze why the play was so popular when it first came out and why a subject such as tyrannicide was presentable in a country governed by a monarch. It looks at how it contained all of the political and social intrigues necessary to make it a timeless classic and all the puerile blood and gore that was needed to entertain a group of theater-hopping commoners in what was considered London's seediest neighborhood.

From the Paper:

"The play was written and performed in 1599 at the Globe theater in Southwark, London. Southwark is located on the south bank of the Thames river, and was traditionally considered the vice district. This section of London was home to 10% of its population, and more than its share of the city's beggars. In 1594 the Lord Mayor, Sir John Spencer, asserted that parts of Southwark were "very nurseries and breeding-places of the begging poor" who swarmed the streets of the City. He estimated the number of these beggars at 12,000, and requested a meeting of several local magistrates in an attempt to banish them from the City or prevent them from crossing the Bridge."

More papers on "Julius Caesar" and Elizabethan England:

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• Analytical Essay # 120097 : "Shakespeare's Tragic Vision"
• Research Paper # 30090 : "The Modern William Shakespeare"

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