Julius Caesar
Act 1, Scene 3
Vocabulary
Tempests – storms
Portentous things– signs predicting doom, bad omens
Tyranny – oppressive government power
Countenance – demeanor, expression
Conspirators – people conspiring or plotting something
Characters
Cicero – a senator, not superstitious, argues that bad omens
are what you make of them and that people interpret “signs”
however they want
Casca – superstitious, lists strange sights he has seen and
heard reported on this night. He is jumpy throughout the
scene
Cassius – he prompts Casca to admit his contempt for
Caesar’s growing power and claims that no one can ever
hold him or defeat him because he claims always has the
option to “dismiss” himself from life through suicide.
Cinna – a conspirator who joins Cassius and Casca and
mentions the importance of winning Brutus to their cause.
He leaves to go deliver Cassius’s forged letters
Visualization: picturing descriptions to
Understand mood and setting
Directions:
1. Review summary with Ms. Goldberg: It is March 14, the
night before Caesar will be assassinated. When the
conspirators meet, the night is dark and stormy, and full of
strange omens and signs. Shakespeare creates tension and
sets the mood for the action in the subsequent acts by
describing the intense weather and unusual reports on this
night.
2. Read out loud individually Group leaders should make
sure that all members of the group are reading the entire
section out loud.
3. Reread as a group and fill out the chart on visualizing the
omens and weather of the night.
4. Discuss findings with Ms. Goldberg and your group
5. Assign roles, act the scene out as a group, and complete
your cast list, individual, and group reflections for this scene.
Visualizing: Picturing the mood
Description of weather
How it helps you visualize the mood
1.
“This dreadful night that thunders,
1. The night of March 14 is stormy, and
lightens, opens graves, and roars as doth the the thunder and lightening are described as
lion…” (I.iii.74-75)
not only loud and disturbing, but also
mystical and eerie, as though this is a
spooky and maybe even evil night.
2.
2.
3.
3.
4.
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5.
5.
Description of portents/omens
How it helps you visualize the mood
1.
“A common slave- you know him well by
sight- held up his left hand, which did flame
and burn like twenty torches joined, and yet
his hand, not sensible of fire, remained
unscorched” (I.iii.15-18)
1.
2.
2.
3.
3.
4.
4.
5.
5.
A slave’s hand is on fire, and he does not
even feel it. Supernatural omens suggest
that something frightening is going to
happen, and that the regular laws of the
universe do not apply.