before we begin, i would like to say a lot of this analysis is very interpretation based: unlike most of my other caesar analysis posts, which are usually strictly lyric-based, this will depend heavily on my interpretation of the lyrics and how they were said. probably not the best way to do an analysis, but oh well. this also means that your interpretation of the lyrics / how they were said will likely differ from mine, which is totally fine, im not trying to say that mine is the only / best interpretation, just trying to explain it :) and finally, a lot of this analysis is probably not going to stand the test of time, given a lot of the songs mentioned are still (from my interpretation) still under construction.
and with those hefty disclaimers out of the way, i present you:
brutus’ suicidal ideation and how it can be traced back to brutus’ prayer (catchy title i know)
one thing that brutus makes very clear to us in this song is that he does not want to kill caesar, and, in fact, he only manages to justify it by convincing himself that it’s what his dad would have wanted. during his whole spiel, though, there’s one lyric that really stands out:
“the story seems to always write itself” is spoken softly, almost remorsefully, but it’s really the “kill the snake” that gets me. i’ve said this before, but i think that snake is truly such an interesting word to use, considering its strong connotation denoting treachery and whatnot. brutus, of course, knows that he, too, is a traitor, which is why i think that this hints at brutus’ desire to be. well. killed? it’s been pointed out to me that this isn’t original to the musical and in fact came from the shakespeare play, but i don’t necessarily think that that’s contrary to my point, it could equally mean that shakespeare’s brutus and yurchuk’s brutus have similar feelings in the matter.
and then, of course, there’s conspirators’ song, in which brutus says that, were he to swear an oath to kill caesar, it would be on his life. not his honour (which we know he’s willing to swear on; in brutus’ prayer, he does just that: “anyone could see that caesar was my friend / and on my honour, i miss the man i knew”), his life, which imo implies that he holds his life in much lower regard than his honour (bc he initially rejects taking the oath at all)
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