Julius Caesar: A Verse Translation
My verse translation of Julius Caesar matches Shakespeare's play line-by-line with the same syntactic complexity and a similar vocabulary range as the original. All blank verse lines remain in verse with accurate and authentic iambic pentameter.
Play Statistics
Unique words in Shakespeare's original: 2,869
Unique words in Richmond's translation: 3,031
Excerpt
From Act 3, Scene 1 (Mark Antony is standing over Caesar soon after Caesar's assassination and delivers his famous "dogs of war" speech)
[Exit all but MARK ANTONY]
MARK ANTONY
Forgive me, please, you bleeding piece of earth,
For being meek and gentle with these butchers!
Here are the ruins of the noblest man
That ever glided on the tide of time.
O, curse the hands that shed this precious blood!
Over your wounds—these silent mouths that part
Their ruby lips and beg my tongue to voice
And utter this—I make this prophesy:
A curse shall fall upon the limbs of men.
Internal fury and fierce civil strife
Shall overwhelm all parts of Italy.
Blood and destruction shall be spread so wide
And dreadful sights will be so commonplace
That mothers merely smile when they behold
Their infants chopped up by the hands of war,
All pity choked when cruel deeds are routine.
And Caesar’s spirit, roving for revenge,
Its goddess by his side hot out of Hell,
Shall from these confines with a monarch’s voice
Cry “Havoc!” and unleash the dogs of war,
So this foul deed can smell above the earth
With rotting men, groaning for burial.
[Enter a SERVANT]
You serve Octavius Caesar, do you not?
SERVANT
I do, Mark Antony.
MARK ANTONY
Caesar has ordered him to come to Rome.
SERVANT
He has received his letters and is coming,
And said to say to you in person that—[sees the body]
O Caesar!—
MARK ANTONY
Your heart is swollen. Stand aside and weep.
Grief, I’m afraid, is catching, and my eyes,
Seeing those beads of sorrow there on yours,
Began to water. Is your master coming?
SERVANT
He’s camped tonight some twenty miles from Rome.
MARK ANTONY
Race back and tell him what has happened here.
This is a mourning Rome, a dangerous Rome,
A Rome not safe yet for Octavius.
Hurry, and tell him. Better yet, hold on.
Don’t leave until I carry his remains
Into the market-place. My eulogy
Will let me test how people there regard
The cruel product of these bloody men,
A finding you’ll include in your report
To young Octavius on the state of things.
Give me a hand.
[Exit with JULIUS CAESAR’s body]
© 2011 by Kent Richmond