Read the extract from 'Julius Caesar' Act 3, Scene 2, given below and answer the questions that follow: Antony: Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears; I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him. The evil that men do lives after them, The good is oft interred with their bones; So let it be with Caesar. The noble Brutus Hath told you Caesar was ambitious; If it were so, it was a grievous fault, And grievously hath Caesar answer'd it. Here, under leave of Brutus and the rest– For Brutus is an honourable man; So are they all, all honourable men– Come I to speak in Caesar's funeral.
Antony repeatedly uses certain words in his speech to describe Brutus. What are they? Why does he do this?
Topic: Act 3 Scene 2 — verbal irony
Answer
He repeatedly calls Brutus "an honourable man" (and the conspirators "honourable men"), and he keeps returning to "Brutus says he was ambitious".
He does this because Brutus has forbidden him to blame the conspirators. The repeated praise therefore becomes his weapon. Each time he sets the word "honourable" beside a fresh proof of Caesar’s goodness, the word loses a little of its meaning, until it turns into open sarcasm and the crowd hears an accusation Antony has never actually made.
The device to name is verbal irony (saying the opposite of what is meant) produced by repetition. Structure your answer as: what the words are, the constraint that forces the indirect method, and the effect on the listeners. A sentence on the effect — the crowd finishes the thought for themselves and so believes it more firmly than if told outright — lifts the answer into the top band.