III
Historically and critically, the Brutus-Portia scenes in “Cesare” are of prime importance: historically, because here for the first time in any play on this subject does Portia figure among the actors; critically, because the Italian dramatist avails himself of the same episode chosen from the same source and treated broadly along the same lines later followed by Shakespeare.
Pescetti, of all the dramatists of Caesar’s fortunes, seems to have been the first to realize the dramatic value of the Brutus-Portia scenes.[[121]] Like Shakespeare, he found his material in Plutarch, and while he does not adhere as faithfully to the Plutarchian sequence, the correspondence in the motifs he employs is so close as to render the presentation of parallels peculiar alone to the two dramatists, a matter of extreme difficulty, and in most instances, of doubtful value. With perhaps two exceptions, to be noted later, there are no hints in Shakespeare’s treatment which he could not have derived from Plutarch, a fact, however, which in no way invalidates the hypothesis herein advanced that Pescetti’s inclusion of Portia influenced Shakespeare to introduce her in his drama. “Julius Caesar” without her would have lost nothing in technical completeness, whatever it might have forfeited in human interest. Voltaire, with Shakespeare’s example before him, excluded Portia from his drama on the ground that the introduction of a love element would detract from the high seriousness he considered proper to his tragic hero. Technically, his drama is sufficiently satisfactory, but like in Muretus and in Grévin, her exclusion injures the fullness of his characterization of Brutus, and robs his tragedy of a character which, skilfully handled, would greatly have enhanced its popular appeal.
Shakespeare’s Portia is a character with which we would grudgingly part. Beautiful in herself, her presence serves to bring the softer side of Brutus into relief, while after her husband’s departure on his fateful mission, her mental anguish serves admirably to increase in the mind of the spectator the presentiment of impending disaster.
Pescetti, like Shakespeare, makes Portia occupy a relatively small part in the action, perhaps for the same reason that prompted the greater dramatist. We are irresistibly attracted to the latter’s Portia, and her persistence in the action would inevitably have led to a divided interest. Possibly Pescetti was dramatist enough to realize this and acted accordingly. His Portia, like Shakespeare’s, serves further to broaden our conception of her husband’s character, while in herself, she is portrayed with power sufficient to revive, at her appearance, the flagging interest of the modern reader, even though she seems at times a Brutus in female attire, and shows a fondness for dialectic more appropriate to the schoolman than to the Roman matron.
From the evidence presented in Pescetti’s handling of this theme little is adducible in support of the hypothesis advanced above; its probability must rest upon the cumulative evidence favoring Shakespeare’s knowledge of “Cesare” presented in the course of this work.
Yet, while these scenes offer little of value for our purpose, their historical significance, and the fact that, as far as can be determined, this is the first time that the matter has been dwelt upon in the literature of the subject,[[122]] must excuse the expository character of much that follows.
In Pescetti, Portia appears three times: once in the first act in the scene immediately following that between Brutus and Cassius; in the second act with Brutus alone; and lastly, in the same act in a scene wherein both overhear Calpurnia’s lament to her Nurse. In the first scene Brutus has little to say. The dialogue is carried on mainly with Cassius. On her first appearance Portia indulges in a soliloquy:
“Non senza gran cagion stamane uscito
Si per tempo di casa è il mio consorte:
Gran cose ei tratta certo, e se non erra
Il mio pensier, egli apparecchia il giusto
Premio al Tiranno ingiusto, se pur giusto
Può darsi premio ad huom si ingiusto, et empio.
Ah perchè il sesso mio non mi permette
Vestir gonne maschili, e ne’ consigli
Mescolarmi de gli huomini, e le cose
Trattar della Republica, e di duro
Acciar gravando il corpo in prò di quella
L’asta, e la spada oprar?”—P. 28.
She longs to dye her sword in the tyrant’s blood. This is a Portia, more like the Roman matrons who could calmly watch the bloody shows in the amphitheatre than resembling the idealized portrait of Shakespeare. Yet, considering her terrible suicide,[[123]] perhaps Pescetti had the truer conception of her real character. That, in spite of her martial bearing, he appreciated her more womanly traits, is evident from the tenor of Cassius’ address, even though it does reflect the attitude of the Renaissance courtier:
“Molto per tempo esci di casa, ò Porzia,
Porzia, di pudicizia raro esempio,
E della matronal prudenza chiaro,
E purissimo specchio, viva imago
Di quel saggio; appo cui fu stolto quale
Più saggio ebbe la Grecia; alla cui morte
Morì la libertade, e nello stesso
Sepolcro a canto a lui volle esser posta,
Qual facenda a quest’ora, oltra l’usato
Tuo, quà ti mena? Senza gran cagione
Non è ciò fermamente, che non suoli
Tu, se non per gravissime, e importanti
Cagioni uscir in pubblico; ma come
A grave, e saggia femmina conviensi
Dentro a muri domestici in onesti
Studi passar il tempo, riputando
Degna d’eterna lode quella donna,
La cui bellezza a pochi, ma la fama
È nota a molti, che non fa del corpo
Nelle pubbliche piazze, e ne’ teatri
A cupid’ occhi, ma alle caste menti
Fa di sua pudicizia altiera mostra.”—Pp. 29–30.
To Cassius’ compliments, and his inquiry as to her early rising, she replies that the love she bears her country demands that she be made a party to their plans. It is in vain that they withhold secrets from a loving woman. Cassius assures her that no one doubts her worth and constancy, but the matters they contemplate are such that it would be unwise to risk their discovery. Yet, since she longs to know, he will tell her.
“Noi trattiam di trarre
Di sotto al giogo Roma, e di riporla
Nello stato, ond’ altrui spietata, e ingorda
Voglia di dominar la trasse a forza.”—Ces., p. 31.
He asks her to aid the cause with her prayers. This is not much to her liking; she would rather draw a sword against the tyrant. Cassius assures her that the prayers of woman have often had greater force than that of arms. Her reply is one of Pescetti’s unconscious gems of humor:
“Io dunque, poich’ à me stringer non lice
Contra il Tiranno il ferro, con la lingua
Gli farò cruda, e dispietata guerra.”—P. 32.
Towards the end of the scene Brutus indulges in an exultant outburst. He seems already to hear the paeans of joy resounding throughout Rome at the news of the Dictator’s death. The scene concludes as Portia invokes Heaven’s blessing on the conspirators’ enterprise. She announces her readiness to die, if failure attend their efforts, for the love she bears her husband is such that she cannot live without him.
We get a nearer approach to Shakespeare’s treatment in Portia’s dialogue with Brutus. This is opened by Brutus, who perceiving that Portia has wounded herself, and thinking that she had sustained the injury in the discharge of some household duty, reproves her for turning her hands to the lowly tools of the housewife. She replies:
“Hò voluto far prova, s’in me tanto
Regni animo, et ardir, che darmi possa
Di mia man morte, occasion venendo,
Ch’il morir bello, ò necessario sia.”—P. 49.
Brutus admires her courage, and inquires the reason for her fears. She assures him that often fortune opposes merit, and she fears for his safety. He loftily replies that fortune can no more prevail against the virtue of his enterprise than the raging sea against the immovable rocks. At this, Portia, in spite of her martial bearing heretofore, begins to exhibit the same vacillation as Shakespeare’s Portia. Fears for her husband now dominate; the Amazon is lost in the wife. She replies:
“Tuttavia, benche lei[[124]] non vinca mai,
Impedisce sovente i suoi disegni;
Et io, s’avvien (che no ’l consenta il cielo)
Che ciò, che tenti, abbia infelice effetto,
E dove pensi dar, riceva morte,
Hò stabilito di tenerti dietro.”—Pp. 49–50. Bru.— “Lodo, Porzia, et ammiro la grandezza,
E generosità della tua mente
Sprezzatrice del fato, e della morte,
E sopra modo pregiomi, et altiero
Vò di consorte tal.”
Yet he does not approve of her design, and conjures her, by the love she bears him, to refrain from all thoughts of self-destruction. Portia replies that she cannot live if he die;
“Porzia di Bruto moglie, e di Catone
Figlia? soffrir il volto del Tiranno,
Onde sia giunto a crudel morte il padre
Et il marito, potrà Porzia? O Bruto
Quanto più ti stimava accorto, e saggio?
Dunque in tant’ anni, che vissuto hai meco
Non hai l’animo mio compreso appieno?
Dell’ amor, ch’io ti porto, ancor potuto
Non ho farti ben chiaro? E tu mi stimi
Si poco amante, ch’io potessi senza
Tè star un’ ora in vita? Bru. Io sò, che m’ami:
Ma sò dall’ altra parte, che non meno
Saggia, che amante se’.”—P. 50.
The scene is now spun out to include a series of mutual protestations of love. It concludes as Calpurnia is seen coming out of the temple, whereupon Brutus and Portia descend from amatory dialogue to vulgar eavesdropping.
Plutarch relates that when Portia showed Brutus the wound in her thigh, “he was amazed to hear what she said to him, and lifting up his hands to heaven, he besought the gods to give him the grace he might bring his enterprise in so good pass, that he might be found a husband worthy of so noble a wife as Portia: so then he did comfort her the best he could.”[[125]] Pescetti does not rest Brutus’ appreciation of his wife on this basis; he rejoices in the possession of a wife so spirited. Shakespeare idealizes the situation in Brutus’ exclamation:
“O ye gods!
Render me worthy of this noble wife.”
Near the end of the third scene in which Portia figures, and wherein she and her husband overhear Calpurnia’s determination to prevent her husband from attending the session of the Senate, Brutus advises her to go home while he goes to join the conspirators. The scene concludes as she speeds him with her blessing.
Throughout these scenes Pescetti utilizes many of the motifs derived from Plutarch, which Shakespeare afterwards included in his treatment. But the emphasis upon several of them has been shifted; the similarity in parts between the two authors is due mainly to this common source. There are but two points of importance wherein distinctly individual resemblance is noticeable. Both in Pescetti and in Shakespeare, as has previously been pointed out, Portia enters the scene under practically the same attendant circumstances. In both dramas she appears immediately after the completion of the details of the assassination. Brutus says to Cassius:
“Ma giamo ad informar del tutto gli altri,
Acciò gli spirti destino, e le forze,
Et apparecchin l’arme all’ alta impresa. Cas.— Aspetta, ch’esce fuor di casa Porzia.”—P. 28.
Hereupon Portia enters.
Shakespeare has:
Cas.— The morning comes upon’s. We’ll leave you Brutus,
And, friends, disperse yourselves; but all remember
What you have said and show yourselves true Romans. Bru.— And, gentlemen, look fresh and merrily;
Let not our looks put on our purposes;
But bear it as our Roman actors do,
With untired spirits and formal constancy;
And so, good-morrow to you every one. Exeunt. Brutus remains. Act II., 1.
Immediately after the few lines to Lucius, Portia enters. While it may be simply a coincidence, it is worth remarking that in both dramas Portia arises in the early morning to seek her husband. There is no warrant for this in Plutarch. That Pescetti should have the conspirators perfecting their plans in the early morning may be regarded as a necessity of his dramatic form. Plutarch does not suggest this touch. Possibly Shakespeare considered it a gain in dramatic effectiveness to have the conspiracy confirmed during the tempestuous night. Perhaps Pescetti’s treatment influenced him. In both dramas the interrogator comments upon Portia’s early rising.
Cassius— Molto per tempo esci di casa, ò Porzia.—Ces., p. 29. Brutus— Portia, what mean you? Wherefore rise you now?
It is not for your health thus to commit
Your weak condition to the raw, cold morning.
Portia in soliloquy says:
Non senza gran cagion stamane uscito
Si per tempo di casa è il mio consorte.—Ces., p. 28.
In Shakespeare we read:
Portia— ... You’ve ungently, Brutus,
Stole from my bed.
Plutarch says: “So when the day was come, Brutus went out of his house with a dagger by his side under his long gown, that nobody saw nor knew but his wife only.” (Marcus Brutus, p. 116.) Thus, according to the biographer, the conspiracy had been perfected days before and Portia by this time evidently knew of it.
Neither is there any warrant in the histories for Portia’s prayer for Brutus:
“O Brutus,
The heavens speed thee in thine enterprise!”—Act II., Sc. IV.
Similarly, in Pescetti, Portia’s last words are a blessing on Brutus:
“Và, che ti scorga, e ti difenda Giove.”—P. 58.
Even closer is her prayer at the conclusion of Brutus’ rapturous outburst in her scene with Cassius:
“Ite, ò forti, ite ò saggi, ite ò de gli alti
Legnaggi, onde scendete, degni; il Cielo
Secondi i desir vostri.”—P. 33.
These coincidences may be simply accidental, but taken in connection with many other points of contact between the two dramas, they assume greater significance, and lend strength to the hypothesis herein advanced: that Shakespeare was influenced by Pescetti’s treatment to include the Brutus-Portia scenes in his own drama.