Brutus had rather be a villager
Than to repute himself a son of Rome
Under these hard conditions as this time
Is like to lay upon us.
--Act I, Scene 2, Lines 170-173
I still do not understand the modern english translations in No Fear Shakespeare and Shakespeare Made Easy, so please try to make it simpler. Thanks!
Answers:
Brutus says: I'd rather be a common man than a politician right now. Times are going to get tough, and the politicians are going to be blamed.
Read what Cassius says before this:
CASSIUS:
Why, man, he doth bestride the narrow world
Like a Colossus, and we petty men
Walk under his huge legs and peep about
To find ourselves dishonourable graves.
Men at some time are masters of their fates:
The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,
But in ourselves, that we are underlings.
Brutus and Caesar: what should be in that 'Caesar'?
Why should that name be sounded more than yours?
Write them together, yours is as fair a name;
Sound them, it doth become the mouth as well;
Weigh them, it is as heavy; conjure with 'em,
Brutus will start a spirit as soon as Caesar.
Now, in the names of all the gods at once,
Upon what meat doth this our Caesar feed,
That he is grown so great? Age, thou art shamed!
Rome, thou hast lost the breed of noble bloods!
When went there by an age, since the great flood,
But it was famed with more than with one man?
When could they say till now, that talk'd of Rome,
That her wide walls encompass'd but one man?
Now is it Rome indeed and room enough,
When there is in it but one only man.
O, you and I have heard our fathers say,
There was a Brutus once that would have brook'd
The eternal devil to keep his state in Rome
As easily as a king.
BRUTUS
That you do love me, I am nothing jealous;
What you would work me to, I have some aim:
How I have thought of this and of these times,
I shall recount hereafter; for this present,
I would not, so with love I might entreat you,
Be any further moved. What you have said
I will consider; what you have to say
I will with patience hear, and find a time
Both meet to hear and answer such high things.
Till then, my noble friend, chew upon this:
Brutus had rather be a villager
Than to repute himself a son of Rome
Under these hard conditions as this time
Is like to lay upon us.
Brutus would rather live a simple life than one of luxury
Brutus is trying to say that he is a man of the people and would not under any circumstances act as imperiously as Caesar is acting. And yet he shares the very same ambition.
"In one of the first exchanges, Brutus and his co-conspirator Cassius talk about the inability of the eye to see itself. Brutus, a deliberately unemotional Stoic, is driven by feelings he is blind to, including his own desire for power and status."
Brutus would have a better REPUTEation as a villager
Than a reputation as a son of Rome (Roman Citizen?)
Because right now living is hard. ( is citizenship always something to be proud of? what if your elected president had done something really bad that made Americans look really bad would you still want to be thought of as American did the Germans want people to know they were Germans after having Hitler in charge only you can decide if being a citizen is always worth it.) the translation stops at living is hard have fun.
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