Julius Caesar

Thomas May (1625-30)

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Historical Records

Biographia Dramatica (1812), 3:437 Google Books:

Julius Caesar. Trag. by Thomas May. The original MS. of this play, which is in five short acts, is in the possession of Mr. Stephen Jones. The author has affixed his name at the conclusion of the piece.

Theatrical Provenance

It has been suggested that the play may have been performed either at Sidney Sussex College or at Gray's Inn, but there is no evidence to support these claims. See the "Critical Commentary" section below.

Probable Genre(s)

Latin tragedy (Harbage).

Possible Narrative and Dramatic Sources or Analogues

Although May's passion for Lucan makes the latter's Civil War appear as the most probable source of the play, Caesar's legacy had reached the Renaissance through many other texts, such as such as Appian's Civil Wars, Plutarch's Lives, Lucan's Civil War, Suetonius's Lives of the Twelve Caesars, Cassius Dio's Roman History and Caesar's own works. The use of these as sources can in no way be ruled out.

For a summary of Catiline's conspiracy, in which Caesar was rumoured to have taken part, see "Catiline's Conspiracy"; for the main events of Caesar's life from the so-called First Triumvirate, see "Caesar and Pompey".

References to the Play

None known.

Critical Commentary

Moore Smith (105) suggests, for unfathomable reasons, that a production of the play took place at Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, in 1616, but this is unprovable and not especially probable.

As far as the dating of the play is concerned, Chester (99) contends as follows:

Concerning the Latin tragedy of Julius Caesar, our suppositions must be even more tenuous. Although this play, which never reached the press, existed for many years in manuscript, it has disappeared without a trace. If we exclude the possibility that May wrote it during the tender years of his residence at Cambridge, two possible dates of composition suggest themselves. The first of these is the period of May's residence at Gray's Inn – that is, 1616 or 1617 – when the play may have been written for performance at the Inns of Court. A more plausible supposition would be a date between 1625 and 1630, during which years May's attention was engaged by Roman history, as witness his English tragedies and his translation of the Pharsalia, the latter a work which undoubtedly served as an important source for the play. We may conclude, I think, that all of May's tragedies were written between 1625 and 1631.

Bentley (4:838): "One suspects that most of this information is not first-hand. Dr. Chester searched for the manuscript without success (Thomas May, p. 99, n. 5.) The evidence for the authorship or even the existence of this play is so slight as to make speculation concerning its date futile."

Bowers (192) . . .

Norbrook argues that this play may have shared the political concerns of May's tragedy of Julia Agrippina (1628), which "drew on Lucan in a stark portrayal of imperial corruption."

For What It's Worth

Will the manuscript containing the tragedy ever be recovered? As early as 1909, Ayres queried: "Can any one tell me where the MS. of Thomas May's tragedy on Julius Caesar is to be found?" Over 200 years after the manuscript was said to be in Stephen Jones's possession, the hopes of recovering it appear exceedingly faint.

A few reflections can also be made regarding the relation between this play and May's Continuation of Lucan’s Historical Poem till the Death of Julius Caesar (1630) and Supplementum Lucani (1640).

Works Cited

Ayres, Harry Morgan. Notes and Queries 11 (1909), 248. Internet Archive

Baker, David Erskine, Issac Reed, and Stephen Jones, eds. Biographia Dramatica; or, A Companion to the Playhouse. 3 vols. London: Longman et al., 1812. (NB: Baker to 1764, Reed to 1782, and Jones to 1811.)

Bowers, Fredson Thayer, ed. The Dictionary of Literary Biography vol. 58: Jacobean and Caroline Dramatists. Detroit: Gale Research Company, 1987.

Chester, Allan Griffith. Thomas May: Man of letters, 1595-1650. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1932.

Moore Smith, George Charles. College Plays: Performed in the University of Cambridge. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1923.

Norbrook, David. "May, Thomas (b. in or after 1596, d. 1650)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004.

Paleit, Edward. War, Liberty, and Caesar: Responses to Lucan’s Bellum Ciuile, ca. 1580–1650. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013.

Site created and maintained by Domenico Lovascio, University of Genoa; updated 26 July 2015.