Shakespeare'S Julius Caesar

Julius Caesar is one of the most popular plays of William Shakespeare, read, annotated and played in schools and colleges in India. In India, the first edition of Julius Caesar was written by Sir Mark Hunter, in 1900, from Madras and Hugh Macmillan, writing the Preface to the Arden Julius Caesar (1902), acknowledged his debt to the very exhaustive and able edition prepared for Indian colleges by Sir Mark Hunter.
Since then, many eminent Indians have written on Julius Caesar and the Indian market, these days, is flooded with newer editions, some genuinely researched and some genuinely and unashamedly copied, badly mutilated. Dr. S.S. Agarwalla has undoubtedly burrowed into not only the English editions but also Indian editions of the play but what distinguishes him from others is that his approach, his style, his presentation, and his analysis is refreshing, useful and at times, radical and sweeping. They are intended to be no more than provocative and stimulating.
Julius Caesar is as much relevant today as it was during the Elizabethan Age because moral and political realism, the backbone of the play, remains the same in the contemporary world, India being no exception. Treachery, jealousy, conspiracy, assassination and battle, in the name of ‘ism’ is no less intense in our world than it was in the world of Julius Caesar. Therein lies the universality of Shakespeare.