Which speaker describes Brutus as ambitious but honorable in Antony's critique?

• A. Antony
• B. Brutus
• C. Cassius
• D. Octavius

Answer: (A)

This question centers on how rhetoric shapes how we perceive a character. In Antony’s funeral speech, he uses irony to present Brutus as both noble and, ultimately, motivated by ambition. He keeps repeating that Brutus is “an honorable man,” which the audience hears as praise, but he fills that praise with evidence and insinuation that Brutus acted from ambition as well as principle. By contrasting Brutus’ claimed motive—to save liberty—from Caesar’s supposed tyranny with concrete details like Caesar’s will and the people’s gifts, Antony guides the crowd to doubt Brutus’s solely virtuous image. The effect is a persuasive, nuanced portrayal: Brutus is described as honorable, yet the context and evidence suggest an ambitious motive behind the betrayal.