Portia

Who She Is

Portia is the wife of Brutus and Cato's daughter, and this is how she presents herself when she demands to know her husband's secret: a woman, but a woman of lineage and proven worth. She appears in two scenes, on the night before the Ides and on the morning when she awaits news from the Capitol, and afterward she is the death that Brutus reports to Cassius in the tent.

Trajectory

In Act II, Scene 1, she gets out of bed to find Brutus in the orchard, after the conspirators have left, and recalls that he rose from dinner the night before, gave her harsh looks, did not answer, and sent her away with a gesture. She asks what illness he is hiding and kneels: by the vow that made them one, she wants to know who the men are who visited him with hidden faces. She asks whether, in marriage, she is excluded from his secrets, and says that if that is all, she is Brutus's courtesan, not his wife. When he answers that she is his honorable wife, she retorts that if she were, she would know the secret. She says she is a woman, but Brutus's woman, and Cato's daughter, and proves her constancy with a wound she made in her own thigh. Brutus prays to the gods to make him worthy of such a woman, promises to tell her everything, and bids her enter.

In Act II, Scene 4, on the morning of the Ides, she sends Lucius to the Senate to see how Brutus is, but nearly lets slip the cause of her distress. She says, aside, that she has a man's mind but a woman's strength, and that it is hard for women to keep a secret:

She questions the Soothsayer, who wants to warn Caesar and fears being crushed by the crowd, and prays for her husband's success. Alone, she feels faint and sends Lucius back, with orders to bring news.

In Act IV, Scene 3, Brutus tells Cassius that she is dead: impatient at his absence and distressed by the news that Octavius and Antony had grown strong, she lost her mind and, with no one near, swallowed fire. Cassius is startled, and Brutus asks that no more be said of her. Shortly after, on hearing the confirmation from Messala, he accepts the loss like a Roman.

Themes Embodied

Portia demands what marriage gives her: to be treated as the half of Brutus, and not as one who lives on the outskirts of his goodwill. She bases her plea on Cato's lineage and on the wound in her thigh. In Act II, Scene 4, the firmness she showed before her husband does not withstand suspense, and she herself confesses it.

Portia and Calpurnia make the same gesture to two husbands who decide for themselves: they kneel and plead in the name of marriage, one that her husband not leave, the other that he tell what he is hiding. Brutus promises to tell and the play does not show him keeping it. Her death is told by Brutus to Cassius as news of a loss, and afterward Brutus hears the confirmation from Messala with the same calm, as if he did not know; the play does not explain the difference. Portia and the conspirators ask for trust in the same currency: the Honor and Reputation of one who says he knows how to keep a secret.

Relationships

• Brutus: her husband, from whom she demands the secret and for whom she waits, and whose absence, he says, drove her to madness.
• Calpurnia: the wife on the other side, who asks Caesar for the opposite, and is undone by Decius's flattery.
• Cassius: hears from Brutus the news of her death and asks how she escaped alive after he had crossed her.