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Plays › The Tragedy of Julius Caesar › A Cobbler

A Cobbler

The Tragedy of Julius Caesar · 6 speeches across 1 scenes

A witty Roman commoner who leads the plebeians in holiday revelry, defying the tribunes.

Who they are

The Cobbler opens the play with a pun-filled defiance of the tribunes Murellus and Flavius, representing the festive, rebellious mood of the Roman populace. His wordplay—“a mender of bad soles”—both entertains and cloaks a political purpose: to celebrate Caesar’s triumph. He is a catalyst for conflict between the ruling class and the commoners, embodying the volatile energy that Caesar’s ambition stirs. The tribunes’ anger at him foreshadows the deeper class tensions that Brutus and Cassius will exploit.

Playing them

Play the Cobbler with mischievous, playful energy—his humor should disarm the tribunes, not inflame them. Vary vocal rhythms: slow, sly pauses before puns to let wordplay land. Physically, use broad, loose gestures (miming a shoe or awl) to contrast the tribunes’ stiff authority. The character has roots in Roman comedy; a light, almost vaudevillian delivery can highlight his role as a folk trickster.

Where they appear

Play A Cobbler

Take the part and Yorick reads every other role aloud, following you line by line as you speak.

Rehearse Julius Caesar on your phone: App Store · Google Play

Shakespeare the way it was meant to be had — out loud

These plays were written to be performed, not silently read. Yorick is a rehearsal app that lets you perform them: you take a part in any of Shakespeare’s 38 plays, and Yorick reads every other role aloud, listens while you speak your lines, keeps your place, and prompts you the moment you dry.

It is built for the person who has to be off book by tech week — school and college productions, community theatre, festivals, drama students and classical auditions — and for anyone who wants to hear a scene rather than skim it. Alongside the performance you get a plain-English translation of every speech, scene context, performance notes, and the ability to ask about any line and get an answer that already knows the play, the scene and who is speaking.

The text is the public-domain Cambridge/Globe edition. Translations and notes are AI-generated rehearsal aids for actors and students, not a scholarly apparatus. Yorick runs in a browser with nothing to install, and on iPhone and Android.