Coriolanus is one of Shakespeare’s later tragedies. The main character Coriolanus received mixed reviews and opinions throughout history, a lot of them, negative. But I have been drawn to this tragic hero, more so than Macbeth – I guess partly because I’m now a bit more familiar with Shakespeare’s plays and I understand his language better – but as a person, I found him quite irresistible, he’s arrogant and angry, but also valiant, noble, modest, honest, and straightforward. A man who is too consistent and uncompromising to bend his knees, he snaps in the end. Even his name, I love his name, Caius Martius Coriolanus – I love the vows, the rhythm and just the sound of it!
I’ve been thinking a lot about him recently. One question is, what caused this tragedy? I kept thinking, if he didn’t do this, things would have turned out better; or if he did this, he wouldn’t have come to a nasty end. If he could have avoided even just one thing! But he acts completely consistent with his character. He’s doomed right from the beginning. The tragedy cannot be avoided.
I’ve also been thinking about what he wants as a protagonist. As we watch him act by act, scene by scene, what does he really want that he doesn’t realise? It’s really hard work! it’s Shakespeare first of all, his character is so complex; and secondly, it’s Coriolanus we’re talking about, who famously is a mystery, who does not open his heart to the audience.
So in this post, we’ll first of all look at my first impression of Coriolanus himself, secondly the relationship between himself and the crowd, lastly what I think is the reason that causes the tragedy.
The story
Roman citizens are at the brink of a riotous protest against the nobilities at the beginning of the play, claiming Caius Martius ‘chief enemy to the people’. But an impending war against the Volsces directs everyone’s attention externally. Martius leads the Roman army, successfully conquers Corioles and wins himself the name ‘Coriolanus’. People line the streets to welcome him home. When Coriolanus asks their votes for him to become consul, they give willingly but almost immediately change their mind, being persuaded by their leaders. The war hero is exiled. Where will he go? He joins the Volsces his former enemy and vows to revenge on his own countrymen.
First impression
So far, what’s your initial impression of Coriolanus? A war hero but somehow also the chief enemy to the people. Harold Bloom calls him a ‘one-man army, the greatest killing machine in all of Shakespeare’, ‘an overgrown child’, ‘anywhere except upon a battlefield, he is, at best, a disaster waiting to happen’. He says, ‘That Coriolanus is not totally unsympathetic is a Shakespearean triumph’. I think he means, Coriolanus is so cold-blooded, it’s amazing Shakespeare manages to make him show some feelings.
I read the chapter in Bloom’s book very quickly and didn’t have time to understand everything so I hesitate to say I disagree with him. But let’s just use those comments as a starting point.
I think Coriolanus is not unsympathetic, he does have feelings and emotions, I’d even go so far as to say he’s a very sensitive person. When his wife welcomes him home after war in tears, he says, ‘wouldst thou have laugh’d had I come coffin’d home, That weep’st to see me triumph? Ah, my dear, Such eyes the widows in Corioles wear, And mothers that lack sons’ (Act 2 Scene 1). In the midst of brutal fighting and killing, he notices the sorrow in the eyes of the young wives and old mothers in the enemy’s city. He feels and remembers their sadness. Which I think is remarkable!
When he’s provoked, he’s so full of emotions his sentences sometimes get incoherent. his frustration turns into anger and bursts like fireworks. And the crowd interprets his angry and abusive language as hatred towards them – he does not love the people. But that’s not true, like Menenius the old friend says
One, ‘he has been bred i’th’ wars Since a could draw a sword, and is ill-school’d In bolted (meaning refined) language (Act 3 Scene 1)’ – He’s just not good at talking!
Two, ‘His nature is too noble for the world. He would not flatter Neptune for his trident Or Jove for’s power to thunder. His heart’s his mouth. What his breast forges, that his tongue must vent, And, being angry, does forget that ever he heard the name of death (Act 3 Scene 1)’ – He doesn’t hide his feelings and thoughts, he’ll say whatever comes to his mind without weighing the cost or worrying about offending people!
Three, ‘He loves your people, But tie him not to be their bedfellow (Act 2 Scene 2)’!
That’s just some initial thoughts. a lot of people see him as a pure brute, but I think there’s a lot more to him.
Act 1 Scene 1 – The divided opinion of the crowd
Let’s admire Shakespeare’s genius for a second. Act 1 Scene 1 we get dropped right into the action, almost half sentence.
First Citizen: Before we proceed any further, hear me speak.
All: Speak, speak.
Proceed what further? What are they doing? On stage, you see a crowd rushing in, waving sticks and clubs. You can probably tell from their bare feet, bony arms and dirty rags that they’re poor. It’s some sort of a riot.
First Citizen: You are all resolved rather to die than to famish?
All: Resolved, resolved.
OK their problem seems to be that they’re starving. They’re on their way to protest with a firm resolution, they will not back down, they’d rather die in protest today than go home hungry again. Who is this protest against? Surprise surprise, it’s Coriolanus, our protagonist, at this stage still called Caius Martius.
We don’t see the protagonist with our own eyes, instead, we hear a third party who talks about the protagonist. It makes things more interesting, it adds more layers into the picture. Just to unpack a little.
When you have a third party, especially here, a crowd, you get lots of different opinions. Someone thinks this person organised, someone thinks the same person chaotic. Which one do I believe? Can they both be true? Secondly, who is this third party? Can I trust them? Does this third party know our protagonist well? In what capacity? Otherwise why would I trust their opinion of him?
So carry on Act 1 Scene 1:
First Citizen: First, you know Caius Martius is chief enemy to the people.
All: We know’t, we know’t.
First Citizen: Let us kill him, and we’ll have corn at our own price. Is’t a verdict?
All: No more talking on’t, let it be done. Away, away.
So we see people’s opinion of Martius: Everyone knows and agrees that Martius is the chief enemy, they’ll kill him and they’ll be able to buy corn and not starve. Then the first citizen explains to the audience how the aristocrats hoard food while leaving nothing to the ordinary citizens. At this point, we hear a second individual citizen speaks:
Second Citizen: Would you proceed especially against Caius Martius?
All: Against him first. He’s a very dog to the commonalty.
See an interesting dynamic here, among the same group of poor citizens, there’s a questioning voice. Why do you single out Caius Martius? Obviously an aristocrat but we soon learn, not the one in charge. Martius’ crime is repeated, ‘he’s a very dog to the commonalty’ meaning exactly, he’s ‘chief enemy to the people’. There’s no reason no explanation. He’s the enemy, don’t ask us to explain why. Now we hear about a different aspect of our protagonist:
Second Citizen: Consider you what services he has done for his country?
First Citizen: Very well; and could be content to give him good report for’t, but that he pays himself with being proud.
We hear a second opinion of Martius. The first one, he’s the enemy of the people. The second one, he has done services for his country. And the first citizen can’t disagree. Even though the first citizen hates him as the enemy, the one who the first citizen thinks is starving the common people, even he can’t deny Martius has done services for his country. Not only that, but he’s even willing to ‘give him good report for’t’! However, the first citizen is still against him, reason? he’s arrogant about his services to the country.
Second Citizen: Nay, but speak not maliciously.
First Citizen: I say unto you, what he hath done famously, he did it to that end. Though soft-conscienced men can be content to say it was for his country, he did it to please his mother and to be partly proud – which he is, even to the altitude of his virtue.
Martius is arrogant but valiant, valiant but arrogant. His services are to win fame, to please his mother and to be proud of what he’s capable of – not really for his country and people. One thing that’s particularly fascinating to me – how does the whole country come to know that Martius fights to please his mother?!
What will the second citizen say in response?
Second Citizen: What he cannot help in his nature you account a vice in him. You must in no way say he is covetous.
Don’t blame it on him, it’s not his fault, he can’t help being proud, or he can’t help being valiant. ‘He can’t help being proud’ is slightly questionable. But either way, you can’t say he is covetous – according to the dictionary, covetous means ‘having or showing a great desire to possess something belonging to someone else’. We see this proven true later on, in Act 1 Scene 10, which is my favourite scene. After Corioles is conquered, the general asks Martius to pick one-tenth of the riches of the city, anything he wants, before the common distribution of the spoils. Martius replies,
‘I thank you, general But cannot make my heart consent to take A bribe to pay my sword. I do refuse it, And stand upon my common part with those That have upheld the doing.’ (Act 1 Scene 10)
I will not take more or before my fellow soldiers. That’s definitely not covetous. In addition, I find him wonderfully modest. When he’s praised for his valour and victory, he blushes and is embarrassed like a boy, and keeps asking people to stop talking about it.
‘No more, I say! For that I have not wash’d My nose that bled, or foil’d some debile wretch, Which without note here’s many else have done, you shout me forth In acclamations hyperbolical; As if I lov’d my little should be dieted In praises sauc’d with lies.’ (Act 1 Scene 10)
Stop blowing trumpets and shouting my name. Just because I haven’t washed the blood from my nose, or because I have defeated some weak enemies – many fellow soldiers here did the same unnoticed – you are exaggerating my small achievements. He rushed into Corioles city gate all by himself and combatted a fierce warrior straight after – these are no small achievements. I love how again he draws attention to his fellow soldiers and gives them praise instead.
It’s extremely puzzling how a man can be so modest but so proud at the same time. But I do love him for it. Back to our two citizens. Second citizen just said, you must in no way say he is covetous. The conversation continues.
First Citizen: If I must not, I need not be barren of accusations. He hath faults, with surplus, to tire in repetition.
Notice how Citizen No.1 is reluctantly agreeing again, that Martius is not covetous. Fine, he’s done services to the country, he’s not covetous. But he has plenty of other faults, I can’t be bothered to list them all one by one, there are too many!
By this point, we’re only at line 40 in Act 1 Scene 1, if you’re watching this on stage, all these will be gone in about a minute! But we’ve already learnt a lot about Martius, a man with a complex personality, who divides opinions, even within the same political group.
Martius & the fickle crowd
When Martius finally enters the scene, facing the same mob, we immediately hear his opinion of the people, in passionate abusive language! His main problem with them is their fickleness.
Martius: He that depends Upon your favours swims with fins of lead, And hews down oaks with rushes. Hang ye! Trust ye? With every minute you do change a mind, And call him noble that was now your hate, Him vile that was your garland.
Someone whom you hate this minute, you will say he’s noble the next. Someone whom you think vile this moment will become your hero the next. These lines are prophetic. This is exactly what happens between Martius and the people later.
Right now, he’s the chief enemy of the people; when he’s back from the war victorious, people crowded the streets to see him and cheer him; they give him their votes to be consul when he’s with them in the marketplace; within the same act same scene, they take their votes back. Next thing you know they banish him shouting down with him! As soon as they hear about Coriolanus is coming back in revenge, they say:
First Citizen: For mine own part, When I said ‘banish him’ I said ‘twas pity.
Second Citizen: And so did I.
Third Citizen: And so did I, and to say the truth so did very many of us. That we did, we did for the best, and though we willingly consented to his banishment, yet it was against our will. (Act 4 Scene 6)
They did it willingly but it was against their will! This is where I wholeheartedly agree with Coriolanus’ judgement of them. It sounded harsh then, but facing these fickle fools, what can I say but echo Coriolanus in Act 1 Scene 1: ‘Hang ye! Trust ye?’ Coriolanus was completely correct! ‘With every minute you do change a mind, And call him noble that was now your hate, Him vile that was your garland.’
Coriolanus asking for ‘voices’
Among all these back and forth between Coriolanus and the crowd, there’s one speech I was particularly drawn to. After the victory on the battlefield, Coriolanus goes to the marketplace to ask the common people for their votes for him to become consul. (Just to clarify the definition of Consul, consul in ancient Rome is each of the two annually elected chief magistrates who jointly ruled the republic.) This is what Coriolanus says:
Your voices! For your voices I have fought,
Watch’d for your voices, for your voices bear
Of wounds two dozen odd; battles thrice six
I have seen and heard of; for your voices
Have done many things, some less, some more.
Your voices! Indeed I would be consul. (Act 2 Scene 3)
For your voices I have fought and watched – Did he do the fighting, shed his blood, stand guard at night, tired and cold, thinking if he does that, the people will be more likely to vote for him? No! Not any true soldier will do that. Not for the vote, or political reasons. He fights because that’s the right thing to do, as a Roman, it’s right to fight and watch to protect his home country.
It’s for you, your life and your home I have fought, not your votes. Isn’t that obvious? Yes, it should be obvious. Coriolanus fights for you and your family, you should naturally give him your vote in gratitude. He deserves it. But custom demands that Coriolanus has to ask for it, in his own words, to beg. He’s playing the part of begging and saying the words that are expected of him, to fulfill the custom, to make the people happy. But for him, this is utter humiliation.
For your voices bear of wounds two dozen odd; battles thrice six I have seen and heard of – He has plenty bloody stories to tell, to impress them with, he has plenty wounds and scars to show. He could have said, maybe like many people before him, I have fought in 18 battles since I was 16, and have three scars on my back, one from this city gate, the other from when a giant ambushed me.
Like his mother and Menenius, they count and remember all his wounds. Shakespeare gives us this absurd dialogue between Coriolanus’ mother and old friend as a contrast.
Volumnia: I’th’ shoulder and i’th’ left arm. There will be large cicatrices (scars) to show the people when he shall stand for his place. He received in the repulse of Tarquin seven hurts i’th’ body. Menenius: One i’th’ neck and two i’th’ thigh – there’s nine that I know. Volumnia: He had before this last expedition twenty-five wounds upon him. Menenius: Now it’s twenty-seven. Every gash was an enemy’s grave. (Act 2 Scene 1)
If you don’t want to be precise, you can exaggerate and dramatise the stories a bit. Like Cominius the general promises to do on his behalf.
Cominius: I’ll report it Where senators shall mingle tears with smiles, Where great patricians shall attend, and shrug, I’th’ end admire; where ladies shall be frighted And, gladly quak’d, hear more; where the dull tribunes, That with the fusty plebeians hate thine honours, Shall say against their hearts ‘We thank the gods Our Rome hath such a soldier.’ (Act 1 Scene 10)
Instead, Coriolanus just simply says, he bears of wounds two dozen odd; battles thrice six I have seen and heard of. Coriolanus hasn’t just ‘seen and heard of the battles, he was always at the front, he rushed into the gate of Corioles alone and had the whole city to answer for alone.
In contrast to the usual ways of politicians, he tries very hard to minimise his effort and bravery and seems to aim to impress them as little as possible. Why? Because boasting is against his sense of integrity. Words are empty and false. I will die for my country in battle with my body, but I will not flatter or entertain you with my tongue.
Unreasonable as it is when you spell it out, people don’t like it! We will be flattered, we will be entertained by your scars, and we will hold onto our ancient right and if you don’t beg, we will not give the vote to you. We forget all about your battles and wounds because the battles are won and we now live in peace and safety. What can I say except ‘Hang’em!’
Despite all these, he asks people patiently, reigning in his temper. He’s putting on a show, a most unwilling actor. On the one hand, he can’t genuinely ask humbly, because he thinks he deserves it without going through the formality of the asking. ‘Better it is to die, better to starve, Than crave the hire which first we do deserve’. On the other hand, he can’t act hypocritically and play the politician either, because it’s against his nature to brag about himself. ‘I had rather be their servant in my way Than sway with them in theirs’ (Act 2 Scene 1)
So when he cries ‘your voices!’, he’s treading a very thin line here. He’s making an effort to submit to people’s expectations of him, at the same time, he’s being true to himself, holding on to his integrity. This is a vulnerable moment, I feel for him and I love him for it!
What does he want?
That’s also the highest point of the arc of his tragedy – he won the victory and was given the glory, honour and the new name ‘Coriolanus’ by the aristocrats, he now even has the voices of the people.
Sixth Citizen: He has done nobly, and cannot go without any honest man’s voice.
Seventh Citizen: Therefore let him be consul. The gods give him joy and make him good friend to the people!
All the Citizens: Amen, amen, God save thee, noble consul! (Act 2 Scene 3)
All the victories seem to give him the false impression that he can be the winner in every area of life. His mother gives a very cinematic description of her god-like son:
Hark, the trumpets. These are the ushers of Martius. Before him He carries noise, and behind him he leaves tears. Death, that dark spirit, in’s nervy arm doth lie, Which being advanc’d, declines; and then men die. (Act 2 Scene 1)
It makes my hair stand up on the back of my neck! But very soon it turns out he’s not in control of everything, things are rapidly falling apart and it’s all downhill from this point on.
He’s confident he’ll be elected consul but to his shocking surprise, they deny him – he can’t control people’s heart, their opinions or the final result. When that happens, he experiences failure for the first time.
He resolves for a reconciliation with the people, but can’t bear the humiliation or control his temper. He can’t control others, he can’t control himself.
He has always won battles, he has always conquered, he has never failed. And he’s always praised for it. That upbringing and life experience make it extremely difficult for him to face failure and admit defeat. It’s impossible for Coriolanus. He’d rather be killed than be defeated, which is easier to achieve on the battlefield, but life is more complicated. When the people shout to banish him, he shouts ‘I banish you!’ Meaning, I’m not defeated, I’m not forced to leave, I choose to leave. Even in this total disaster, he’s still pretending he’s the one in charge.
He wants absolute control. He wants things to go his way, when it doesn’t, the world collapses. He doesn’t try to find a way to mend things or find a common ground to talk. He’s too proud to compromise or even explain himself. He just walks out saying, ‘thus I turn my back. There is a world elsewhere.’ (Act 3 Scene 3) which sounds quite cool but I think it’s the reason of his tragedy.
He lives in the delusion of his absolute power, he’s trying to play god. No human being has total control or any control really of the result of wars, or people’s opinions, or one’s own emotions. But Coriolanus lives in the delusion that he has. The harder he grips, the more he loses. In the end, he loses everything. I do love this man, it’s really sad to watch till the end.
A lot of things happen in Act 4 and 5 which I avoided so as not to spoil the story too much. There are also a lot more excellent speeches which I can’t comment on. Again this is just my reading of Coriolanus. What do you think of him?
A Day of Small Things 