CORIOLANUS

in full Caius Marcius Coriolanus, aristocratic Roman soldier in Shakespeare's tragedy Coriolanus. Trained by his mother, Volumnia, to be brave and disdainful, Coriolanus is the perfect warrior, but he is incapable of bending to the political expediencies of peacetime. His arrogance and pride, combined with a pathological need for Volumnia's approval, bring about his downfall and death. The affection Coriolanus shows for his wife, Virgilia, points to a potentially better nature that has been destroyed by his mother's malign influence. the last of the so-called political tragedies by William Shakespeare, produced in 160708 and published in the First Folio of 1623 from an authorial fair copy, edited for the printer. The five-act play, based on the life of Gnaeus Marcius Coriolanus, a legendary Roman hero of the late 6th and early 5th centuries BC, is essentially an expansion of the Plutarchan biography. Though it is Elizabethan in structure, it is sharply classical in tone. The action of the play follows Caius Marcius (afterwards Caius Marcius Coriolanus) through several phases of his career. He is shown as an arrogant young nobleman in peacetime, as a bloodstained and valiant warrior against the city of Corioli, and as a modest victor and candidate for consul. When he refuses to flatter the Roman citizens, for whom he feels contempt, or to show them his wounds to win their vote, they turn on him and banish him. Bitterly he joins forces with his enemy Aufidius, a Volscian, against Rome. Leading the enemy to the edge of the city, Coriolanus is ultimately persuaded by his mother, Volumniawho brings with her Coriolanus' wife, Virgilia, and his sonto make peace with Rome, and in the end he is killed. Coriolanus is in many ways unusual for Shakespearean drama: it has a single narrative line, its images are compact and sharply effective, and its most effective moments are characterized by understatement or silence. When the banished Coriolanus returns at the head of the opposing army, he says little to Menenius, the trusted family friend and politician, or to Volumnia, who have come to plead for Rome. His mother's argument is long and sustained, and for more than 50 lines he listens, until his resolution is broken from within: then, as a stage direction in the original edition testifies, he holds her by the hand, silent. In his own words, he has obeyed instinct and betrayed his dependence; he cannot stand / As if a man were author of himself / And knew no other kin. Thus is his desire for revenge defeated. While his mother is hailed as patroness, the life of Rome, Coriolanus returns to the enemy city, where he is accused of treachery and meets his fate at the hands of a mob.