Coriolanus Act Three – “How shall this bisson multitude digest the senate's courtesy?”

Coriolanus Act Three – “How shall this bisson multitude digest the senate's courtesy?”

‘Coriolanus’ Act Three moves back to the Capitol where Coriolanus hears that Aufidius is raising a new army. Coriolanus fears that has raised a new army. Coriolanus worries an attack on Rome by the Volsces is imminent but he is assured that the Vosces can not raise their army again so quickly.

Then tribunes enter and inform all assembled that the citizens of Rome will not accept Coriolanus as a consul. Brutus and Sicinius are accused by Coriolanus of rallying the common citizens against him. Then Coriolanus rails against the common people:

“Now, as I live, I will. My nobler friends,

I crave their pardons:

For the mutable, rank-scented many, let them

Regard me as I do not flatter, and

Therein behold themselves: I say again,

In soothing them, we nourish 'gainst our senate

The cockle of rebellion, insolence, sedition,

Which we ourselves have plough'd for, sow'd,

and scatter'd,

By mingling them with us, the honour'd number,

Who lack not virtue, no, nor power, but that

Which they have given to beggars…

As for my country I have shed my blood,

Not fearing outward force, so shall my lungs

Coin words till their decay against those measles,

Which we disdain should tatter us, yet sought

The very way to catch them…

O good but most unwise patricians! why,

You grave but reckless senators, have you thus

Given Hydra here to choose an officer,

That with his peremptory 'shall,' being but

The horn and noise o' the monster's, wants not spirit

To say he'll turn your current in a ditch,

And make your channel his? If he have power

Then vail your ignorance; if none, awake

Your dangerous lenity. If you are learn'd,

Be not as common fools; if you are not,

Let them have cushions by you. You are plebeians,

If they be senators: and they are no less,

When, both your voices blended, the great'st taste

Most palates theirs. They choose their magistrate,

And such a one as he, who puts his 'shall,'

His popular 'shall' against a graver bench

Than ever frown in Greece. By Jove himself!

It makes the consuls base: and my soul aches

To know, when two authorities are up,

Neither supreme, how soon confusion

May enter 'twixt the gap of both and take

The one by the other.”

Then Menenius urges Coriolanus to go to the market and ask for the plebeians to pardon him. Coriolanus is accused of treason by Brutus and Sicinius and they call for Coriolanus to be arrested and eventually they call for him to be executed. Coriolanus draws his sword, and a number of Senators try to help him but they are all swept away by a mob. Coriolanus takes refuge in the house of a senator. Menenius calms the crowd, makes them understand that Coriolanus is a soldier unschooled in rhetoric and he eventually convinces them to let him talk to Coriolanus and bring him before them to later air their dispute with him.

“Consider this: he has been bred i' the wars

Since he could draw a sword, and is ill school'd

In bolted language; meal and bran together

He throws without distinction. Give me leave,

I'll go to him, and undertake to bring him

Where he shall answer, by a lawful form,

In peace, to his utmost peril…

I'll bring him to you.”

We cross to Coriolanus where he tells a group of Roman nobles that he has no intention of changing his character to suit the desires of the mob. Volumnia comes in and berates him for his belligerence.

“You might have been enough the man you are,

With striving less to be so; lesser had been

The thwartings of your dispositions, if

You had not show'd them how ye were disposed

Ere they lack'd power to cross you.”

Then Menenius arrives and says to Coriolanus that he should take back what he said and then maybe the plebeians might recant and make him into a consul. and their tribunes, and then perhaps they will allow him to be consul. Initially Coriolanus refuses, but eventually his mother convinces him otherwise.

“Pray, be counsell'd:

I have a heart as little apt as yours,

But yet a brain that leads my use of anger

To better vantage…

You are too absolute;

Though therein you can never be too noble,

But when extremities speak. I have heard you say,

Honour and policy, like unsever'd friends,

I' the war do grow together: grant that, and tell me,

In peace what each of them by the other lose,

That they combine not there…If it be honour in your wars to seem

The same you are not, which, for your best ends,

You adopt your policy, how is it less or worse,

That it shall hold companionship in peace

With honour, as in war, since that to both

It stands in like request?

…Now it lies you on to speak

To the people; not by your own instruction,

Nor by the matter which your heart prompts you,

But with such words that are but rooted in

Your tongue, though but bastards and syllables

Of no allowance to your bosom's truth.

Now, this no more dishonours you at all

Than to take in a town with gentle words,

Which else would put you to your fortune and

The hazard of much blood.

I would dissemble with my nature where

My fortunes and my friends at stake required

I should do so in honour: I am in this,

Your wife, your son, these senators, the nobles;

And you will rather show our general louts

How you can frown than spend a fawn upon 'em,

For the inheritance of their loves and safeguard

Of what that want might ruin…

I prithee now, sweet son, as thou hast said

My praises made thee first a soldier, so,

To have my praise for this, perform a part

Thou hast not done before…let

Thy mother rather feel thy pride than fear

Thy dangerous stoutness, for I mock at death

With as big heart as thou. Do as thou list

Thy valiantness was mine, thou suck'dst it from me,

But owe thy pride thyself.”

In the marketplace, Brutus and Sicinius prepare to further sabotage and stir Coriolanus so that he will lose his temper. Coriolanus enters with accompanied by Menenius and Cominius, and announces that he will submit to whatever is the will of the common people. Then Sicinius charges Coriolanus with contriving “to take from Rome all season’d office and to wind yourself (himself) into power tryrannical…” and Coriolanus becomes angry and then attacks the tribunes and the plebeians again. “The fires i' the lowest hell fold-in the people!

Call me their traitor! Thou injurious tribune!

Within thine eyes sat twenty thousand deaths,

In thy hand clutch'd as many millions, in

Thy lying tongue both numbers, I would say

'Thou liest' unto thee with a voice as free

As I do pray the gods…

Let them pronounce the steep Tarpeian death,

Vagabond exile, raying, pent to linger

But with a grain a day, I would not buy

Their mercy at the price of one fair word;

Nor cheque my courage for what they can give,

To have't with saying 'Good morrow.'”

Sicinius answers back and says that Coriolanus should be banished from Rome and the people agree. Cominius tries to talk and defend Coriolanus but Coriolanus says that he will gladly leave the city:

“You common cry of curs! whose breath I hate

As reek o' the rotten fens, whose loves I prize

As the dead carcasses of unburied men

That do corrupt my air, I banish you;

And here remain with your uncertainty!

Let every feeble rumour shake your hearts!

Your enemies, with nodding of their plumes,

Fan you into despair! Have the power still

To banish your defenders; till at length

Your ignorance, which finds not till it feels,

Making not reservation of yourselves,

Still your own foes, deliver you as most

Abated captives to some nation

That won you without blows! Despising,

For you, the city, thus I turn my back:

There is a world elsewhere.”