EXCERPT FROM CORIOLANUS | Act 3 : Scene 3

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CORIOLANUS

You common cry of curs, whose breath I hate

As reek o’ th’ 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 rumor 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 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.

 

EXCERPT FROM CORIOLANUS | Act 5 : Scene 3

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VOLUMNIA 

Nay, go not from us thus.

If it were so, that our request did tend

To save the Romans, thereby to destroy

The Volsces whom you serve, you might condemn us

As poisonous of your honor. No, our suit

Is that you reconcile them, while the Volsces

May say “This mercy we have showed,” the Romans

“This we received,” and each in either side

Give the all-hail to thee and cry “Be blest

For making up this peace!” Thou know’st, great son,

The end of war’s uncertain, but this certain,

That, if thou conquer Rome, the benefit

Which thou shalt thereby reap is such a name

Whose repetition will be dogged with curses,

Whose chronicle thus writ: “The man was noble,

But with his last attempt he wiped it out,

Destroyed his country, and his name remains

To th’ ensuing age abhorred.” Why dost not speak?

Think’st thou it honorable for a noble man

Still to remember wrongs?—Daughter, speak you.

He cares not for your weeping.—Speak thou, boy.

Perhaps thy childishness will move him more

Than can our reasons.—There’s no man in the world

More bound to ’s mother, yet here he lets me prate

Like one i’ th’ stocks. Thou hast never in thy life

Showed thy dear mother any courtesy

When she, poor hen, fond of no second brood,

Has clucked thee to the wars and safely home,

Loaden with honor. Say my request’s unjust

And spurn me back; but if it be not so,

Thou art not honest, and the gods will plague thee!

That thou restrain’st from me the duty which

To a mother’s part belongs.—He turns away.—

Down, ladies! Let us shame him with our knees.

To his surname Coriolanus ’longs more pride

Than pity to our prayers. Down! An end.

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They kneel.

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This is the last. So, we will home to Rome

And die among our neighbors.—Nay, behold ’s.

This boy that cannot tell what he would have,

But kneels and holds up hands for fellowship,

Does reason our petition with more strength

Than thou hast to deny ’t.—Come, let us go.

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They rise.

 

This fellow had a Volscian to his mother,

His wife is in Corioles, and his child

Like him by chance.—Yet give us our dispatch.

I am hushed until our city be afire,

And then I’ll speak a little.