Coriolanus: Act 1, Scene 1 Translation

Enter a company of mutinous Citizens with staves,
clubs, and other weapons.

FIRST CITIZEN Before we proceed any further, hear me
speak.

ALL Speak, speak!

FIRST CITIZEN You are all resolved rather to die than to
famish? 5

ALL Resolved, resolved!

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 10
our own price. Is ’t a verdict?

ALL No more talking on ’t; let it be done. Away, away!

SECOND CITIZEN One word, good citizens.

FIRST CITIZEN We are accounted poor citizens, the patricians
good. What authority surfeits on would 15
relieve us. If they would yield us but the superfluity
while it were wholesome, we might guess they
relieved us humanely. But they think we are too
dear. The leanness that afflicts us, the object of our
misery, is as an inventory to particularize their 20
abundance; our sufferance is a gain to them. Let
us revenge this with our pikes ere we become
rakes; for the gods know I speak this in hunger for
bread, not in thirst for revenge.

SECOND CITIZEN Would you proceed especially against 25
Caius Martius?

ALL Against him first. He’s a very dog to the
commonalty.

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.

SECOND CITIZEN Nay, but speak not maliciously.

FIRST CITIZEN I say unto you, what he hath done 35
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. 40

SECOND CITIZEN What he cannot help in his nature you
account a vice in him. You must in no way say he
is covetous.

FIRST CITIZEN If I must not, I need not be barren of accusations.
He hath faults, with surplus, to tire in 45
repetition. (Shouts within.) What shouts are these?
The other side o’ th’ city is risen. Why stay we prating
here? To th’ Capitol!

ALL Come, come!

Enter Menenius Agrippa.

FIRST CITIZEN Soft, who comes here? 50

SECOND CITIZEN Worthy Menenius Agrippa, one that
hath always loved the people.

FIRST CITIZEN He’s one honest enough. Would all the
rest were so!

MENENIUS
What work ’s, my countrymen, in hand? Where go 55
you
With bats and clubs? The matter? Speak, I pray you.

SECOND CITIZEN Our business is not unknown to th’
Senate. They have had inkling this fortnight what
we intend to do, which now we’ll show ’em in 60
deeds. They say poor suitors have strong breaths;
they shall know we have strong arms too.

MENENIUS
Why, masters, my good friends, mine honest
neighbors,
Will you undo yourselves? 65

SECOND CITIZEN
We cannot, sir; we are undone already.

MENENIUS
I tell you, friends, most charitable care
Have the patricians of you. For your wants,
Your suffering in this dearth, you may as well
Strike at the heaven with your staves as lift them 70
Against the Roman state, whose course will on
The way it takes, cracking ten thousand curbs
Of more strong link asunder than can ever
Appear in your impediment. For the dearth,
The gods, not the patricians, make it, and 75
Your knees to them, not arms, must help. Alack,
You are transported by calamity
Thither where more attends you, and you slander
The helms o’ th’ state, who care for you like fathers,
When you curse them as enemies. 80

SECOND CITIZEN Care for us? True, indeed! They ne’er
cared for us yet. Suffer us to famish, and their
storehouses crammed with grain; make edicts for
usury to support usurers; repeal daily any wholesome
act established against the rich, and provide 85
more piercing statutes daily to chain up and restrain
the poor. If the wars eat us not up, they will;
and there’s all the love they bear us.

MENENIUS
Either you must confess yourselves wondrous
malicious 90
Or be accused of folly. I shall tell you
A pretty tale. It may be you have heard it,
But since it serves my purpose, I will venture
To stale ’t a little more.

SECOND CITIZEN Well, I’ll hear it, sir; yet you must not 95
think to fob off our disgrace with a tale. But, an ’t
please you, deliver.

MENENIUS
There was a time when all the body’s members
Rebelled against the belly, thus accused it:
That only like a gulf it did remain 100
I’ th’ midst o’ th’ body, idle and unactive,
Still cupboarding the viand, never bearing
Like labor with the rest, where th’ other instruments
Did see and hear, devise, instruct, walk, feel,
And, mutually participate, did minister 105
Unto the appetite and affection common
Of the whole body. The belly answered—

SECOND CITIZEN Well, sir, what answer made the belly?

MENENIUS
Sir, I shall tell you. With a kind of smile,
Which ne’er came from the lungs, but even thus— 110
For, look you, I may make the belly smile
As well as speak—it tauntingly replied
To th’ discontented members, the mutinous parts
That envied his receipt; even so most fitly
As you malign our senators for that 115They are not such as you.

SECOND CITIZEN Your belly’s answer—what?
The kingly crownèd head, the vigilant eye,
The counselor heart, the arm our soldier,
Our steed the leg, the tongue our trumpeter, 120
With other muniments and petty helps
In this our fabric, if that they—

MENENIUS What then?
’Fore me, this fellow speaks. What then? What then?

SECOND CITIZEN
Should by the cormorant belly be restrained, 125
Who is the sink o’ th’ body—

MENENIUS Well, what then?

SECOND CITIZEN
The former agents, if they did complain,
What could the belly answer?

MENENIUS I will tell you, 130
If you’ll bestow a small—of what you have little—
Patience awhile, you’st hear the belly’s answer.

SECOND CITIZEN
You’re long about it.

MENENIUS Note me this, good friend;
Your most grave belly was deliberate, 135
Not rash like his accusers, and thus answered:
“True is it, my incorporate friends,” quoth he,
“That I receive the general food at first
Which you do live upon; and fit it is,
Because I am the storehouse and the shop 140
Of the whole body. But, if you do remember,
I send it through the rivers of your blood
Even to the court, the heart, to th’ seat o’ th’ brain;
And, through the cranks and offices of man,
The strongest nerves and small inferior veins 145
From me receive that natural competency
Whereby they live. And though that all at once,
You, my good friends”—this says the belly, mark
me—

SECOND CITIZEN
Ay, sir, well, well. 150

MENENIUS “Though all at once cannot
See what I do deliver out to each,
Yet I can make my audit up, that all
From me do back receive the flour of all,
And leave me but the bran.” What say you to ’t? 155

SECOND CITIZEN
It was an answer. How apply you this?

MENENIUS
The senators of Rome are this good belly,
And you the mutinous members. For examine
Their counsels and their cares, digest things rightly
Touching the weal o’ th’ common, you shall find 160
No public benefit which you receive
But it proceeds or comes from them to you
And no way from yourselves. What do you think,
You, the great toe of this assembly?

SECOND CITIZEN I the great toe? Why the great toe? 165

MENENIUS
For that, being one o’ th’ lowest, basest, poorest,
Of this most wise rebellion, thou goest foremost.
Thou rascal, that art worst in blood to run,
Lead’st first to win some vantage.
But make you ready your stiff bats and clubs. 170
Rome and her rats are at the point of battle;
The one side must have bale.

Enter Caius Martius.

Hail, noble Martius.

MARTIUS
Thanks.—What’s the matter, you dissentious rogues,
That, rubbing the poor itch of your opinion, 175
Make yourselves scabs?

SECOND CITIZEN We have ever your good word.

MARTIUS
He that will give good words to thee will flatter
Beneath abhorring. What would you have, you curs,
That like nor peace nor war? The one affrights you; 180
The other makes you proud. He that trusts to you,
Where he should find you lions, finds you hares;
Where foxes, geese. You are no surer, no,
Than is the coal of fire upon the ice
Or hailstone in the sun. Your virtue is 185
To make him worthy whose offense subdues him,
And curse that justice did it. Who deserves greatness
Deserves your hate; and your affections are
A sick man’s appetite, who desires most that
Which would increase his evil. He that depends 190
Upon your favors swims with fins of lead,
And hews down oaks with rushes. Hang you! Trust
you?
With every minute you do change a mind
And call him noble that was now your hate, 195
Him vile that was your garland. What’s the matter,
That in these several places of the city
You cry against the noble senate, who,
Under the gods, keep you in awe, which else
Would feed on one another?—What’s their seeking? 200

MENENIUS
For corn at their own rates, whereof they say
The city is well stored.

MARTIUS Hang ’em! They say?
They’ll sit by th’ fire and presume to know
What’s done i’ th’ Capitol, who’s like to rise, 205
Who thrives, and who declines; side factions and
give out
Conjectural marriages, making parties strong
And feebling such as stand not in their liking
Below their cobbled shoes. They say there’s grain 210
enough?
Would the nobility lay aside their ruth
And let me use my sword, I’d make a quarry
With thousands of these quartered slaves as high
As I could pick my lance. 215

MENENIUS
Nay, these are almost thoroughly persuaded;
For though abundantly they lack discretion,
Yet are they passing cowardly. But I beseech you,
What says the other troop?

MARTIUS They are dissolved. Hang 220
’em!
They said they were an-hungry, sighed forth
proverbs
That hunger broke stone walls, that dogs must eat,
That meat was made for mouths, that the gods sent 225
not
Corn for the rich men only. With these shreds
They vented their complainings, which being
answered
And a petition granted them—a strange one, 230
To break the heart of generosity
And make bold power look pale—they threw their
caps
As they would hang them on the horns o’ th’ moon,
Shouting their emulation.

MENENIUS What is granted them?

MARTIUS
Five tribunes to defend their vulgar wisdoms,
Of their own choice. One’s Junius Brutus,
Sicinius Velutus, and I know not. ’Sdeath!
The rabble should have first unroofed the city 240
Ere so prevailed with me. It will in time
Win upon power and throw forth greater themes
For insurrection’s arguing.

MENENIUS This is strange.

MARTIUS Go get you home, you fragments. 245

Enter a Messenger hastily.

MESSENGER
Where’s Caius Martius?

MARTIUS Here. What’s the matter?

MESSENGER
The news is, sir, the Volsces are in arms.

MARTIUS
I am glad on ’t. Then we shall ha’ means to vent
Our musty superfluity. 250

Enter Sicinius Velutus, Junius Brutus, (two Tribunes);
Cominius, Titus Lartius, with other Senators.

See our best elders.

FIRST SENATORMartius, ’tis true that you have lately told us:
The Volsces are in arms.

MARTIUS They have a leader,
Tullus Aufidius, that will put you to ’t. 255
I sin in envying his nobility,
And, were I anything but what I am,
I would wish me only he.

COMINIUS You have fought together?

MARTIUS
Were half to half the world by th’ ears and he 260
Upon my party, I’d revolt, to make
Only my wars with him. He is a lion
That I am proud to hunt.

FIRST SENATOR Then, worthy Martius,
Attend upon Cominius to these wars. 265

COMINIUS
It is your former promise.

MARTIUS Sir, it is,
And I am constant.—Titus Lartius, thou
Shalt see me once more strike at Tullus’ face.
What, art thou stiff? Stand’st out? 270

LARTIUS No, Caius Martius,
I’ll lean upon one crutch and fight with t’ other
Ere stay behind this business.

MENENIUS O, true bred!

FIRST SENATOR
Your company to th’ Capitol, where I know 275
Our greatest friends attend us.

LARTIUS, to Cominius Lead you on.—
To Martius. Follow Cominius. We must follow you;
Right worthy you priority.

COMINIUS Noble Martius. 280

FIRST SENATOR, to the Citizens
Hence to your homes, begone.

MARTIUS Nay, let them follow.
The Volsces have much corn; take these rats thither
To gnaw their garners.

Citizens steal away.

Worshipful mutineers, 285

Your valor puts well forth.—Pray follow.

They exit. Sicinius and Brutus remain.

SICINIUS
Was ever man so proud as is this Martius?

BRUTUS He has no equal.

SICINIUS
When we were chosen tribunes for the people—

BRUTUS
Marked you his lip and eyes? 290

SICINIUS Nay, but his taunts.

BRUTUS
Being moved, he will not spare to gird the gods—

SICINIUS Bemock the modest moon.

BRUTUS
The present wars devour him! He is grown
Too proud to be so valiant. 295

SICINIUS Such a nature,
Tickled with good success, disdains the shadow
Which he treads on at noon. But I do wonder
His insolence can brook to be commanded
Under Cominius.

BRUTUS Fame, at the which he aims,
In whom already he’s well graced, cannot
Better be held nor more attained than by
A place below the first; for what miscarries
Shall be the General’s fault, though he perform 305
To th’ utmost of a man, and giddy censure
Will then cry out of Martius “O, if he
Had borne the business!”

SICINIUS Besides, if things go well,
Opinion that so sticks on Martius shall 310
Of his demerits rob Cominius.

BRUTUS Come.
Half all Cominius’ honors are to Martius,
Though Martius earned them not, and all his faults
To Martius shall be honors, though indeed 315
In aught he merit not.

SICINIUS Let’s hence and hear
How the dispatch is made, and in what fashion,
More than his singularity, he goes
Upon this present action. 320

BRUTUS Let’s along.

They exit.