English Study Buddy

A.     Shakespeare is not criticizing Coriolanus’s contempt for the mob.  He is showing the cost of his hero’s inability to conceal it.’  With close reference to the text, say how adequate you find this view of Coriolanus’s role in the play.

B.      By what means and how successfully does Shakespeare seem to have made drama out of history in Coriolanus?  You are not required to consider the source material of the play.

C.  Either, (1) “His nature is too noble for the world.” “He’s poor in no one fault, but stored with all.” Discuss these two comments on Coriolanus, examining and criticizing the attitudes towards his character and tragic predicament which they represent.

Or, (2) “Quarrelling and fighting scarcely cease from beginning to end, yet they only reflect, never dominate, the fundamental stresses in Coriolanus.”  Discuss, with illustrations.

Or, (3) “Why, he is so made on here within as if he were son and heir to Mars; set at upper end o’ the table; no question asked him by any of the senators but they Stand bald before him.  Our general himself makes a mistress of him, sanctifies himself with’s hand, and turns up the white o’ th’ eye to his discourse.  But the bottom of the news is, our general is cut i’ th’ middle and but one half of what he was yesterday, for the other has half by the entreaty and grant of the whole table.  He’ll go, he says, and sowl the porter of Rome’s gates by th’ ears; he will mow all down before him, and leave his passage polled.”

D. Either, (1) “In Coriolanus, the dramatic conflict lies less in the military and political struggles than in the struggles within and between individuals.”  How far do you agree with this view of “dramatic conflict” of the play?

Or, (2) How successful is Shakespeare in creating scenes of (a) war, and (b) popular feeling in Coriolanus, and to what dramatic purposes does he put them?

E. Either, (1) In your view, is Coriolanus truly a tragedy?

Or, (2) What are the interest and significance of Menenius and Volumnia in the drama and themes of Coriolanus?

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