(I. i. 69.)
This, then, is the background against which are grouped with more or less prominence, as their importance requires, Coriolanus’ family, his associates, his rival, round the central figure of the hero himself.
CHAPTER IV
THE KINSFOLK AND FRIENDS
OF CORIOLANUS
Of the subordinate persons, by far the most imposing and influential is Volumnia, the great-hearted mother, the patrician lady, the Roman matron. The passion of maternity, whether interpreted as maternal love or as maternal pride, penetrates her nature to the core, not, however, to melt but to harden it. In her son’s existence she at first seems literally wrapped up, and she implies that devotion to him rather than to her dead husband has kept her from forming new ties:
Thou hast never in thy life
Show’d thy dear mother any courtesy,
When she, poor hen, fond of no second brood,
Has cluck’d thee to the wars and safely home,
Loaden with honour.
(V. iii. 160.)