I find in Fabius, a most ancient writer, that he lived untill he was an old man: who repeateth this of him: that oftentimes in his latter daies he used to utter this speech: A heavie case and most wretched, for an aged man to live banisht.
At all events some such feeling as his regrets in this variant tradition suggest, makes us prefer the version that Plutarch followed and that Shakespeare adapted. Coriolanus deserves to be spared the woes that the future has in store. As it is, he falls in the fulness of his power, inspired by great memories to greater audacity, and, no doubt, elated at the thought of challenging and outbraving death, when death is sure to win.
APPENDIX A
NEAREST PARALLELS BETWEEN GARNIER’S CORNELIE,
IN THE FRENCH AND ENGLISH VERSIONS,
AND JULIUS CAESAR
It should be remembered that it is not on these particular equivalents, mostly very loose, that those who uphold the theory of connection between the two plays rely, but on the general drift of the corresponding scenes which in this respect strikingly resemble each other and in no way produce the same impression as the narrative of Plutarch.
| French. | English. |
| Cassie. Miserable Cité, tu armes contre toy | Cassius. Accursed Rome, that arm’st against thy selfe |
| La fureur d’un Tyran pour le faire ton Roy: | A Tyrants rage, and mak’st a wretch thy King: |
| Tu armes tes enfans, injurieuse Romme, | For one mans pleasure (O injurious Rome!) |
| Encontre tes enfans, pour le plaisir d’un homme: | Thy chyldren gainst thy chyldren arm’d: |
| Et ne te souvient plus d’avoir faict autrefois | And thinkst not of the riuers of theyr bloode, |
| Tant ruisseler de sang four n’avoir point de Rois, | That earst were shed to saue thy libertie, |
| Pour n’estre point esclave, et ne porter flechie | Because thou euer hatedst Monarchie.[264]... |
| Au sendee d’un seul, le joug de Monarchie.[265] (line 1065.) | |
| ... Quoy Brute? et nous faut-il trop craignant le danger, | But, Brutus, shall wee dissolutelie sitte |
| Laisser si laschement sous un Prince ranger? | And see the tyrant line to tyranize? |
| Faut-il que tant de gens morts pour nostre franchise | Or shall theyr ghosts, that dide to doe us good, |
| Se plaignent aux tombeaux de nostre couardise? | Plaine in their Tombes of our base cowardise.... |
| Et que les peres vieux voisent disant de nous, | |
| “Ceux-là ont mieux aimé, tant ils ont le coeur mous, | “See where they goe that haue theyr race forgot! |
| Honteusement servir en dementant leur race, | And rather chuse, (unarm’d) to serue with shame, |
| Qu’armez pour le païs mourir dessus la place.”[266] (line 1101.) | Then, (arm’d), to saue their freedom and their fame!”[267] |
| Brute. Je jure par le Ciel, thrône des Immortels, | Brutus. I swear by heauen, th’ Immortals highest throne. |
| Par leurs images saincts, leurs temples, leurs autels, | Their temples, Altars, and theyr Images, |
| De ne souffrir, vray Brute, aucun maistre entreprendre | To see (for one) that Brutus suffer not |
| Sur nostre liberte, si je la puis defendre. | His ancient liberty to be represt. |
| J’ai Cesar en la guerre ardentement suyvi, | I freely marcht with Caesar in hys warrs, |
| Pour maintenir son droit, non pour vivre asservi ... | Not to be subject, but to ayde his right, ... |
| ... Il verra que Decime a jusques aujourdhuy | But he shall see, that Brutus thys day beares |
| Porté pour luy l’estoc qu’il trouvera sur luy. | The self-same Armes to be aueng’d on hym.... |
| ... Je l’aime cherement, je l’aime, mais le droit | I loue, I loue him deerely. But the loue |
| Qu’on doit à son païs, qu’à sa naissance on doit, | That men theyr Country and theyr birth-right beare, |
| Tout autre amour
surmonte.[268]... (line 1109.) | Exceeds all loues.[269]... |
| Cassie. Tandisque Cassie aura goutte de sang | Cassius.... Know, while Cassius hath one drop of blood |
| En son corps animeux, il voudra vivre franc, | To feede this worthles body that you see, |
| Il fuira le servage ostant la tyrannie, | What reck I death, to doe so many good? |
| Ou l’ame de son corps il chassera bannie.[270] | In spite of Caesar, Cassius will be free.[271] |
| Brute. Toute ame genereuse indocile a servir | Brutus. A generous or true enobled spirit |
| Deteste les Tyrans. | Detests to learne what tasts of seruitude. |
| Cassie. Je ne puis m’asservir, | Cassius. Brutus, I cannot serue nor see Rome yok’d: |
| Ny voir que Rome serve, et plustost la mort dure | No, let me rather die a thousand deaths.... |
| M’enferre mille fois, que vivant je l’endure.... | |
| O chose trop indigne! Un homme effeminé ... | O base indignitie! A beardles youth[272] ... |
| Commande a l’Univers, la terre tient en bride,[273] | Commaunds the world, and brideleth all the earth,[274] |
| Et maistre donne loy au peuple Romulide, | And like a prince controls the Romulists; |
| Aux enfants du dieu Mars.... | Braue Roman Souldiers, sterne-borne sons of Mars.... |
| O Brute, O Servilie, Qu’ores vous nous laissez une race avilie! | O Brutus, speake! O say, Servilius! Why cry you aime,[275] and see us used thus? |
| Brute est vivant, il sçait, il voit, il est present, | But Brutus liues, and sees, and knowes, and feeles, |
| Que sa chere patrie on va tyrannisant: | That there is one that curbs their Countries weale. |
| Et comme s’il n’estoit qu’une vaine semblance De Brut son ayeul, non sa vraye semence, | Yet (as he were the semblance, not the sonne, Of noble Brutus, his great Grandfather); |
| S’il n’avoit bras ny mains, sens ny coeur, pour oser, | As if he wanted hands, sence, sight or hart, |
| Simulacre inutile, aux Tyrans s’opposer: | He doth, deuiseth, sees, nor dareth ought, |
| Il ne fait rien de Brute, et et d’heure en heure augmente | That may extirpe or raze these tyrannies: |
| Par trop de laschetéla force violente. (line 1201.) | Nor ought doth Brutus that to Brute belongs, But still increaseth by his negligence His owne disgrace and Caesars violence. |
APPENDIX B
THE VERBAL RELATIONS OF THE VARIOUS VERSIONS OF PLUTARCH ILLUSTRATED BY MEANS OF VOLUMNIA’S SPEECH
This passage, though it does not show the successive modifications of the text quite so fully and strikingly as some others, is the most interesting in so far as it is the longest in which Shakespeare closely follows the lead of the original.
The Latin version of the Renaissance is placed first, both because in definite form it is chronologically the earliest, and because for the reasons already given it cannot be held to have had much influence on Amyot, North and Shakespeare.
It is of course impossible to reconstruct the Greek text that Amyot put together for himself. I have taken that of the edition of 1599, published half a dozen years after his death, as a fair approximation. The chief variations from the Latin are given in spaced type.