Four Plays

by John Osborne

  COMINIUS: You have fought –

  CORIOLANUS: And will again, by the look of it.

  FIRST SENATOR: Then go with Cominius.

  COMINIUS: You did pledge yourself–

  CORIOLANUS: And why shouldn’t I keep it? Titus Lartius, do you think you won’t see me go in against Aufidius? What is it? Pressures is it? ‘Comment’ is it? Is it? What is the ‘is’?

  LARTIUS: No, no ‘is’, Caius Marcius. I have made my position clear, I think.

  CORIOLANUS: Well done!

  MENENIUS: Yes, well said.

  FIRST SENATOR: Let’s go to the Capitol, most of ‘em are behind us.

  LARTIUS: (To COMINIUS.) Let’s go. (To CORIOLANUS.) Give your support to Cominius. To us you are something more than an elected deputy.

  CORIOLANUS: What deputy ever became leader?

  COMINIUS: Dear Marcius, your place is assured and your recognition will come.

  (He raises his hand.)

  FIRST SENATOR: (To Roman CITIZENS.) Get off home, to your families, your workbenches, both sides of industries, your floors, we shall all sit down.

  CORIOLANUS: And get piles or paunches or the both. You’ve done well today; led from behind and observed from the front. Get the feel of them.

  (He, the SENATORS and the MOB leave in an uproar of banner waving, shouting, singing, journalists weaving, cameras wobbling, some waving to the audience they are performing to. Leaving the two tribunes alone)

  SICINIUS: Was there anyone ever as arrogant or obvious as Marcius?

  BRUTUS: No one.

  SICINIUS: When we were chosen as tribunes for the people –

  BRUTUS: Did you see his expression?

  SICINIUS: See it! Hear it!

  BRUTUS: Don’t be deceived. When he’s moved, which is too much of the time, he will go for anything or anyone, and someone will always be there to listen to him.

  SICINIUS: Or record it. But there’s a coldness.

  BRUTUS: That’s right. That’s his strength.

  SICINIUS: He’ll be eaten soon enough. He’s got too much conceit in him as it is. Can you see him being bum boy to Cominius?

  BRUTUS: Cominius is a decrepit bully boy general grown old. He’ll be blamed for being too old, if there’s any blame. And if there’s any triumph going, Marcius will have the edge on him.

  SICINIUS: Besides, Caius Marcius might lose, but, in these days of fashion and upstarts, Caius Marcius is the man to watch.

  BRUTUS: He’ll be watched all right. Let’s go.

  SICINIUS: Let’s.

  Scene 3

  Corioli. The Senate House. Enter TULLUS AUFIDIUS with SENATORS.

  FIRST SENATOR: So, Aufidius, think Rome knows every which way what’s going on here?

  AUFIDIUS: Don’t you? Everything here or, indeed, anywhere, is known almost before it’s happened. I first heard – I think I’ve got the letter here. Yes. Here it is. They’ve troopments at the ready. Cominius; Marcius, your old enemy. They hate in Rome as much as here if not more so. Titus Lartius, thought a ‘good sort’. These three: not bad leaders. Think on it.

  FIRST SENATOR: Our army’s ready. We never doubted Rome would ever be any different.

  AUFIDIUS: We could have taken every town before Rome had woken up to it.

  SECOND SENATOR: Bring your army up, Aufidius; but, knowing them. I think you’ll find they’re still not ready for us.

  AUFIDIUS: Not ready? Oh, I’m only talking of certainties and one of those if ever there was one is Caius Marcius. If he and I could just ever meet – neither of us can do any more – till that time.

  Scene 4

  Rome. A room in CORIOLANUS’s house. VOLUMNIA, his mother and VIRGILIA, his wife.

  VOLUMNIA: What a glum mood you’re in. If I had my son for a husband I should hope I’d put a better face on it than you are; considering what he’s at. I remember when he was very tiny, he seemed the only thing life would ever yield up to me; I wouldn’t let him a wink out of sight. Even so, I don’t think I ever held him back the once; always forward – at least that’s what I tried to do, and now it’s no more different than all those other times; oh, long before he became what he is since. Didn’t I let him go to a violent, rotten and filthy war? And didn’t he come back practically weighed down with citations and awards like he did when he was a schoolboy? I tell you, Virgilia, I am more proud at this moment, if it’s possible, than the first time I set eyes on him.

  VIRGILIA: Supposing he had fallen back – even a little? Let alone died in all this thrusting and ambition?

  VOLUMNIA: Thrusting and ambition’ you call it! Its very existence was reputation enough for me. If I had a dozen sons and I loved every one of them as much as my – and your – Marcius, I’d rather the whole lot of them snuffed out and for a good cause than one of them come up to Marcius’s scratch.

  (Enter SERVANT.)

  SERVANT: Madam, Lady Valeria is here.

  VIRGILIA: Forgive me but I’ll go.

  VOLUMNIA: Indeed you won’t. Oh, I see, your husband’s gesture; his voice in the air; seeing what he’ll do to someone like Aufidius. Do you really think he has a chance against such a man, a man, a man like ours? I can hear him say ‘Come on, you lot. You were all begotten in timidity even if you’d been born in Rome. There’s no blood in you. Red piss.’

  VIRGILIA: Red piss, as you call it,’s bad enough to watch without more blood.

  VOLUMNIA: You cowish little idiot. What do you know about blood?

  (To SERVANT.) Well, don’t keep Lady Valeria waiting.

  (To VIRGILIA.) We’ve got lots to chat about.

  VIRGILIA: All I can say is, or think is, God save my husband from Aufidius, or indeed anyone like him.

  VOLUMNIA: Aufidius! He’d beat him into the ground.

  (Enter VALERIA.)

  VALERIA: Well, hallo.

  VOLUMNIA: My dear Valeria.

  VIRGILIA: How nice to see you.

  VALERIA: But how are you both? Aren’t these terrible times? I mean they’re just terrible. What are you doing there decorating? But it looks perfectly splendid. And how’s the little son, the little grandchild?

  VIRGILIA: He’s well enough for his age. Thanks to his grandmother’s looking after.

  VOLUMNIA: I know my grandson. He’d rather be up and about and doing things. One day. Changing things. Worthwhile things. Than moping about the state of things at home.

  VALERIA: His father’s son all right. And so pretty as well. Do you know, I looked at him last Wednesday for a whole half an hour – that face, that determination, what do you call it, resolve. I saw him chase a butterfly in your garden here, and do you know, he wouldn’t even let that little creature baulk him! I don’t know whether it was his falling down and knees all scratched and bruised, but he was in such a rage, that child, in such a torrent, nothing could have saved that doomed insect.

  VOLUMNIA: Just like his father.

  VALERIA: Wouldn’t give an inch.

  VIRGILIA: Not an inch.

  VALERIA: Come along. Let’s have some fun together in your lovely garden.

  VIRGILIA: I’m not going out of doors.

  VALERIA: Not going out of doors?

  VOLUMNIA: Oh, she will, you see.

  VIRGILIA: No, if you’ll forgive me, I won’t. I’m not moving from this house; not even into that garden until His Lordship’s come back from all his rhetoricising and legalised brawlings.

  VALERIA: Come, you mustn’t upset yourself. There’s lots to do while he’s away.

  VIRGILIA: It’s not that I’m lazy, as you think, or busy as I think.

  VALERIA: Can’t waste time; especially now.

  VIRGILIA: I’d rather it used me rather than busy myself.

  VALERIA: Honestly, go along with me because I really do have the most exciting news for you; yes, your husband.

  VIRGILIA: There can’t be any yet.

  VALERIA: No, honestly, I tell you. I heard it last night.

  VIRGILIA: What did you hear then?

  VALERIA:
Well, aren’t I telling you? I heard it from a Senator. Simply this: the Volscians have raised an enormous army. General Cominius has taken some battalions or whatever they’re called from the Roman Army and, guess who’s immediately behind it, but Titus Lartius and your very own husband. By this time they must be fanned out; is that what they call it? Anyway, entrenched or something, in strategic positions or something, right in front of Corioli itself. And from all accounts, they don’t mean to stay there long. They’ll deal with them soon enough, you can take it from me. It’s true, I promise you. So come along, you should be pleased.

  VIRGILIA: Forgive me, Valeria, I’ve not yet taken this in.

  VOLUMNIA: Oh, leave her alone, Valeria, whatever news you tell her she’ll do nothing but mope and be a misery.

  VALERIA: I’m beginning to think you’re right. Well, see you later. Oh, come along, Virgilia, give yourself a face-lift and forget the war for an afternoon. The dreariness of the winter and strikes and dark evenings.

  VIRGILIA: In a word, no. I will not and I must not, so both go and enjoy yourselves.

  VALERIA: Please yourself – of course.

  (VOLUMNIA and VALERIA have VIRGILIA to herself.),

  Scene 5

  A bleak, battle-torn area on the outskirts of Corioli. Enter SOLDIERS with CORIOLANUS and LARTIUS. Flak jackets, berets, helmets, rifles, shields, home-made bombs and bottles hurling, the sound of gunfire and sniping, etc. From the flies a parachute descends bearing a heavily armed PARATROOPER. Before this, CORIOLANUS has been observing his descent keenly through binoculars.

  CORIOLANUS (To LARTIUS.) A fiver they’ve made contact.

  LARTIUS: Ten.

  CORIOLANUS: Done.

  LARTIUS: Right.

  (The PARATROOPER lands with a clang of boots and rubble and is helped out of his parachute. He approaches CORIOLANUS and salutes smartly)

  CORIOLANUS: Well, have they made contact?

  PARATROOPER: They’re giving each other’s eyeballs a good going over, sir, but no action as such yet.

  LARTIUS: Well, that’s a tenner up your spout.

  CORIOLANUS: How far away?

  PARATROOPER: Mile and a half.

  CORIOLANUS: Right, this’ll be it soon enough. With God’s good luck, we should blow the bleeding bejesus out of them in five minutes and back up those poor sods being shot at out there for damn all. What do you say, Lartius?

  LARTIUS: Let’s get to it.

  (The Roman SOLDIERS prepare to advance in splendid regimental style, poised on the edge of streets, and so on, when two SOLDIERS of Corioli appear in paramilitary uniform and nonchalantly waving white flags.)

  CORIOLANUS: So, there you are. Tell me, Tullus Aufidius, is he still stuck behind your barricades?

  FIRST SOLDIER: No, and there’s not one of us that’s less afraid of you than he is.

  CORIOLANUS: What a strange race they are. All verbal quirks and long top lips.

  (Sound of drums and sniping.)

  FIRST SOLDIER: D’ye hear that then? That’s our lads alright. We’ll rip down our barricades rather than see you pound us up like dogs but we’ll do it when it suits us. (More noise of rifle fire off stage.)

  D’ye hear that then? How far away d’ye think that is? And who do you think it is? That’s Aufidius, that is. D’ye hear what he’s doing to your poor under-paid professionals?

  LARTIUS: Get back before someone kills you. Right, lads. (The two SOLDIERS retreat, jeering and throwing stones as the Roman SOLDIERS prepare to stand ground.)

  CORIOLANUS: They don’t look afraid, but if they don’t, it’s because of no imagination; and without imagination, take it from me, you won’t find much skill, just random wind. You know your equipment, you know how to use it and to use it well; and to use your brains, which is a damn sight more useful than anything they’ve got to pitch against us, or ever shall have. Let’s get in there, Titus – why do we let them waste our time with chat and drums and banners. Anyone who holds back, he’ll deal with me and forget he ever heard the word ‘regulations’. (The ROMANS charge down the street with a terrifying noise For a while, all we hear is the sound of automatic rifles, shouting and so on. After some of this, they are beaten back to behind their coils of barbed wire, armoured vehicles, etc., led by CORIOLANUS.)

  CORIOLANUS: Call yourselves bloody Romans! May the world’s pox rot your bollocks off. Let you all stew in the pus of your sisters’ cunts so you stink a mile off. You little gooseygander men, what are you doing, running from red bog faced layabouts that my six-year-old’d stand up to. Balls of fire! What is this – a whole company without a mark except those shot up the arse! Now hear me! Get those miserable faces turned round the right way and get stuck into it or as sure as God made little apples, and you rotten lot, I’ll turn round and I’ll start my own private war with you – and make no mistake who’d win. Come on then! Get your fingers out and-we’ll-be-in-crumpet-before-them!

  (A gap appears in the barricade at the other end of the street.)

  There’s an opening! Get in there! And if it isn’t your birthday, you weren’t born.

  (CORIOLANUS dashes through the opening and disappears.)

  FIRST SOLDIER: It’s not my birthday.

  SECOND SOLDIER: Mine neither. Haven’t been born long enough, anyway.

  FIRST SOLDIER: Look, they’ve really got him in this time.

  (Noise and gunfire off from the direction of the closed barricade.)

  SECOND SOLDIER: Short and curly’s department this time, I’ll bet.

  (Enter LARTIUS.)

  LARTIUS: Where’s your commander?

  FIRST SOLDIER: Halted at the barricades looks like, sir. Right behind them he was before you could say how’s your father. Next thing he’s disappeared. All on his tod. Dressed up and nowhere else to go but in.

  LARTIUS: Oh, Marcius, only you. No one else.

  FIRST SOLDIER: Dead right, sir.

  SECOND SOLDIER: Looks like that’s it, then.

  FIRST SOLDIER: Look, sir.

  (Enter CORIOLANUS, having forced himself back through the barricade obviously seriously wounded and covered in blood. He beckons wildly to LARTIUS)

  LARTIUS: Well, don’t gape at the poor bastard – follow up! (A slight pause and the ROMANS follow LARTIUS and bearing CORIOLANUS with them, disappear behind the barricades)

  Scene 6

  Inside Corioli.

  Enter two Roman SOLDIERS under fire and stone throwing.

  FIRST SOLDIER: Don’t fancy that lot.

  SECOND SOLDIER: As Caius Marcius says, they’re not a lovable lot.

  FIRST SOLDIER: I don’t want love, I just want out of this ugly bleeding army. Watch it.

  (They duck from a sniper’s volley. CORIOLANUS and LARTIUS enter. The first contemphtes LARTIUS, very much on his guard)

  CORIOLANUS: There’s a certain sound about ammunition wasting itself. The ill-trained warlike wanker. How do you think our lads have made out?

  LARTIUS: On the whole, they’ve held. As you well know, Caius, if they make mistakes their orders sometimes actually require it. Allowance has to be made for the situations of war, call it what you like. We can’t guarantee or legislate against painful or hasty headed decisions, any more than wisdom as well as bravery and initiative.

  CORIOLANUS: Aufidius is the man. If we can get himl Titus, take what you think you need to mop up the city. What’s left I’ll take with me to back up Cominius.

  LARTIUS: You’re wounded. Orderly!

  CORIOLANUS: I’m not even wound up yet. A bit of blood letting’s good for the likes of me so long as it doesn’t weaken the natural spleen too much when I catch up with friend Aufidius. Just so long as he recognises me.

  LARTIUS: He will!

  (Exit CORIOLANUS.)

  (To RADIO SIGNALLER) Get all officers you can contact and we’ll meet in the old market. If it’s still there. Get on with it.

  (He rushes off

  The SIGNALLER disappears into his armoured vehicle. Enter COMINIUS, looking grim, with
SOLDIERS in support)

  COMINIUS: Take a breather, lads. You did well; like people’ll have learned to expect from Roman troops in spite of what they say. Sensible and restrained under fire; and calm and disciplined in retreat. Rest while you get the chance. They won’t leave us for long.

  (The SIGNALLER puts his head out of the radio van.)

  Well? Got anything?

  SIGNALLER: Seems like Lartius and Marcius got caught in a frontal assault from half Corioli. There’s a running battle. But I think Marcius is trying to limit the area.

  COMINIUS: Keep contact.

  (Enter CORIOLANUS)

  CORIOLANUS: Am I too late?

  COMINIUS: Not while you are here.

  CORIOLANUS: Old devil!

  (They clasp hands.)

  COMINIUS: As usual. Giving them shit where it’s needed, which is everywhere, then belting on. And the men?

  CORIOLANUS: All right without their tribunes to make them down warfare for shorter hours, thank you. They’re well paid to be shot at. If you can be well paid. It’s difficult to know which side the fire came from. But why are you back here?

  COMINIUS: We weren’t doing so well. I think I followed the what-ye-call-it battle concept as we went over it.

  CORIOLANUS: Move, move, move! Yes… The orders were Where do they seem concentrated? With

  Aufidius?

  COMINIUS: Who else?

  CORIOLANUS: Let me go back.

  COMINIUS: You’re in no proper state. Still, I can’t say no. Take what you need with you.

  CORIOLANUS: Volunteers. And volunteers I do mean. The rest can stay behind, those who come for the uniform, the ride, and all the rest of it.

  (They all yell enthusiastically.)

  Well done! But for Aufidius, we need not just the best but the fastest. The rest had better stay here with Cominius.

  COMINIUS: Do as he says. Take your pick.

  CORIOLANUS: You, you, you, you… (Etc)

  COMINIUS: Let’s go.

  (They divide and disappear. Enter LARTIUS with Roman TROOPS)

  LARTIUS: Keep these barricades. If we abandon the outskirts, we’ll get holed up inside.

  SOLDIER: Yes, sir.