- John Barton
Almost all theatrical texts have been created for realisation in the theatre. However astonished we may be by Shakespeare�s poetry on the page, it is in its utterance by a performer that such work truly comes to life. Yet what makes play-going so fascinating, and furthermore, seeing a different production of the same play, is how directors, actors and designers have collaborated uniquely to provide their own readings of a text. As Peter Holland observes in the opening to English Shakespeares, �productions of any Shakespeare play invite comparisons with other explorations of the same text� , and this essay intends to compare and contrast two productions of Coriolanus: Terry Hands� 1989 production staged at the RST and David Thacker�s 1994 show in the Swan Theatre . However, rather than attempt to make generalised points, this essay will be focusing on two pivotal aspects of the playtext: the relationships between Coriolanus and Aufidius and Coriolanus and Volumnia. The underlying intention is to demonstrate how both necessarily engage with the subjects of masculine and maternal relationships, but to thoroughly different ends. While both interrogate the systems of masculine identity, Hands� production seems to suggest masculinity itself as being endangered by a counter-strike of matriarchal authority, personified by Volumnia, that may well be partly grounded in its performance at the tail-end of the Thatcherite era. Thacker�s production more directly addresses issues of homo-eroticism. Though each seeks to deconstruct and problematise the �Herculean hero� as identified by Bruce Smith , the main point will always be to demonstrate the validity of both productions� interpretations, and how each illuminates different aspects of the original text.
I: Aufidius and Coriolanus
�We band of brothers� - Henry V
Masculine identity of whatever kind is something men give to each other. It is not achieved in isolation� They do so under a complicated system of rules whereby they alternately abet and oppose one another� Masculine ideals in Shakespeare�s plays are never lastingly realised.
Both Coriolanus and Aufidius invest a great deal of importance in their encounters. To Coriolanus, the Volscian captain is both the ideal sparring partner, �a lion / I am proud to hunt� (1.1.233-4) , and a reference point from which he can construct his own pre-eminent warrior identity:
Coriolanus: They have a leader,
Tullus Aufidius, that will put you to�t.
I sin in envy of his nobility,
And were I anything but what I am,
I would wish me only he.
(1.1.225-9)
The last two lines betray the paradox behind Coriolanus� earlier wish to be �author of himself / and knew no other kin� (5.3.36-7), for Aufidius provides a necessary mirror from which Coriolanus can form his own sense of heroic self-hood. Aufidius too longs to beat the man who has defeated him five times, and this desire manifests in a dream of combat with homo-erotic connotations: �He�s mine or I am his� (1.10.12). When Coriolanus offers himself in Antium in 4.5 , Aufidius� reaction is to eroticise his perennial opponent and compare his joy to that of a bridegroom:
Let me twine
My arms about that body�.
Know thou first,
I loved the maid I married; never man
Sighed truer breath. But that I see thee here,
Thou noble thing, more dances my rapt heart
Than when I first my wedded mistress saw
Bestride my threshold�
Twelve several times, and I have nightly since
Dreamt of encounters �twixt thyself and me �
We have been down together in my sleep,
Unbuckling helms, fisting each other�s throat �
And waking half-dead with nothing.
(4.5.109-129)
As Coppelia Kahn rightly points out, in the bounding of the two warriors, �Shakespeare represents Roman emulation with more explicit erotic intensity than in any of the classical tragedies� . Yet it is also a relationship complicated by fantasy, for while Coriolanus imagines Aufidius �a lion�, a fictional counterpart designed to reassure him of the reality of his own male grandeur by giving him the image of himself, Shakepeare�s Aufidius is actually someone only too aware of his own deficiencies. He is ultimately willing to �potch at [Coriolanus] some way / Or wrath or craft� rather than attempt to emulate him, for repeated defeat has meant �mine emulation/hath not the honour in�t it had� (1.1012-13). Therefore, whereas Coriolanus prizes himself on his honesty, Aufidius� profound willingness to use underhand means undercuts the entire masculine construct formulated at the beginning of this essay by Brian Smith. In performance, it is up to the director how complex and charged the relationship and homo-erotic element is between the two. In particular, it is the playing of three specific scenes that call for our attention, and which I will be specifically focusing on: (1) Coriolanus and Aufidius� first encounter at Corioli, (2) Coriolanus� reception at Antium and (3) the final scene.
