Coriolanus | Why are the plebians so hostile toward Coriolanus?
In the opening scene of the play, one member of the angry plebian mob says of Coriolanus, "Let us kill him, and we'll have corn at our own price" (I, i., l.10). This implies that the people are hostile toward Coriolanus as a member of the Roman patrician class depriving them of basic sustenance. But there is no evidence that the lower class is starving, merely that the price of corn is high, and the people do not vent their wrath toward Menenius or any of the other rich Romans. Coriolanus makes no bones as to his opinion of the plebians, whom he calls "scabs" on the body politic. It is not...
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