Keeping Up With Volumnia

For some odd reason, us, as humans, are either obsessed with out mothers, or we hate them. More specifically, mother’s in fiction/pop culture. Psycho, Medea, Mommy Dearest, Gypsy; the list goes on and on. In Shakespeare’s ‘Coriolanus’, Volumnia is the mother of the war hero, Caius Marcius. She is constantly pushing her son to be better, to do the things she only wishes she could do. Volumnia revels in her son’s victories and his scars. She’s the ultimate mom-ager. 

Sound familiar?

In our modern-day society, Kris Jenner would be Volumnia. Kris tried (and failed) to create a music career in the early eighties (cue the not-hit song ‘I Love My Friends’, which Jenner claims was just a ‘joke amongst friends’), and when she failed, she projected her dreams and desires onto her children. 

There are a lot of differences between Volumnia and Kris. For example, Volumnia was blocked from her dreams of power by her gender and the era she lived in, whereas Kris’s gender is not prohibiting her from acting out her desires. Volumnia’s relationship with her daughter-in-law is turbulent, whereas Kris is head-over-heels in love with Kanye. Kris is infamous for causing fights between Kim and other celebrities, most of them old friends, while Volumnia begs her son not to fight the city he once called home.

This is super interesting to me for many reasons. On one hand, it goes to show you that Shakespeare is the father of every plot device known to man, real or not real. (You can thank him for Lion King) Practically every movie deals with plot devices ‘fathered’ by Good Ol’ Willy. On another hand, it’s pretty freakin’ cool how people never change. Mother’s like Volumnia still exist to this day. We see it in Kris Jenner, we see it in Dance Moms, we see it everywhere!