SHAKESPEARE A t l a s t ! A m a g a z i n e w i t h a l l t h e Wi l l i n t h e w o rl d
Issue 2017
Fact vs. Fiction
All Hail the King
A look at how the bard adapted the Holinshed Chronicles for the play.
11th Century Scottish heroes pay tribute to 17th century king. PAGE 18
Long Live the King
PLUS The Great Chain of Being ➲ p.2
Mood & Tone ➲ p.4
The story of Malcolm III’s
Blank Verse
rise to power.
➲ p.7
Conflicts ➲ p.11
The Supernatural ➲ p.12
Fate vs Free Will ➲ p.14
Imagery ➲ p.15
Murder most foul A review of tragedy in the
Macbeth, and a study of the main character’s trgic flaw
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Contents 4
Reign of Blood
An examination of each Act in Macbeth to study the tragic fall of the main character from Act I to Act V.
S h akespeare Magazine Is s ue O ne D ec ember 2017
F OUND E R and EDITOR Paul A pol inario
D ESIGN EDITOR
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The makeover of Macbeth
A comparison of how the character of Macbeth was shaped by the Holinshed chronicles.
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All Hail the King
Macbeth was a tribute to his newest sponsor, the first Scottish king of England.
Madeline Paige
PHOTO EDITOR Chr is D uncan
LAYOUT EDITO R A lan Michael
B USINE SS MAN AGER Megan E lizabeth
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Bloggin’ with the Bard
What lessons can Shakespeare and actors who have played Macbeth teach us?
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Something wicked this way comes
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Confessions of a Witch
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Stars hide your fires
What part do the witches really play in Macbeth? It’s all a little bit wyrd.
A critical look into the concept of fate and free will when it comes to Macbeth’s choices
Welcome to my favourite Star Wars: The Force Doth Awaken.
Welcome to Issue 2017 of the Shakespeare Magazine This magazine was designed specifically for Mr. Apolinario’s students as
an alternative to simply reading informative lecture material. Hopefully, things are presented here in such a manner that they have a lasting affect on student learning as we study the bard himself.
We can’t presume to know Shakespeare’s intimate thoughts, but he must surely
have felt he’d done pretty well in life. We do know from his works that he had an inkling that some of his writing might live after him. But he certainly was not a legend in his own lifetime.
No, the legend came later. But it would not have been possible if Shakespeare’s
plays and poems had not stood – as they continue to stand – the test of time. That’s why we celebrate Shakespeare today, and every day. That’s why Shakespeare Magazine exists. Because his words speak to us, like a living entity, from 400 years ago. And they continue to empower and enrich our lives. Thank you, William. Enjoy the magazine.
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Royalty of the Scottish play: (left-right) Malcolm, the Prince of Cumberland; Duncan, King of Scotland; Macbeth, Thane of Glamis and Cawdor.
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A tragic story about unchecked ambition, Macbeth is a cautionary tale about Concerning Greed, Power, and Mayhem which leads to inevitable self destruction. Here we examine Acts I-V and see how Macbeth’s tale unfolds.
Blood SHAKESPEARE magazine 5
So foul and fair a day I have not seen.
In The Tragedy of Macbeth, Act 1, the war hero Macbeth returns home and, on the way, encounters three witches who prophesy that he will one day be king of Scotland. Seized by ruthless ambition and spurred on by his wife, Macbeth plans to murder King Duncan, thus setting in motion a series of events that will lead to his eventual downfall. In Act 1, we learn that Macbeth has distinguished himself in battle. Returning from the There’s no art To find the mind’s construction in the face. He was a gentleman on whom I built an absolute trust.
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battlefield, he and Banquo meet three witches. These “weird sisters” predict that Macbeth will not only be rewarded by King Duncan but that he will become king himself. However, the witches also greet Banquo as a father of kings. Motivated by the witches’ prophecy, Macbeth considers killing Duncan. The assassination becomes more likely when the king decides to visit Macbeth’s castle. Lady Macbeth, on hearing about the witches’ predictions and the king’s visit, resolves that she and her husband will kill Duncan. When Macbeth hesitates, she urges him on. As Act II begins, Macbeth and Lady Macbeth are about to commit this evil deed. By the start of Act II, thoughts become deeds. It appears that Macbeth and Lady Macbeth have committed the perfect crime. In fact, it may have been carried
He’s here in double trust: First, as I am his kinsman and his subject, Strong both against the deed; then, as is host, Who should against his murderer shut the door, Not bear the knife myself. Besides, this Duncan Hath borne his faculties so meek, hath been So clear in his great office, that his virtues Will plead like angels, trumpet-tongued, against The deep damnation of his taking-off ... I have no spur To prick the sides of my intent, but only Vaulting ambition, which o'erleaps itself And falls on th' other. -Act 1 Scene 7
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“Thou hast it now: king, Cawdor, Glamis, all, As the weird women promised, and I fear Thou played’st most foully for ’t. Yet it was said It should not stand in thy posterity, But that myself should be the root and father Of many kings.”
out more successfully than they had hoped -the attendants are slain and therefore unable to defend themselves, and Duncan’s sons flee, thereby casting suspicion on themselves. However, in Act II the plot is unravelling and the hints of tragedy begin to appear. One of the play’s major themes—beware of excessive ambition—begins to be developed as Macbeth becomes tortured by guilt. It is in Act II that Lady Macbeth dominates as the stronger character. She drugs those who are guarding Duncan, enabling Macbeth to kill the king. Macbeth then kills the guards, too, so that he can more easily blame them for this murder. Duncan’s sons, Malcolm and Donalbain, flee. They are afraid that they will be murdered by a kinsman eager to claim the throne. Because they run away, some people suspect them of killing their own father. As the act closes, it seems that Macbeth will be named king. Act ill begins with Macbeth on
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the throne, as the witches had predicted. All is going well for him—or is it? There’s still Banquo to think of, whom the witches hailed as “Lesser than Macbeth, and greater.” Act III marks a turning point in the action. Up until now, things have gone very much the way Macbeth had planned. However, his sense of insecurity leads him to fear Banquo and his offspring. When his plan to murder Banquo and his son is only partially successful, a series of events is set in motion, leading to Macbeth’s downfall. Macbeth hires murderers to kill Banquo and Banquo’s son, Fleance. The murderers botch the job, killing Banquo but letting Fleance escape. Then, at a state dinner, Macbeth is shocked to see the ghost of Banquo sitting in the king’s chair, thus ruining the
“A little water clears us of this deed. How easy is it, then!”
“Beware the thane of Fife ... for none of woman born shall harm Macbeth ... shall never vanquished be until Great Birnam Wood to high Dunsinane Hill shall come against him.” evening altogether for everyone. Macbeth decides to visit the witches again, determined to know “the worst.” At the end of Act III, we learn that Malcolm is in England, preparing to invade Scotland, and that Macduff has gone to join him. Act IV will be a turning point in the play. Macbeth seeks help from the witches to secure his power. The forces of good, however, are beginning to gather against him. In Act IV, Macbeth‘s decline is in full
swing. During his visit to the witches, he see apparitions, who make seemingly contradictory predictions, and Macbeth, grown desperate to secure his throne, interprets the apparitions’ words in the most favorable way. Forces begin to gather against Macbeth, and his situation becomes more desperate. It is at the start of Act IV that Macbeth learns from the witches that he must “Beware Macduff” but that he need not fear any man “of woman born.” He also learns that he will never be vanquished until the forest itself marches against him. However, he sees a vision indicating that Banquo will indeed father a long line of kings. Armed with his new knowledge, Macbeth orders the murder of Macduff’s wife and son. Macduff himself is in England to join forces with Malcolm and is overcome when he hears the news. Nevertheless, he and Malcolm will lead an army against Macbeth. The final act will determine the outcome as Macbeth, grown reckless in evil, battles against Malcolm and his men. It is quite clear that Act IV shows with great poignancy the final effects of Macbeth’s actions on himself, his wife, and the kingdom of Scotland. As the act begins, Macbeth has fortified himself behind the stone walls of Dunsinane, armed with the prophecy of the apparitions. Lady Macbeth had suffered a mental and emotional breakdown. As the
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“Bring me no more reports. Let them fly all. The spirits that know All mortal consequences have pronounced me thus: ‘Fear not, Macbeth. No man that’s born of woman shall e’er have power upon thee.’ Then fly, false thanes, and mingle with the English epicures.”
army of angry Scots who are determined to overthrow Macbeth approaches, Lady Macbeth kills herself. What’s left of Macbeth’s former glory will not allow him to die without a fight. The final speech by Malcolm is meant to lift the mood of the audience. However, this play’s main message is a dark one: Even the noblest and most heroic humans can fall into the depths of depravity and ruin. As the play closes, Duncan’s son Malcolm takes the throne of Scotland. In reality, Malcolm does become king in 1057, seventeen years after Duncan’s death. He reigned as Malcolm Ill Canmore for thirtyfive years. Malcolm had been protected during exile by Edward the Confessor and was later able to return the favor to England. After England was defeated in the Battle of Hastings in 1066 by William of Normandy, the grandchildren of Edmund Ironside, half-
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brother to Edward the Confessor, fled in exile to Scotland to be protected by Malcolm. The names of the grandchildren were Edgar and Margaret. Malcolm and Margaret eventually married. After the brief reign of Malcolm’s brother, Donalbain, three of Malcolm and Margaret’s sons ruled in succession. It was from the last of these sons, David I, that all future kings of Scotland, including the Stuarts, descended. Queen Elizabeth II is the twentyeighth generation of this line.
“I will not yield, to kiss the ground before young Malcolm’s feet, Lay on, Macduff, and damned be him that first cries, “Hold, enough!”
Reign of Blood
Hail, king! For so thou art. Behold where stands the usurper’s cursèd head. The time is free. I see thee compassed with thy kingdom’s pearl, that speak my salutation in their minds, Whose voices I desire aloud with mine. Hail, King of Scotland!
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The
makeover of
Macbeth
Shakespeare’s Macbeth bears little resemblance to the real 11th century Scottish king. Macbeth was a king of the Scots whose rule was marked by efficient government and the promotion of Christianity, but who is best known as the murderer and usurper in William Shakespeare’s tragedy.
By Shakespeare’s time, the story of the eleventh-century Scottish king Macbeth
Holinshed Chronicles
was a mixture of fact and legend. Shakespeare and his contemporaries,
• Macbeth meets the witches.
however, probably regarded the account
• Duncan is slain in an ambush set up by
of Macbeth in Raphael Holinshed’s Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland as completely factual. The playwright drew on the Chronicles as a source for the play. Yet he freely adapted the material for his own purposes, as this chart indicates:
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Macbeth and his friends, who are angry at the naming of Malcolm as Prince of Cumberland. Macbeth’s claim to the throne has some basis. • Banquo is Macbeth’s accomplice in the slaying, and Lady Macbeth does not have a prominent role in the narrative.
Michael Fassbender is the latest actor to take on the role of the treacherous and murderous of Scottish thanes, in the new film adaptation of Shakespeare's Macbeth
Although Shakespeare may have consulted
Shakespeare’s Macbeth
other Scottish histories, it is probable that he primarily relied on Holinshed’s Chronicles
• Shakespeare uses this account. • Duncan is slain while he is a guest at Macbeth’s castle. Macbeth and his wife are the only conspirators, and Macbeth does not apparently have a legitimate claim to the throne. • Banquo is not an accomplice. Using a different story in the Chronicles, in which a wife urges her husband to kill a friend and guest, Shakespeare creates Lady Macbeth.
for his “facts.” Some scholars have suggested that Shakespeare became aware of Holinshed’s account of Macbeth in the summer of 1605. At that time he may have seen, at Oxford, an entertainment titled Tres Sibyllae staged for King James. In this pageant, three sibyls—the prophetesses named in the title—predict that the descendants of the Scottish king Banquo would reign over a great kingdom. This was meant to flatter King James because he regarded Banquo as own mythical ancestor.
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Jon Finch (above) and Sir Patrick Stewart (right) are just two others who have portrayed the overly ambitious Scottish tyrant in Shakespeare’s Macbeth.
As for the real Macbeth; there is not much similarity between the real Macbeth, a moarmaer or subking of Moray, a region that was annexed to Scotland, and that of Shakespeare’s Macbeth. It is true, as Shakespeare wrote, that Macbeth became king of Scotland by killing King Duncan, who was a relative by marriage and whom he had served as a general. However, Macbeth’s claim to the throne was quite legitimate due to the ancient Scottish custom of tanistry. According to this system, kingships were not passed from father to son. Instead the ablest, oldest male in an extended royal family was chosen by a
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family council or chose himself by declaring war on his competitors. That’s what the real Macbeth did. He declared war on King Duncan and killed him fairly in battle. Macbeth ruled for seventeen years (from 1040 to 1057), and contemporary accounts describe it as a prosperous period. Things were even peaceful enough for him to take a trip to Rome in 1050. Four years later, however, he was invaded by a Northumbrian force led by Duncan’s son Malcolm Canmore and, in 1057, was killed by Canmore. Hardly any of Shakespeare’s play Macbeth is historically accurate.
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All Hail the King HISTORY: A TRIBUTE TO THE KING
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Macbeth is set in eleventh-century Scotland. However, Shakespeare wrote the play with an eye on seventeenth-century current events. In November 1605, a group of Catholics seeking revenge for the severe anti-Catholic laws of James I plotted to blow up the king and Parliament. With the help of Guy Fawkes, a soldier of fortune, they rented a cellar directly beneath the House of Lords, in which to stockpile barrels of gunpowder. Incredibly, the conspirators succeeded in storing thirty-six barrels of gunpowder in that cellar. To appreciate the magnitude of the threat, imagine a group of terrorists today smuggling tons of high explosives into the Capitol building in Washington, D.C. The plot was revealed when a lord, who happened to be a brother-in-law of one of the conspirators, was anonymously warned by letter not to attend the opening of Parliament. This warning helped the authorities to break the case, and they arrested Guy Fawkes as he entered the cellar. Fawkes and some of the other chief conspirators were executed. Although their numbers were few, their plan was so frightening that it led, for a time, to increased persecution of all English Catholics. ln England, Guy Fawkes day is still
commemorated on November 5th each year with fireworks and the burning of dummies representing Guy Fawkes. In Macbeth, Shakespeare capitalized on the sympathy generated for the king by this incident. He chose the Scottish setting for his next play knowing that James’s family, the Stuarts, first came to the Scottish throne in the eleventh century. One of the most virtuous characters in the play, Banquo, was thought to be the father of the first of the Stuart kings. Shakespeare included witches in the play knowing that James I had written a book that argued the existence of witches.
“imagine a group of terrorists today smuggling tons of high explosives into the Capitol building in Washington, D.C.”
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Bloggin’ with the Bard
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ELIZABETHAN DRAMA During the late sixteenth century, Elizabethan drama came into full bloom. Playwrights turned away from religious subjects and began writing more sophisticated plays. Drawing on models from ancient Greece and Rome, writers reintroduced tragedies plays in which disaster befalls a hero or heroine. Dramatists also began writing their plays in carefully crafted unrhymed verse, using rich language and vivid imagery. Macbeth, like other Shakespearean plays, was performed at the Globe theater. This structure was circular, open to the sky, and lined with galleries. Because the Globe, like other Elizabethan theaters, had no lighting, the plays were performed in broad daylight. Also there were no sets, so the words of the play had to create the illusion of time and place for the audience. As you read Macbeth imagine what it wouid have been like watching or performing the play at the Globe.
Imagery Shakespeare's imagery is a key element of his plays, commenting on and reinforcing such other elements as plot, character, atmosphere, and theme.
sensory experiences. It is what helps you see, hear, feel, smell, and taste, rather than just read words or listen to them spoken. In Elizabethan theater, imagery was especially important because there was no lighting or elaborate scenery to “paint” a scene for the audience.Words alone had to do the work. Shakespeare was a master of imagery, packing sense experiences into every line.
The Elizabethans believed that the uni-verse extended in a great chain of being from God down to the lowliest creature. Every item in this chain had its proper place, reflecting a universal order. Harmony in heaven mirrored harmony in the natural world, the political state, and the family.When this order was disrupted, the whole structure of the universe was at risk. Elizabethan spectators were prob-ably not surprised, therefore, when the killing of Duncan leads to distur-bances in nature. As Shakespeare wrote in Troilus and Cressida (1.iii. 109—I I 0):”Take but degree [established rank] away, untune that string, / And hark, what discord follows!”
In Macbeth, for instance, one strand of images con-
cerns darkness as a cloak for evil.The murder of Duncan is so horrible a deed that Macbeth wants it to be done in darkness (I.iv.50-5 I )."Stars, hide your fires; / Let not light see my black and deep desires."
Elizabethans’ World View
Imagery is the language that writers use to re-create
The next two lines, even more subtly, indicate that
Macbeth wants to darken or blind his own con-science: "The eye wink at the hand; yet let that be I Which the eye fears, when it is done, to see." These images relate to many other literary ele-ments, hinting at the deed to come (plot), suggesting a conflict within Macbeth (character), evoking a scene of ominous darkness (atmosphere), and revealing the evil that will permeate the play (theme.)
“Though bladed corn be lodged and trees blown
down.” Notice how this line appeals to the senses of touch and sight. in addition, Shakespeare creates patterns of images that run through a whole play. in Macbeth, for instance, images relating to blood, ill-fitting clothes, and babies are just three of the patterns he uses to create a mood and enhance the play’s meaning.
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Classical Tragedy A tragedy in the classical sense is a type of drama in which the major character under-goes a morally significant struggle that ends disastrously.According to Aristotle in the Poetics, the purpose of tragedy is to arouse the emotions of pity and fear in the audience and thus to produce a catharsis of these emotions. Macbeth is a tragic figure in this classical sense. When introduced in Act I, scene iii, Macbeth is flushed with victory after fighting nobly for the king. He is presented in a pleas-ing light, and the audience is meant to like him and root for him.
BLANK VERSE Blank verse—unrhymed iambic pentameter was invented during the English Renaissance to reflect natural speech rhythms. An iamb is a metrical foot consisting of an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable, and the term pentameter means that there are five such feet to the line. Macbeth is written mainly in blank verse: Me thought 1 heard a voice cry, "Sleep no more (11, ii, 34) Unvaried blank verse would soon grow dull, however.That's why Shakespeare introduces variations, like a trochaic foot (' at the beginning of a line: "List'ning their fear ... (II, ii, 28--29). As you hear th e melody" of Shakespeare's dialogue, listen for the rhythm too: a drumbeat iambic, with variations.
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SHAKESPEAREAN TRAGEDY In Shakespearean tragedy, the central character is a person of high rank and personal quality.Through some fatal weakness a tragic flaw this person is enmeshed in events that lead to his or her downfall. As the audience views the destruction of this character, its members experience a mixture of pity, fear, and awe that lifts them out of their everyday lives. At the beginning of this play, the hero, Macbeth, is pictured as courageous and loyal. By the end of the play, his ambition has dri-ven him to commit a series of horrendous acts. Shakespeare, how-ever, adds nobility to Macbeth's destruction by giving him a reckless bravery in ActV--even when everything is Iost. This courage in the face of impossible odds reminds us of the man's stature and increases the awe that his downfall inspires. Those who agree Macbeth is mad should support their answers by pointing out that the theme of evil runs throughout the play, and that Macbeth has become evil and cannot redeem himself. His lack of restraint or human caring at this point might indicate madness.Those who say he is not mad might state that he was led on to perform evil deeds by out-side forces, but is suffering for them now.They might mention that it is a weakness of character, not madness, that drives his actions. However, Shakespeare seems to be trying to evoke sympathy for Macbeth at this point.As the possibility of death approaches, Macbeth experiences a moment of truth when the conse-quences of his actions become clear to him. He knows that life could bring no joy to him now and, in weariness, makes his peace with the thought of dying. If students do not think this speech evokes pity, they might point out the fact that Macbeth here seems to be concerned for only himself.
CONFLICT Conflict—the struggle between
two forces is what creates drama.This struggle can be an external conflict between two characters or groups, or it can be an internal conflict within a character.The climax of a play is the point at which the internal and external conflicts are greatest. Usually the action rises to the climax—the moment of highest tension and then falls as the conflicts are resolved. In Macbeth, Act III, the rising action leads the new king to a state dinner and the sight of a guest who should not be there! Most of the conflicts are manifested in Act III. Macbeth had hoped to change the course of fate by killing both Banquo and Banquo’s only son, Fleance. As long as Fleance lives, the witches’ prophecy about Banquo’s sons can come true and MacBeth’s throne is threatened. Many scholars believe the exact climax of the play occurs with the stage direc-tion “Exit Fleance.” Ask: Why is Fleance’s escape important to the drama? The escape is important because it means that Macbeth still has a force or enemy to reckon with and that the witches’ prophecy about Banquo’s heirs can come true. It is the first time that one of Macbeth’s plots has gone wrong. It also means that someone has lived to tell of attempted murder, leading people to conclude that Duncan may not have been murdered by the grooms Although some schol-ars argue that the climax occurs when Fleance actually escapes, oth-ers believe that the climax of the play, the point at which the internal and external conflicts are greatest, occurs here, when Macbeth learns of Fleance’s escape. The ghost appears when Macbeth mentions Banquo, indicating that he is probably feeling guilty about Banquo’s death. Macbeth’s shock at the sight of the ghost reveals his agitation-----both about the actions he’s taken and the course of future events.
Point of Conflict
Internal Conflicts Macbeth’s desire to
Fear of what the
believe the witches
prophecies would mean
Desire to kill Duncan
Guilt at the thought of
and take the throne
murder & betrayal
External Conflicts Macbeth steals the
Malcolm & MacDuff raise
throne
and army to fight him
ASIDES The use of an aside was a common convention among playwrights of the period to indicate words that were thought or spoken so the audience could hear them but the other characters in the play could not. It is sometimes used, as it is in lines 107 and 116, to reveal a character’s secret thoughts. Sometimes an aside is a joke or witty remark at the expense of the other characters. An aside can also indicate a private conversation between two characters outside the hearing of other characters on stage.
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TONE & MOOD Tone in writing is not really any different than the tone of your voice. You know that sometimes it is not “what” you say, but “how” you say it. Its the way the author expresses his attitude through his writing. Mood is simply an element that evokes certain feelings or vibes in audience through words and descriptions. “Macbeth” is a tragedy, so its tone is predominantly dark, elegiac and depressing. So, yeah, we’re going to go ahead and say that the mood of this play is a somber, sinister, dark and foreboding play. Even the humor is bleak.
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THEME Themes are the fundamental and often universal ideas explored in a literary work. The overall theme of the play is the corrupting power of unchecked ambition. When the play is broken down we see that the theme of Act 1 is that of betrayal towards Duncan. Act II is that Macbeth needs to live with his guilty conscience. By Act III the audience is becoming more aware of the ruthlessness of Macbeth since he has to cover up his murderous misdeeds. Act IV is a clear forshadowing of Macbeth’s downfall as predicted by the three weird sisters; while Act V reminds everyone that a guilty conscience is not easily mended. Macbeth has a similar to the lesson learned in Oedipus Rex. Unfortunately, due to the character’s high standing, they are the only ones who can punish themselves after they have recognized the consequences of their actions.
SYMBOLS
MOTIFS
Symbols are objects, characters, figures, and colors used to represent abstract ideas or concepts. Initially the play starts with blood which focuses on Duncan’s win against Norway, but later it leads to the murder and the Macbeths’ guily conscience. Daggers on the other hand are located in three parts: as visions for Macbeth, as real items in the killing of Duncan, Banquo and Lady MacDuff, and as metaphors when Malcolm claims that ‘there’s daggers in men’s smiles’. Children are used to either show the end of family lines, such as that of Macbeth and MacDuff, but the extension of family - such as the 8 kings that show Banquo’s heirs. The equivocator-MacDuff plays a key symbol. Macbeth unbalanced the physical and spiritual realm in the Great Chain of Being by the death of Duncan. Macduff is the avenging angel set to rebalance the scales.
Motifs are recurring structures, contrasts, and literary devices that can help to develop and inform the text’s major themes. It cannot be denied that there numerology plays a big part in Elizabethan plays. The number three appears in the witches, three prophecies, the visions of the dagger, Macbeth’s feelings towards sleep, the knocking and Macbeth’s claim that he is ‘cabined, cribbed, confined...” ‘Fair is foul and foul is fair.’ Things are not what they seem. From the interpretations of the prophecies to the betrayal of Duncan’s thanes, there is a recurring concept of the duality in nature. Lady Macbeth said it best “Look like the flower, but be the serpent under it.” Visions & hallucinations happen quite often for Macbeth - the dagger and Banquo’s ghost, representing his conscience. Finally there is the repetition of light and darkness to show good and evil.
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Something wicked this way comes
The witches of Macbeth have facinated audiences. But were they originally inspired by Shakespeare’s royal patron, King James I?
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Round about the cauldron go; In the poison’d entrails throw. Double, double toil and trouble; Fire burn and cauldron bubble. SHAKESPEARE magazine 25
T
The opening scene of Macbeth not only introduces the audience to the supernatural element that will be carried throughout the play, but it also establishes a theme of disorder through the presence of the witches, the stormy weather, and the bleak landscape. The witches enter with a crash of thunder and announce they will go to the heath and await Macbeth; thus creating an ominous and creepy scene to set the tone of the play. As the witches wait for Macbeth to arrive, audiences see a references to several stories regarding acusations of witchcraft activities in London at the time. History scholars believe that one reason Shakespeare included witches in Macbeth is the fact that the king, James I, had openly expressed his belief in witches. King James himself became famous as a witch hunter. The plot of Macbeth is taken from Holinshed’s Chronicle, and edited to flatter Shakespeare’s royal patron. While Holinshed depicts Macbeth as, “…gouerning the realme for the space of ten yeares in equall iustice…”, Shakespeare’s Macbeth has a short and bloody reign. Just as the role of Macbeth is altered, so James’ adopted ancestor Banquo is exonerated. While Holinshed lists Banquo as a willing co-conspirator, Shakespeare portrays him as a blameless and loyal subject. The identity of the ‘Weird Sisters’ is also changed from Holinshed, making more direct reference to the 1591 trial. Their identity in
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Holinshed is ambiguous – they are described as, “goddesses of destinie, or else some nymphs or fairies…” or “creatures of the elder world.” The chronicle states that the historical Macbeth consulted sorcerers, “either for that he thought his puissance over great; either else for that he had learned of certaine wizzards, in whose words he put great confidence…” Unmistakeably though, Shakespeare’s witches are human: a dramatization of what the 17th century English believed members of their community were really doing. But why would the playwright who wrote with such virtuosity about fairies in A Midsummer Night’s Dream choose now to write about witches instead? James himself had written of fairies in his 1597 work on the supernatural, Daemonology, stating that they were delusions of the devil. Certainly, the link between Scottish witches and fairies already existed. James had written of numerous witches gone to the stake with confessions
involving faerie hills and magical stones. Thus, Shakespeare could have easily left the witches unchanged and have presented material that would have been familiar to the king. Witchcraft was a topic of controversy in seventeenth-century Europe and America.The attitude toward witches and witchcraft varied widely. Some regarded the existence of witches to be nothing more than a harmless superstition. Others felt witches to be real and a source of evil that had to be wiped out. As a result, waves of hysteria over witches and their supposed to the devil sometimes swept over the land, Between the fifteenth and eighteenth centuries thousands of people were convicted of being witches and executed.The most famous trials - America occurred
in 1692 in Salem, Massachusetts, where nineteen people were cc:,. victed of being witches and hanged. Have interested students learn more about the beliefs of Elizabethans in regard to witchcraft.
By the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes. Open, locks, whoever knocks!
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Confessions of a
Witch
Scottish actress Lynn Kennedy was a haunting presence in the last Macbeth film & now discusses the role of ‘wyrd’ in the play. When there is a discussion of fate versus free will scholars have long debated whether Macbeth's tragedy results from the inexorable pressures of fate or from his own free choice of evil. This debate tends to focus on the role of the witches. The great Shakespearean scholar George Lyman Kittredge argued that these weird sisters were not just run-of-themill crones but arbiters of human destiny. He identified them with the Norns, Scandinavian goddess-es of fate: The Norns were goddesses who shaped beforehand the life of every man. Sometimes they came in the night and stood by the cradle of the new-born child, uttering their decrees.... Sometimes they were met in wild places at unexpected moments.... They were great pow-ers of destiny.... they not only fore-saw the future, but decreed it. If the Witches do in fact deter-mine Macbeth's fate, then he has no power of choice and is lost from the instant he sets eyes upon them. In this view, he is merely a plaything of fate.
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Irving Ribner, among others, argued against this position. He felt that Shakespeare was writing from a Christian rather than a pagan perspective. While Christians acknowledge the reality of evil, in the person of the devil, they believe that God gave humans the power to choose evil or good. Though he is presented with temptation to do wrong, Macbeth chooses his own course. An argument for Macbeth's free will is that Banquo, subject to the same or similar temptation, remains virtuous.
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“I shall despair. !ere is no creature loves me, And if I die, no soul will pity me. And wherefore should they, since that I myself Find in myself no pity to myself?� Richard III - Act V, Scene 3
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Stars, hide your fires! Star Wars and Shakespeare might seem like strange bedfellows, to borrow a phrase from The Tempest. But we think the Bard has much in common with the Sci-Fi epic… Almost 40 years since the first Star Wars film was released, a staggering variety of sequels, prequels, spinoffs, Lego sets, video games, graphic novels – and just about everything else you can imagine – have sprung up around the ’70s blockbuster. And just like our Bill, this pop-culture phenomenon inspires people to create a lot of whole lot of art – so it was really only a matter of time before someone did a mash-up of the two. Ian Doescher, creator of the William Shakespeare’s Star Wars series, has risen to the challenge in recent years with his hugely popular iambic pentameter
adaptations. These chronologically distant cultural behemoths also share major themes and, to some extent, characters. Take Star Wars episodes I-VI; the character of Darth Vader is truly a tortured soul of a man who suffers from a tremendous amount of greed and ambition - VOILA! you have the tragedy of Anakin Skywalker or simply...Macbeth. In Star Wars: The Force Awakens we have a King Lear allegory in Han Solo (“You’re Han Solo?” “I used to be.”) The aging smuggler and war hero is wandering
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the galaxy with a devoted Wookiee companion, Chewbacca, who keeps him grounded in the wake of his son’s turn to darkness. Chewie brings as much pathos as comic relief in this film, just like Lear’s wise Shakespearean Fool. Then we have R2-D2 – the beloved droid from the original saga, and veteran of a million school lunchboxes – waking up at the end of the film like a mirthful Puck in A Midsummer Night’s Dream: “What fools you mortals be, I’ve had the map all along!” If R2-D2 is Puck, then speedy newcomer BB-8 must be The Tempest’s Ariel. This mischievous droid aids Finn in his little white lies and is the inciting force that leads Rey to her Miranda-like “brave new world” moment: “I didn’t know there was this much green in the whole galaxy.” Han and Leia are indisputably Beatrice and Benedick, 30 years later. Their witty, warm, often barbed exchanges echo Much Ado About Nothing’s reluctant lovers even now, when their partnership is at an end. In Star Wars episodes IV-VI, Luke does not follow any Shakespearean character because he was designed to emulate the legendary tale of Sir Gawain and embark on the Hero’s journey. Jyn Erso, in Rogue one on the other hand is a Hamlet type character where she loses her father only to ‘speak’ with his ghost through a holo-projector and gain a determination to kill the man responsible for her father’s death. Some of Shakespeare’s best moments focus on the inner lives of his characters. The political intrigue, family drama, gender role smashing, and identity wrangling in almost any installment of the Star Wars saga parallels Shakespeare’s career-long attention to these eternal themes. Hamlet famously says “There are more things in heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of your philosophy”. And some of those are in a galaxy far, far away.
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“But life itself, my wife, and all the world, Are not with me esteemed above thy life. I would lose all, ay, sacri!ce them all Here to this devil, to deliver you.”
The Merchant of Venice Act IV, Scene 1
“I go, I go; look how I go, Swifter than arrow from the Tartar’s bow.” A Midsummer Night’s Dream Act III, Scene 2
“I do not think a braver gentleman, More active-valiant or more valiantyoung, More daring or more bold, is now alive”
“Though she be but little, she is fierce!”
A Midsummer Night’s Dream Act III, Scene 2
Henry IV, Part 1 Act V, Scene 1
“Hell is empty and all the devils are here”
The Tempest Act I, Scene 2
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