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2019-
MACBETH (c. 1605)
The context:
The beginning of the reign of King James I. He was Scottish (James VI of Scotland).
The King sponsored Shakespeare’s company → The King’s Men
The King was interested in witches and witchcraft.
Shakespeare decided to write this play to honour him. Banquo’s descendants – the ones that, according to the witches, will be kings – are, allegedly, King James’ ascendants, his lineage. He also includes witches for the first time, and the goddess of the witches, Hecate.
Links:
https://www.bl.uk/shakespeare/articles/royal-shakespeare-a-playwright-and-his-king
https://www.bl.uk/shakespeare/articles/witchcraft-magic-and-religion
https://www.bl.uk/shakespeare/articles/witchcraft-in-shakespeares-england
The Genre:
Macbeth is a tragedy:
The main characters are from the noble class → King, Princes, Thanes The main character, Macbeth, is a real hero who goes wrong. The hero falls because of his tragic flaw (hamartia)→ he is too proud (hubris) and believes that the witches are there to help him achieve his goals. He is blinded by his ambition and fails to see how the gods/fate are playing with him. His hamartia is a typical hubris (an excess of pride, arrogance, or ambition which causes the hero’s destruction in the end). The ending is tragic, producing the catharsis (a purifying cleansing of the emotions, mainly through pity and fear) in the audience. Although the previous order is restored, all the main characters die.
However, Shakespeare introduces characters who don’t belong to the noble class: the Porter and the Old Man:
−The Porter is the one in charge of the humorous relief → He would be the Fool of other tragedies.
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https://www.bl.uk/shakespeare/articles/shakespeares-fools
−The Old Man is a symbolic character → He sees the destruction brought upon nature and foresees the chaos of the country. His role would be that of the Chorus in the Greek tragedy.
Macbeth is one of Shakespeare’s four major tragedies, the others are Othello, King Lear and Hamlet.
Subgenre:
Macbeth is a history play. Shakespeare wrote some plays based on historical events: Julius Caesar, Richard II, Richard III, etc. In them, the playwright was inspired by chronicles about kings.
This play shows events that happened in Scotland in the 11th^ century, according to the chronicles of the time. Nowadays, the history told about Macbeth has been strongly contested for its biased portrait of Macbeth and Banquo (remember that Banquo was believed to have been King James’ ancestor). Apparently, Macbeth was a good king, he reigned for some twenty years and there is no evidence of the existence of Banquo. Nonetheless, the fact that the events shown in the play have been proved wrong doesn’t mean that the play has lost any of its value.
Themes and Symbols:
Ambition – thirst for power. It’s the first sin that brings about a chain of sins to cover the first. Guilt → Macbeth has hallucinations, Lady Macbeth commits suicide after turning mad. This guilt provides the characters with humanity, the audience can pity them, although their actions are despicable. Fate → Is Macbeth’s fate already written? Is he marked to be the king? Are the witches telling him a fact? Or… Is he lured into doing something because the witches tell him? Would he have acted differently, that is, being a faithful knight to his king, had the witches not talked to him? Are they the inciters or the prophets of fate? Remember Matrix I, the scene of the oracle: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EUN1ClT9i9w The Good King versus the Tyrant → Duncan represents what a good king should be: fair, compassionate, loving, trustful, one that rewards his people properly. Macbeth is described as a tyrant, he is the opposite of Duncan.
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Manhood representing violence → All the references which Lady Macbeth makes about what being a man means to spur Macbeth into action.
Links:
https://www.bl.uk/shakespeare/articles/manhood-and-the-milk-of-human-kindness- in-macbeth
https://www.bl.uk/shakespeare/articles/unsex-me-here-lady-macbeths-hell-broth
https://www.bl.uk/shakespeare/articles/character-analysis-lady-macbeth
