GETTING READY TO READ
MACBETH
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

Lived 1564-1616

One of England’s greatest writers

Wrote 38 plays, 154 sonnets, and 2 narrative epic poems
•
Plays: Comedies, histories, and tragedies.
4 Categories or “eras”:
1.
2.
3.
4.
•
Pre 1594 (Richard III, The Comedy of Errors)
•
Christopher Marlowe
•
Roots in Roman and medieval drama
•
Somewhat predictable plots
1594-1600 (Romeo and Juliet, Henry V, Midsummer Night’s Dream)
•
Begins interweaving comedy and tragedy
•
Greater characterization
1600-1608 (Macbeth, Hamlet, King Lear)
•
Greatest tragedies that earned him fame
•
Comedies “problem plays” without comic resolution
Post-1608 (Cymbeline, The Tempest, Henry VIII)
•
More serious, most symbolic era
•
Shakespeare’s maturity as a playwright
Sonnets: Vivid, passionate, technically constructed poems of 14 lines
•
•
Themes of love, beauty, time, nature, and heaven
Click here for Shakespeare’s Sonnets
A HISTORICAL TRAGEDY
 Macbeth is Shakespeare's shortest tragedy
 Historical references to real people and places
 Source for the main plot of the play:
•
•
Holinshed’s Chronicles of England, Ireland, and Scotland (1587)
“The Chronicle of Macbeth” and other chronicles
•
Macbeth, King of Scotland, 1040-1057
 Shakespeare wrote plays to please his royal patrons:
Queen Elizabeth Tudor (1558-1603) and King James Stuart (1603-1625)
• Established the legitimacy and nobility of the reigning king or queen
• Glorified the monarch’s ancestors
•
•
Richard III, a play written for the Tudors
Macbeth, a play honoring the Stuarts
 Click here for Shakespeare’s Theaters
 Click here for the all-time record of Kings and Queens of England
CHARACTERISTICS OF
TRAGEDY
 Tragedy originated in ancient Greece
•
Aristotle (400 BC) Greek Philosopher
•
•
•
•
Tragedy arouses pity for the hero, and fear for all human beings
Catharsis: Cleansing of emotions
Tragic Flaw: Hubris or pride
Fate and destiny
 The main character, called the tragic hero, comes to an unhappy or miserable end
 The tragic hero is generally a person of importance in society,
such as a king or queen
 The tragic hero exhibits extraordinary abilities but also has a tragic flaw
•
The tragic flaw, or fatal error in judgment or weakness of character, leads directly to his or
her downfall
HISTORICAL CONTEXT:
THE RENAISSANCE

Shakespeare wrote during the Renaissance (1400-1600)

Renaissance is French for “Rebirth”
•
•

Revival of classical learning, values, and wisdom
•
•

Close relationship of music and poetry
Essential part of civic, religious, and courtly life
Hautboy = Oboe; Spinet = First piano
Science: Discovery and exploration of new continents and space
•
•

Humanism: Importance of the Individual, downplay religious and secular dogma
Artists inspired by classical Greek and Roman works
Remained unchallenged until Pablo Picasso and Cubism
Music: Major changes in styles of composing music and developing new musical instruments
•
•
•

Classical philology (study of language and literature)
Ancient Greece and Rome
Art: New forms of drawing, painting, and sculpture
•
•
•

Middle Ages (500-1400) widely believed to be period of social stagnation and religious domination
Petrarch called the Middle Ages the “Dark Ages”
Inventions: Telescope, Mariner’s compass, submarine, parachute
Substitution of Copernican for Ptolemaic system of astronomy
Spread of knowledge and ideas
•
Gutenberg’s Printing Press
WITCHCRAFT
 Renaissance - widespread curiosity and belief in the supernatural
 Witchcraft was punishable by death
• King James I of England published a book entitled Demonology
• 50,000 people murdered for practicing witchcraft in Northern Europe
 Macbeth and Witchcraft
• Three evil witches (the “wyrd” sisters) drive the action in Macbeth
•
The Three Fates control the “thread” of life (they spin, measure, and cut)
• The play is thought to be cursed due to witches and untimely deaths
• Theatrical superstition: If the word “Macbeth” is spoken on a stage or in
a theater, all friends involved in the production will die horrible deaths
• The euphemism “The Scottish Play” is used to refer to the play instead
M AC B E TH & BA N QU O
M E E T T H E W I T C H E S ( AC T I , S C E N E 3 )
Using figures, tables or examples with text
How might this painting contribute to the meaning of a dramatic scene
in a novel or play? What details does the artist use to illustrate the tone
and mood found between the lines of the story?
SETTING OF MACBETH
 11th century SCOTLAND
 References to Ireland, the Hebrides, Northern England
 Castles and battlefields
•
•
•
•
Inverness – Macbeth’s castle
Forres – Royal palace for the reigning king
Dunsinane Hill – Macbeth’s fortress
Birnam Wood – Near Dunsinane
SETTING OF MACBETH
Inverness
Dunsinane
SHAKESPEARE’S
LANGUAGE
 Grammatical forms
•
•
Pronouns: You = thou, thee, thy, thineself, thine
Verbs
•
•
Are = art
Come = cometh
 Grammatical structures
•
Helping verbs
•
•
“Know you not he has?” = Don’t you know he has?
Unusual word order
•
“O, never shall the sun that morrow see!” = O, the sun shall never see tomorrow.
 Rhythmic patterns of verse
•
•
Iambic pentameter – 5 sets of “iambs” unstressed and stressed syllables
Trochaic tetrameter – 4 sets of “trochees” stressed and unstressed syllables
 Plays on words
•
•
Contractions for rhyming effect: For it = for’t
Puns for humorous effect
•
•
Murderer: “My Lord, his throat is cut; that I did for him.”
Macbeth: “Thou art the best o’ the cut-throats!”
FAMOUS QUOTES FROM
MACBETH
 Witches: “Fair is foul, and foul is fair”
• The witches’ philosophy of life
 Macbeth: “Let not light see my black and deep desires”
• Macbeth wrestling with his values and the morality of his actions
 Lady Macbeth: “Yet I do fear thy nature; / It is too full o’ the milk of
human kindness / to catch the nearest way”
• Lady Macbeth wishing her husband would be more evil
 Banquo: “Thou hast it now: King, Cawdor, Glamis, all / Just as the
weird women promised, and I fear / Thou play’dst most foully for’t”
•
Banquo reflecting on Macbeth’s rise to the throne