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Use this Padlet as a way to become a Dramaturg for Macbeth!

Create a presentation on what you've learned about the play. Feel free to do your own research!

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Dramaturgy is the study of a play to assist directors in bringing a play to life. Essentially, dramturgs will research aspects of a play for a particular production.

This link provides one dramaturg's process of preparing materials for a play.

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Illuminating the world of the play

By Amy Steele

I vividly remember when I first learned about dramaturgy. A friend of mine who is primarily a lighting designer was dramaturging a production of Dancing at Lughnasa. As she described her process, I was completely absorbed. She studied the play from a literary and performance standpoint, but she also went beyond that and investigated the social, political, cultural, and historical contexts of the play's world. Through her multidimensional understanding of the dramatic material, she was able to help me appreciate how truly rich the play was.

Inspired by this experience, I began my own investigation of dramaturgy, quickly recognizing it was an ideal match for my personality. In addition to reading and writing, I revel in the scavenger-hunt quality of research and applying newfound connections to a project. Above all, I love to share what I learn with others (I was a high school theatre and English teacher at the time), which is one of the dramaturg's main duties. I soon decided to return to graduate school to study dramaturgy in more depth and am now a professional dramaturg. I've since worked with many high school and college student-dramaturgs and have been delighted by their enthusiasm. Once young theatre artists are exposed to this work, they soon realize just how appealing and indispensable it can be.

What exactly is a dramaturg?

Summarizing what a dramaturg does in one tidy sentence is challenging. Some dramaturgs say they are literary and historical consultants who work with directors, designers, and actors to make an artistic vision a reality. Others reply that they are scholars who apply their research to make the world of a play come alive. Then there are dramaturgs who collaborate with playwrights to help shape new scripts and stories as well as advocate for playwrights' intentions during the rehearsal process. Dramaturg and professor Geoffrey Proehl uses the phrases "historical, critical, literary, and philosophical consciousness," "watchdog," "audience's surrogate," "designated readers," "keeper of the text," "word person," and "diplomat or mediator" to describe dramaturgs.

When Mark Bly, senior dramaturg at the Arena Stage in Washington, D.C., is asked for a description of what he does, he generally answers, "I question." (Both of these definitions and more are found in Dramaturgy in American Theater: A Sourcebook, listed with other resources in a sidebar on page xx). As varied as these answers are, each is absolutely accurate. The common connection is that a dramaturg learns as much as she can about a play's context-or its world-and its text. As my mentor in graduate school wisely told me, "What a dramaturg does often depends on the situation she's in, but she's always a fundamental member of a production team." (On a side note, "dramaturg" is pronounced with a hard "g," and it is not spelled with an "e" on the end. "Dramaturge," pronounced with a soft "g," is French for "a writer or adaptor of plays.")

Despite the multiplicity of the dramaturg's duties, many tasks-particularly of production research-are relatively consistent. Each time I prepare materials for a production, I follow a specific procedure, or research and play analysis guide, that my mentor passed down to me. Since then, I've made my own additions to the outline, and I'm sure some students with whom I've worked have made their own adjustments. Having a specific series of steps is a useful and flexible framework for beginning dramaturgs, particularly for high school students, because it helps to make production dramaturgy a tangible, definable set of actions. In this article, I'm going to focus on production dramaturgy, or dramaturgy that is specific to a production of a play that has already been produced and is usually published. In new play dramaturgy, a dramaturg helps a playwright develop a new work, which often follows a different process.

Meet with the director

Before I begin the actual dramaturgy process, which is outlined below, I always meet with the play's director to discuss my ideas, thoughts, and questions about the play and a research game plan. As with other members of the production team, the dramaturg answers to the director and works the closest with her. Because the director may have a particular take on the play and its world, it is important for the dramaturg to support and illuminate this vision through his research and other participation in the rehearsal process. Meeting with the director prior to the research process helps guide the dramaturg's pre-production preparation.

What follows are the tasks I complete for pre-rehearsal work. Please note that these steps are in no specific order. Also, keep in mind that a dramaturg does not have to complete every task each time he works on a play. The play will dictate which areas he needs to study and which he does not. In regard to your students, encourage them to find their own hook into the play-something that really interests or speaks to them-and begin research with that subject.

Do initial readings

Script analysis is an ongoing process for a dramaturg, and finding a method that best suits an individual's style and the play's needs is key. I've found it helpful to break down my initial analysis into three phases: after the first reading, I jot down my gut reaction to the play; following the second and subsequent close readings, I note the play's structure and style, its prevailing mood and tone, and the story's ambiguities and complexities. Finally, I make a list of topics to research (these usually deal with setting details and other world-of-the-play issues). If a student dramaturg needs an introduction to formal script analysis, Backwards and Forwards: A Technical Manual for Reading Plays by David Ball is a popular resource that provides a succinct and effective text analysis method.

Create a text glossary

I compile the following into a glossary: words or foreign phrases that require definition and/or pronunciation clarification; references and allusions that need to be explained (such as mythological, literary, historical, biblical, music, and pop culture references); unique social customs that require elaboration; and titles and character names that need to be analyzed. This is frequently one of the first tasks I complete because it's often a springboard into other areas of research.

Research the playwright's background

Although a playwright's life does not necessarily inform her work, it's important to know pertinent autobiographical information that does shape or influence the play. For instance, I'm in the process of conducting research for The Crucible and After the Fall by Arthur Miller, which were both influenced by Miller's reaction to and experience with the House Un-American Activities Committee's (HUAC) search for communists in America. Knowing how HUAC personally affected Miller is integral to understanding both plays. Playwright biographies, autobiographies, journals, letters, documentaries, and interviews are useful sources for such material and often provide dramaturgs with interesting tidbits and anecdotes about a play's inspiration, formation, and production history.

Being familiar with the playwright's body of work can come in handy as well. Sometimes a play may have been inspired or influenced by another of the playwright's works. Understanding the connections, or possibly lack of connections, among a playwright's writing reveals much about her work.

Research the background of the play

A dramaturg should determine three basic things about a script: its source material; what adaptations have been done of the original play; and as much as possible about the play's setting and historical period.

If a play evolved from a particular source, it's usually enlightening to read that material. For example, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum was inspired by three comedies by the ancient Roman playwright Plautus. Reading these plays reveals just how much Larry Gelbart and Burt Shevelove, the book's authors, are paying homage to Plautus in their musical comedy. And it's interesting to learn that the roots of low comedy date back to ancient Rome.

Often more than one version of a play exists. If that's the case, the dramaturg should become familiar with the various adaptations, learn why the differences came to be, and decide which edition is the most effective. Particularly if a play is in the public domain, studying script versions allows the dramaturg to suggest which text a production team should use or what revisions should be made. This comparison process also applies to translations and adaptations since the quality among these may vary.

Describing the historical period in which a play is set and communicating the pertinent societal concerns of people living in that era and location are also among the dramaturg's responsibilities. This information provides the actors and others on the production team with a context for the world of the play. (More on this later.)

Study the play's production history

Knowing when and where a play was first produced and the critical and popular reception it received is informative. Then repeat the process for other major productions or revivals. Critics' reviews may also include interesting play analyses and point to some possible difficulties in the script. During this time, it is enlightening to read noteworthy academic essays, books, and articles that have been written about the play or playwright as well, keeping an eye out for what sheds light on the text and world of the play and provides interpretation possibilities. I've found that collecting production photos and design sketches from previous productions is also helpful to see how other artists have interpreted the play.

Review other materials that reflect the world of the play

Other resources that can help to convey information about the play's context include:

Art, music, and popular culture of the play's time period. For example, while working on Black Coffee by Agatha Christie, it was useful to investigate the popular music and dances the younger generation of the 1930s enjoyed because the character Barbara, a young independent woman, continually surprises her old-school Aunt Caroline with her bright lipstick and "vulgar songs." Knowing what dances and music were popular during that period helped the actor playing Barbara develop her character.

Timelines. These are a compact way to share historical information.

The work of a playwright's contemporaries. Who else was writing when the playwright wrote the play, and what were they writing, creating, and composing?

Other artists that influenced the playwright. When I was preparing dramaturgy for an Alley Theatre production of Edward Albee's Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, I learned that Albee was inspired by the James Thurber short story "The Breaking Up of the Winships" and Thurber's cartoons. I included the short story and some cartoons that reminded me of George and Martha's relationship in my research materials.

Music and visual images that evoke the play's mood, tone, or theme (see the "world-of-the-play presentations" section for an example).

Video references. Documentaries, cinematic adaptations of the play, and other films that suggest the play's world are beneficial.

Maps and photographs of the play's geographic setting. While working on the Alley's Stones in His Pockets by Marie Jones, I gathered numerous photos of County Kerry, Ireland, the setting for the play. Although County Kerry's lush landscape was important to the story, the play was set on bare stage, encouraging the actors to conjure up their green surroundings. The photographs aided the actors' imaginations, and they were in turn able to communicate the beauty to the audience.

Magazines and newspapers from the time period in which the play is set. Frame 312 by Keith Reddin is set in the present day and the time of President Kennedy's death. The protagonist is personally affected by the tragedy and the Zapruder film that recorded the assassination, so I brought the issue of Life that published stills of the Zapruder film to rehearsal. I also shared other primary magazine and newspaper sources to illustrate the country's reaction to the event. A DVD recording of the Zapruder film was useful, too. And while working on a production of Hart and Kaufman's You Can't Take It With You, a play focusing on one family during the Depression, I shared New York Times and other news and magazine photos and stories from that period with the director and cast to show the contrast of the joy in the Sycamores' home to the general mood in the country. That the Sycamores were able to enjoy their lives during such economic hardship reveals a great deal about their family relationship and individual spirits.

Children's books. These often convey background information in a well-researched, concise, and attractive manner. While investigating resources for The General from America by Richard Nelson, a play in which Benedict Arnold is the main character, I found many well-written books that succinctly summarized the events of the American Revolution and described daily life in colonial America. I've also found children's books about Shakespeare's world and plays to be constructive while dramaturging the bard's work.

Organize your research for presentation

So what does a dramaturg do with all of this information? First, it must be organized in an easy-to-
access manner. I like to compile my materials into a production notebook that divides up the steps of the research that's been done. I store information that can't fit into the notebook into a box or crate that is clearly labeled with the production's title. Once that's done, the dramaturg chooses the most significant and useful material to share with the director, cast, and others who might find it informative, such as designers and, in the professional theatre, education and community outreach staff to help them develop study guides.

It's important to remember that although a dramaturg may find all of the material interesting, the rest of the production team may not be able to use it all. Don't overwhelm them with too much stuff; instead, distill the research into a concise, readable format and then compile it into packets to distribute either prior to or during the first rehearsal. Before assembling the packets or giving any materials to the actors, however, it's a good idea to ask the director if he approves of the information it will contain. Sometimes directors are selective about the research presented to actors and therefore prefer things to be filtered through them first.

While distilling materials, remember that directors will most likely want research that details the play's text and context, provides information about its production history, and communicates the playwright's intentions; actors look for material to aid them in better understanding their characters and the world in which they live; and designers may request additional references to supplement their own research. I also find it helpful to post visual images in the rehearsal hall (see the "bulletin board" activity below) and to build some sort of reference library for the cast.

Attend rehearsals

A question I'm frequently asked is how often the dramaturg has to be in rehearsal. Although the time commitment should be negotiated with the director, it's wise to attend all table work sessions and to be present while the director and actors are investigating textual issues. In professional productions, often the dramaturg will present her research packet at the first rehearsal and then participate in script discussion for the next few days. I take copious notes during this period to not only remind me what ideas, thoughts, and questions the cast and director have, but also to archive the process in case any of the information is needed for future projects or productions.

Once the director begins to block the play, it's usually not necessary for the dramaturg to be at each rehearsal. Coming in two to three times a week at that point to observe the production's progress and to see if any questions or issues have arisen is appropriate. During this time, I ask questions. For example: Is the production keeping in line with the vision that the director and I discussed during our first meeting? If not, why and how has it changed? Is the production staying true to the playwright's intentions? Is the story clear? If I have notes to give about any of these issues, I discreetly take them during rehearsal and then share them with the director once rehearsal is over. Again, it's important to discuss with the director prior to the rehearsal period if she would like such notes and how she would like the dramaturg to share them with her. I've worked with directors who like to have one-on-one discussions with me after rehearsal, whereas others have preferred me to e-mail my notes.

At the end of the rehearsal process, dramaturgs attend run-throughs, dress rehearsals, and previews to see how the whole production is coming together-technical cues and costumes will have been added at this point-and to ensure that everything will make sense to the audience. In this regard, the dramaturg is acting as an "in-house critic," getting a feel for how the public will respond to the production. If anything might be unclear to the audience, dramaturgs should notify the director of these concerns and offer possible solutions.

Dramaturgy activities for the classroom

Most of what I've discussed are steps that occur in a professional theatre setting, but they're as just applicable in an educational theatre environment. In a moment I'll touch on some things you and your students can do during the production process. First, let's consider some things you can do in the classroom.

Dramaturgy teams

Assign the entire class a play to read, and then break them into dramaturgy teams. Each team is responsible for completing one assignment in the dramturgy process. Once the team has completed its work, the members should compile their information into a packet that can be shared with the entire class. Encourage students to summarize and paraphrase written material in their own words rather than simply copying information from books or printing it off the internet. It's important for dramaturgs to have solid writing skills and to present their research in an attractive and professional manner. Teams should then share their packets with the entire class in an oral presentation. They can get as creative with this as they'd like, but the goal of this part of the activity is to work on verbally communicating what they've learned. Dramaturgs spend a lot of time talking about their knowledge and ideas; therefore, good communication skills are a must.

After each group has presented its materials, organize them into one final production notebook that may be used for other class projects or as a resource for the play if it is ever produced at the school. Indeed, doing this project for a play that is going to be presented during the school year would be especially meaningful.

An advanced version of this activity would be to assign each team to read separate plays that vary in style and period and then require individual team members to complete one step of the research needed. Each team, therefore, would create an entire packet of the research needed for its assigned play. Once the teams finish their project, the class would have multiple completed play packets to review, allowing students to see how each team interpreted the tasks and how their processes differed depending on what type of play was researched.

Dramaturgy bulletin boards

This activity can be done as an extension of the dramaturgy teams activity, on its own, or as part of a play rehearsal. Assign individuals or teams a play to read and research according to the dramaturgy procedure I've outlined. Instead of gathering information into a production notebook, however, students will present their research in a visual manner, either through decorating a bulletin board in the classroom or rehearsal hall, developing a power-point presentation, creating a website, or utilizing some other visual medium. To finish the project, students have to present their bulletin boards to the class, explaining how the elements reflect the world of the play. This activity encourages students to see their plays and research visually, helping them understand how painting, photography, sculpture, maps, book illustrations, cartoons, advertisements, magazine and newspaper spreads, production photos, design sketches, film and dance clips, etc. can convey the play's world.

Miscellaneous classroom dramaturgy activities

Dramaturgical skills are applicable to all areas of theatre, and can also be used in script analysis, playwriting, scene work, and design assignments. Because dramaturgy is so multifaceted, I would advise doing a dramaturgy unit early in the school year to help students learn how to effectively read, respond to, and investigate plays.

Rehearsal dramaturgy

Although the above classroom activities are certainly applicable to the rehearsal process, here are some dramaturgy activities specific to preparing a play for production.

World-of-the-play presentation
A dramaturgy project I've found particularly effective for an educational theatre production is a world-of-the-play presentation during the first rehearsal. The presentation provides the dramaturg with the opportunity to immerse the cast in the play's context. An element of the presentation may include bringing in food from the play's time period and/or setting that somehow symbolically represents characters or issues in the play. Playing music and displaying artwork and other pictorial materials that evoke the play's mood and style is also fun. Once the actors have a had a chance to soak up the aural and visual imagery and snack on the food, the dramaturg should explain why she chose each component, and then review the research packet she's compiled. This presentation is an instructive and creative way to prepare for the first play reading, and it generates enlightened discussion.

I did this type of presentation when I dramaturged Goodnight Desdemona (Good Morning Juliet) by Ann-Marie MacDonald in graduate school. The play is a postmodern romp through the subconscious of Constance, a nerdy, lovesick doctoral student who is writing her dissertation about how Othello and Romeo and Juliet are actually comedies but that the fools in each story, which would turn these popular tragedies into comedies, have somehow gotten lost. Constance ends up getting sucked into the worlds of Othello and Romeo and Juliet to search for the fools. Her journey through these worlds not only helps her dissertation, but it also encourages her to discover her own inner strength, attractiveness, and confidence.

As the cast entered the rehearsal hall for the first Desdemona rehearsal, I had a Moby CD playing that included songs that melded music from different genres and time periods together to create a new, unique sound. Since the play's style used the same blending technique, I thought Moby's music was an apt connection. I had also set out photos of Louise Nevelson sculptures, artwork that was an inspiration not only for me, but for the set designer and director as well. Nevelson's work is a mix of organization and chaos that reminded me of Constance's personality and life. Finally, I provided the cast with food that would have been eaten in the worlds of Romeo and Juliet and Othello (fruits, cheeses, and breads), the candy Smarties and Nerds since Constance is a tightly wound academic at the beginning of her journey, and Wheaties "Breakfast of Champions" to show that Constance is strengthened by the end of her experience. As the cast and director snacked on the food, I explained the elements of my presentation and then shared the research packet I compiled. It was a wonderful way to begin the rehearsal process.

Audience study guides
Preparing study guides for student audiences is a common practice in the regional theatre. For a high school play, why not develop study guides for students, teachers, and other staff not involved in the production? Distribute them to English classes and other subject areas and leave copies in the main office for visitors to read. Make them available to audience members to read before or after the production by placing them in the theatre lobby. Guides often include the same type of information a dramaturg provides to the cast, with the addition of material that introduces audiences to the play's context and illustrates major themes; pre- and post-performance discussion questions are also great to add. Remember that numerous copies of the study guides will have to be made, so keep your design simple.

Program notes, pre-performance discussions, and lobby displays
Educating the playgoing community beyond providing study guides is another valuable dramaturgical duty. Student dramaturgs can write notes for the program to give audiences pertinent background knowledge about the play and/or organize pre-performance discussions with audience members to verbally present them with information that will help them better understand the play they are about to see (we call these "Informances" at the Alley). If they're adventurous, student dramaturgs may even organize and moderate a post-show talkback during which audience members may ask the cast, director, and dramaturg questions about the production. Lobby displays that include attractive and educational materials for the audience to peruse before the show and during intermission may also be created by the dramaturg (materials from the bulletin board project could be used for this).

Although not an exhaustive list of dramaturgical duties, the process and activities I've outlined are a good introduction to the work involved prior to mounting a production. Once they've been exposed to these assorted skills and recognize just how integral dramaturgy is in making the world of a play come to life, students will be ready to flex their knowledge and imagination for the next project.

Dramaturgy resources
Here's a list of websites, books, and organizations that are useful to dramaturgs.

1. Arts Journal. This online digest offers a comprehensive reference for current events in all art areas; updates can be sent via a daily e-mail. (www.artsjournal.com)

2. Arts Lynx International Theatre Resources. An online resource that includes an array of timelines, dictionaries, miscellaneous theatre links, and other research tools. (www.artslynx.org/theatre/drama.htm)

3. Dramaturgy Bibliography. Compiled for a university theatre course, this site has a comprehensive annotated bibliography with sources useful to the dramaturg.

4. Dramaturgy in American Theater: A Source Book, edited by Susan Jonas, Geoffrey S. Proehl, and Michael Lupu (first edition), Wadworth Publishing, 1996. A thorough collection of essays about the art of dramaturgy, this book is a must-read for serious dramaturgs.

5. History of the Theatre by Oscar G. Brockett with Franklin J. Hildy (ninth edition), Allyn and Bacon, 2003. A significant overview of theatre history.

6. Lexis/Nexis Academic. This database found in research libraries contains an extensive newspaper and legal archive.

7. Literary Managers and Dramaturgs of the Americas. This dedicated group provides a supportive network for dramaturgs. An LMDA student membership is also very affordable. The website includes many resources and links to other reliable dramaturgy websites.

8. MLA Bibliography. A thorough bibliographic database found in most libraries.

9. Theatre Communications Group. TCG is an advocacy group for the professional not-for-profit American theatre that publishes American Theatre magazine, among other useful resources.

Amy Steele is the resident dramaturg at the Alley Theatre in Houston, and a member of the Literary Managers and Dramaturgs of the Americas.

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I vividly remember when I first learned about dramaturgy. A friend of mine who is primarily a lighting designer was dramaturging a production of Dancing at Lughnasa. As she described her process, I was completely absorbed.

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If you don't feel like reading the Dramaturgy 101 article, this is the steps the author, Amy Steele, follows.

1) read the text
2) create a glossary of unfamiliar or historical terms
3) research the playwright's background
4) research the background of the play
5) study previous productions of the play
6) look at other materials related to the play: art, music, movies, books, etc.
7) organize your information for a presentation.

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- How is Macbeth a tragic hero?
- Is Lady Macbeth a villain?
- How do supernatural elements influence the show?
- How do historical events surrounding the plot of Macbeth and English influence the show?
-How should this play be performed?

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History Shakespeare referred to for Macbeth.

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Description

Holinshed's Chronicles (1577) - often referred to as just 'Holinshed' - is a large collaborative work describing England, Scotland, Ireland and their histories from their first inhabitation to the mid-16th century. The work was a principal source for many literary writers of the Renaissance, including Marlowe, Spenser, Daniel and Shakespeare.

In 1548, the prominent London printer and bookseller Reyner (or Reginald) Wolfe ambitiously decided to produce a universal history and cosmography (i.e. description and mapping) of the world. After Wolfe's death in 1573, his assistant Raphael Holinshed took over the project, hired more writers and restrained its scope to the British Isles. The Chronicles was first published in 1577 in a two-volume folio edition, illustrated with numerous woodcuts. After Holinshed's death in 1580, Abraham Fleming published the significantly expanded and revised second edition of 1587 in a larger folio format, this time without illustrations.

Shakespeare and Holinshed

Shakespeare used Holinshed as a source for more than a third of his plays, including , and the English history plays such as Richard III. He used it in a range of ways, sometimes following the text of the Chronicles closely, even echoing its words and phrases; sometimes using it as an inspiration for plot details; and at other times deviating from its account altogether, either preferring other sources or his own imagination. Comparing Shakespeare's plays to Holinshed and other sources can provide rich insight into his creative intentions and processes, as well as giving us an idea of some of the context in which Shakespeare's contemporary audiences would have understood his plays.

It is widely believed that Shakespeare used the 1587 edition of Holinshed, based on similarities between some of Shakespeare's text and passages which only appear in the later edition.

Holinshed as a source for King Lear

Shakespeare loosely follows Holinshed's account of Leir, a legendary king of Britain whose story is set in roughly the 8th century BCE. The main differences are that in Holinshed, Leir's eldest daughters are married to the Dukes of Cornwale and Albania after the love test and that Leir decrees only half of his kingdom is to be assigned to the Dukes immediately, the rest to be divided at his death. The Dukes rise up against Leir and take control of the other half by force, allowing the King a small maintenance which, with the support of Gonerilla and Regan, is gradually diminished. Leir flees to Gallia (France) where Cordeilla gives him money for clothes and attendants, receiving him at court with all the honour of a king. Cordeilla is renamed as Leir's sole heir and she and her husband Aganippus raise an army and restore Leir to the throne, killing the Dukes. Leir rules for two years before he dies and the throne passes to Cordeilla. She rules for five years, but after the death of Aganippus, Margan and Cunedagius - the sons of Gonerilla and Regan - rise up against her, refusing to be ruled by a woman. Cordeilla is taken prisoner and, in despair of regaining her liberty, kills herself. There follows a period of civil war.

One of the key similarities to Holinshed is the emphasis on the naturalness of Cordeilla's love for her father, and the unnaturalness of Gonerilla and Regan. Lear's madness in King Lear, as well as his death and the murder of Cordelia, seem to be Shakespeare's invention.

The text for the story of Leir and Cordeilla is very similar in both editions of Holinshed with changes restricted to spelling or phrasing. As well as the text of the Leir story, the 1577 edition also has woodcut illustrations of Leir as a warrior king wearing armour and of Cordeilla, shown both as a queen and a despairing suicide.

Holinshed as a source for Macbeth

The main events Shakespeare depicts in Macbeth are found in Holinshed's account of the reign of Duncan (an account now believed to be based on legend rather than historical fact). Some of the key differences are that Holinshed presents Duncan as a weak king, 'softe and gentle of nature', and Makbeth as cruel, but valiant and an effective ruler. Holinshed gives greater legitimacy to Makbeth's treason: Duncan names his son Prince of Cumberland and so cuts off Makbeth's legitimate chance to succeed him on the throne. Shakespeare increases Lady Macbeth's role and invents her sleepwalking and suicide, the haunting of Macbeth by Banquo's ghost and his return to the witches.

Shakespeare also used ideas from other parts of Holinshed's 'Historie of Scotlande'. Duffe, a 10th-century king, was murdered by Donwalde, spurred on strongly by his wife. The pair get Duffe's personal attendants drunk, and Donwalde blames and slays them in his fabricated rage at discovering the murder. Macbeth also echoes the mood of this account: Duffe was a victim of attempted murder by witchcraft, and after his death Scotland was plunged into a period of darkness and storm. The account of Kenneth (ruling shortly after Duffe) was also influential. Kenneth murders Duffe's son in order to assure his own son's succession and - like Macbeth in Act 2, Scene 2 - is plagued in his guilt by a mysterious voice in the night that prevents him from sleeping and strikes him with dread and terror.

Chapter 13 of Holinshed's 'Description of Scotlande' perhaps provides insight into the creation of Lady Macbeth's character, describing men and women as being equal in 'labour & painefulnesse'. It details the dislike by Scottish women of wet nurses, fearing accusations of infidelity and the degeneration and 'grow[ing] out of kinde' of their babes, 'except they gave them sucke themselves', and linking the 'milke of theyr brestes' with the 'bloud of their owne bellies'. Holinshed also describes women going to war alongside their men with no less courage or ferocity: 'they slew the first living creature that they found, in whose bloud they not onely bathed their swordes, but also tasted therof with their mouthes'.

Holinshed as a source for Marlowe's Edward II

Christopher Marlowe used Holinshed (probably the 1587 edition) as the primary source for his play about . He was inspired by the Chronicles ' vivid account of the King's turbulent reign (1307-1327), which starts with Edward I's death and the return of Edward II's low-born favourite, Piers Gaveston, from banishment.

In his dramatisation of the King's downfall, Marlowe selects, rearranges and reinvents parts of Holinshed's Chronicle to create a moving tragedy with intriguing characters. His play charts Edward's love for Gaveston and Spencer; his neglect of his Queen and earls; the rise and fall of ambitious Mortimer and his lover Queen Isabella; and the King's abdication and murder. Many of Holinshed's details of domestic and foreign policy - particularly wars with France, Scotland and Ireland - are pushed to the margins of Marlowe's Edward II.

The final scenes of Marlowe's play draw on Holinshed's version of Edward's brutal murder at Berkeley Castle. In the Chronicles, his killers held him down 'with heavie feather beddes, (or a table as some write)' and 'put into his fundament [i.e. his bowels] an horne, and through the same they thrust up into his bodie a hote spitte' (p. 883). In Marlowe's play, Lightborne calls for a 'red-hot' spit, a 'table and a feather-bed'. Some see Edward's gruesome murder, as described in both these texts, as a vicious punishment for his homosexuality.

Digitised extracts

Title page

pp. 19-20 of 'The Historie of Englande': account of the reign of Leir

p. 239 of 'The Historie of Scotlande': opening of the account of Duncan's reign, comparing the characters of Duncan and Makbeth

pp. 234-35 of 'The Historie of Scotlande': Makbeth and Banquho's meeting with the weird sisters and Makbeth's murder of Duncan and subsequent coronation

p. 847 of the reign of 'Edward the seconde. 1307': Gaveston returns from banishment and encourages the new King to give in to 'voluptuous pleasure, & riottous excesse'. In 1308, both Gaveston and Edward are wedded to high-born women. Edward marries 'Isabell the French kings daughter' and Gaveston marries Edward's niece, Margaret.

p. 851 Gaveston is beheaded, ridding the realm of 'such a daungerous person'. The King's son Edward is born.

pp. 881-84 The Earl of Spencer is 'drawne and hanged on a payre of Gallowes', and his bowels taken out of his bodie and burnt'. Edward is persuaded to resign, and later imprisoned and killed. Holinshed judges him to be a king of 'good and courteous nature' whose 'pitifull tragedie' was caused by the 'heynous vices' and 'immoderate ambition' of his favourites.

Note about illustrations

The woodcut illustrations of the 1577 edition were intended to bring the textual account to life, but not to be historically realistic or to serve as a documentary source in themselves. Although most of the costly woodcuts used were commissioned specifically for the project, a large number of them were reused throughout the work and as such illustrate types rather than specific individuals or events. For example, the woodcuts illustrating Cordeilla's suicide, Makbeth's coronation and even Leir himself, are also found elsewhere in the book illustrating other suicides, other coronations and other kings. This distance between text and image perhaps explains some of the difficulty to modern readers posed by the illustration of Makbeth and Banquho meeting the weird sisters, whose courtly dress belies their description as 'straunge & ferly' ( ferly meaning 'unexpected', 'frightful' or 'wondrous' - the word was changed to 'wild' in the 1587 edition). In addition, all of the characters are dressed in Renaissance rather than medieval clothes. This woodcut, which only appears the once in Holinshed, has been variously interpreted as being a generic illustration of lords meeting ladies in a wood, as being evidence that witches could be upper class, or as depicting this specific event but being part of an illustrative tradition that did not require such a close correspondence with its text.

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Holinshed's Chronicles (1577) - often referred to as just 'Holinshed' - is a large collaborative work describing England, Scotland, Ireland and their histories from their first inhabitation to the mid-16th century. The work was a principal source for many literary writers of the Renaissance, including Marlowe, Spenser, Daniel and Shakespeare.

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The Gunpowder Plot was a failed attempt to blow up England's King James I (1566-1625) and the Parliament on November 5, 1605. The plot was organized by Robert Catesby (c.1572-1605) in an effort to end the persecution of Roman Catholics by the English government. Catesby and others hoped to replace the country's Protestant government with Catholic leadership. Around midnight on November 4, 1605, one of the conspirators, Guy Fawkes (1570-1606), was discovered in the cellar of the Parliament building with barrels of gunpowder. Fawkes and other men involved in the plot were tried and executed for treason. Every November 5, the British celebrate Guy Fawkes Day by burning Fawkes in effigy.

Gunpowder Plot Discovered

At about midnight on the night of November 4-5, Sir Thomas Knyvet, a justice of the peace, found Guy Fawkes lurking in a cellar under the Parliament building and ordered the premises searched. Thirty-six barrels of gunpowder were found, and Fawkes was taken into custody. After being tortured, Fawkes revealed he was a participant in an English Catholic conspiracy to annihilate England's Protestant government and replace it with Catholic leadership.

Did you know? From 1604 to 1611, King James I sponsored an English translation of the Bible that became known as the Authorized King James Version.

What became known as the Gunpowder Plot was organized by Robert Catesby, an English Catholic whose father had been persecuted by Queen Elizabeth I (1533-1603) for refusing to conform to the Church of England. Guy Fawkes had converted to Catholicism, and his religious zeal led him to fight in the army of Catholic Spain in the Protestant Netherlands.

Catesby and the handful of other plotters rented a cellar that extended under the House of Lords building, and Fawkes planted the gunpowder there. However, as the November 5 opening meeting of Parliament approached, Lord Monteagle (1575-1622), the brother-in-law of one of the conspirators, received an anonymous letter warning him not to attend Parliament on November 5. Monteagle alerted the government, and hours before the attack was to have taken place Fawkes and the explosives were found. By torturing Fawkes, King James' government learned the identities of his co-conspirators. During the next few weeks, English authorities killed or captured all the plotters and put the survivors on trial

Gunpowder Plot: Aftermath

Fawkes and the other surviving chief conspirators were sentenced to be hanged, drawn and quartered in London. Moments before the start of his execution, on January 31, 1606, Fawkes jumped from a ladder while climbing to the gallows, breaking his neck and dying.

Following the failed Gunpowder Plot, new laws were instituted in England that eliminated the right of Catholics to vote, among other repressive restrictions.

Guy Fawkes Night

In 1606, Parliament established November 5 as a day of public thanksgiving. Guy Fawkes Night (also referred to as Guy Fawkes Day and Bonfire Night) now is celebrated annually across Great Britain on November 5 in remembrance of the Gunpowder Plot. As dusk falls, villagers and city dwellers across Britain light bonfires, set off fireworks and burn effigies of Fawkes.

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The Gunpowder Plot was a failed attempt to blow up England's King James I (1566-1625) and the Parliament on November 5, 1605. The plot was organized by Robert Catesby (c.1572-1605) in an effort to end the persecution of Roman Catholics by the English government.

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Why should you read "Macbeth"? - Brendan Pelsue

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It is hard to imagine a world without Shakespeare. Since their composition four hundred years ago, Shakespeare's plays and poems have traveled the globe, inviting those who see and read his works to make them their own.

Readers of the New Folger Editions are part of this ongoing process of "taking up Shakespeare," finding our own thoughts and feelings in language that strikes us as old or unusual and, for that very reason, new. We still struggle to keep up with a writer who could think a mile a minute, whose words paint pictures that shift like clouds. These expertly edited texts are presented to the public as a resource for study, artistic adaptation, and enjoyment. By making the classic texts of the New Folger Editions available in electronic form as Folger Digital Texts, we place a trusted resource in the hands of anyone who wants them.

The New Folger Editions of Shakespeare's plays, which are the basis for the texts realized here in digital form, are special because of their origin. The Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, DC, is the single greatest documentary source of Shakespeare's works. An unparalleled collection of early modern books, manuscripts, and artwork connected to Shakespeare, the Folger's holdings have been consulted extensively in the preparation of these texts. The Editions also reflect the expertise gained through the regular performance of Shakespeare's works in the Folger's Elizabethan Theater.

I want to express my deep thanks to editors Barbara Mowat and Paul Werstine for creating these indispensable editions of Shakespeare's works, which incorporate the best of textual scholarship with a richness of commentary that is both inspired and engaging. Readers who want to know more about Shakespeare and his plays can follow the paths these distinguished scholars have tread by visiting the Folger either in-person or online, where a range of physical and digital resources exists to supplement the material in these texts. I commend to you these words, and hope that they inspire.

Michael Witmore
Director, Folger Shakespeare Library

Until now, with the release of the Folger Digital Texts, readers in search of a free online text of Shakespeare's plays had to be content primarily with using the Moby™ Text, which reproduces a late-nineteenth century version of the plays. What is the difference? Many ordinary readers assume that there is a single text for the plays: what Shakespeare wrote. But Shakespeare's plays were not published the way modern novels or plays are published today: as a single, authoritative text. In some cases, the plays have come down to us in multiple published versions, represented by various Quartos (Qq) and by the great collection put together by his colleagues in 1623, called the First Folio (F). There are, for example, three very different versions of Hamlet, two of King Lear, Henry V, Romeo and Juliet, and others. Editors choose which version to use as their base text, and then amend that text with words, lines or speech prefixes from the other versions that, in their judgment, make for a better or more accurate text.

Other editorial decisions involve choices about whether an unfamiliar word could be understood in light of other writings of the period or whether it should be changed; decisions about words that made it into Shakespeare's text by accident through four hundred years of printings and misprinting; and even decisions based on cultural preference and taste. When the Moby™ Text was created, for example, it was deemed "improper" and "indecent" for Miranda to chastise Caliban for having attempted to rape her. (See The Tempest, 1.2: "Abhorred slave,/Which any print of goodness wilt not take,/Being capable of all ill! I pitied thee..."). All Shakespeare editors at the time took the speech away from her and gave it to her father, Prospero.

The editors of the Moby™ Shakespeare produced their text long before scholars fully understood the proper grounds on which to make the thousands of decisions that Shakespeare editors face. The Folger Library Shakespeare Editions, on which the Folger Digital Texts depend, make this editorial process as nearly transparent as is possible, in contrast to older texts, like the Moby™, which hide editorial interventions. The reader of the Folger Shakespeare knows where the text has been altered because editorial interventions are signaled by square brackets (for example, from Othello: " If she in chains of magic were not bound, "), half-square brackets (for example, from Henry V: "With Hamlet: "O farewell, honest blood and sword and fire to win your right,"), or angle brackets (for example, from soldier. Who hath relieved/you?"). At any point in the text, you can hover your cursor over a bracket for more information.

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Macbeth, set primarily in Scotland, mixes witchcraft, prophecy, and murder. Three "Weïrd Sisters" appear to Macbeth and his comrade Banquo after a battle and prophesy that Macbeth will be king and that the descendants of Banquo will also reign. When Macbeth arrives at his castle, he and Lady Macbeth plot to assassinate King Duncan, soon to be their guest, so that Macbeth can become king.

After Macbeth murders Duncan, the king's two sons flee, and Macbeth is crowned. Fearing that Banquo's descendants will, according to the Weïrd Sisters' predictions, take over the kingdom, Macbeth has Banquo killed. At a royal banquet that evening, Macbeth sees Banquo's ghost appear covered in blood. Macbeth determines to consult the Weïrd Sisters again. They comfort him with ambiguous promises.

Another nobleman, Macduff, rides to England to join Duncan's older son, Malcolm. Macbeth has Macduff's wife and children murdered. Malcolm and Macduff lead an army against Macbeth, as Lady Macbeth goes mad and commits suicide.

Macbeth confronts Malcolm's army, trusting in the Weïrd Sisters' comforting promises. He learns that the promises are tricks, but continues to fight. Macduff kills Macbeth and Malcolm becomes Scotland's king.

Three Witches, the Weïrd Sisters

Donalbain, Duncan's younger son

Seyton, attendant to Macbeth

Macduff, a Scottish noble

Young Siward, Siward's son

A Captain in Duncan's army

Three Messengers, Three Servants, a Lord, a Soldier

Attendants, a Sewer, Servants, Lords, Thanes, Soldiers (all nonspeaking)

Alarum within. Enter King , Duncan Malcolm,
Donalbain, Lennox, with Attendants, meeting a bleeding
Captain.

DUNCAN Of kerns and And Fortune, on his damnèd Shipwracking storms and direful thunders ,
FTLN 0014 What bloody man is that? He can report,
FTLN 0015 As seemeth by his plight, of the revolt
FTLN 0016 The newest state.
MALCOLM FTLN 0017 This is the sergeant
FTLN 0018 5 Who, like a good and hardy soldier, fought
FTLN 0019 'Gainst my captivity.-Hail, brave friend!
FTLN 0020 Say to the King the knowledge of the broil
FTLN 0021 As thou didst leave it.
CAPTAIN FTLN 0022 Doubtful it stood,
FTLN 0023 10 As two spent swimmers that do cling together
FTLN 0024 And choke their art. The merciless Macdonwald
FTLN 0025 (Worthy to be a rebel, for to that
FTLN 0026 The multiplying villainies of nature
FTLN 0027 Do swarm upon him) from the Western Isles
FTLN 0028 15 is supplied;
FTLN 0029 smiling,
FTLN 0030 Showed like a rebel's whore. But all's too weak;
FTLN 0031 For brave Macbeth (well he deserves that name),
FTLN 0032 Disdaining Fortune, with his brandished steel,
FTLN 0033 20 Which smoked with bloody execution,
FTLN 0034 Like Valor's minion, carved out his passage
FTLN 0035 Till he faced the slave;
FTLN 0036 Which ne'er shook hands, nor bade farewell to him,
FTLN 0037 Till he unseamed him from the nave to th' chops,
FTLN 0038 25 And fixed his head upon our battlements. gallowglasses
DUNCAN
FTLN 0039 O valiant cousin, worthy gentleman! quarrel
CAPTAIN
FTLN 0040 As whence the sun 'gins his reflection
FTLN 0041
FTLN 0042 So from that spring whence comfort seemed to
FTLN 0043 30 come
FTLN 0044 Discomfort swells. Mark, King of Scotland, mark:
FTLN 0045 No sooner justice had, with valor armed,
FTLN 0046 Compelled these skipping kerns to trust their heels,
FTLN 0047 But the Norweyan lord, surveying vantage,
FTLN 0048 35 With furbished arms and new supplies of men,
FTLN 0049 Began a fresh assault.
DUNCAN
FTLN 0050 Dismayed not this our captains, Macbeth and
FTLN 0051 Banquo?
CAPTAIN
FTLN 0052 Yes, as sparrows eagles, or the hare the lion.
FTLN 0053 40 If I say sooth, I must report they were
FTLN 0054 As cannons overcharged with double cracks,
FTLN 0055 So they doubly redoubled strokes upon the foe.
FTLN 0056 Except they meant to bathe in reeking wounds
FTLN 0057 Or memorize another Golgotha,
FTLN 0058 45 I cannot tell-
FTLN 0059 break But I am faint. My gashes cry for help.
DUNCAN
FTLN 0060 So well thy words become thee as thy wounds:
FTLN 0061 They smack of honor both.-Go, get him surgeons.

Thunder. Enter the three Witches.

Enter Macbeth and Banquo.

MACBETH How far is 't called to ?
FTLN 0130 So foul and fair a day I have not seen.
BANQUO
FTLN 0131 40 -What are these,
FTLN 0132 So withered, and so wild in their attire, Forres
FTLN 0133 That look not like th' inhabitants o' th' Earth
FTLN 0134 And yet are on 't?-Live you? Or are you aught
FTLN 0135 That man may question? You seem to understand
FTLN 0136 45 me
FTLN 0137 By each at once her choppy finger laying
FTLN 0138 Upon her skinny lips. You should be women,
FTLN 0139 And yet your beards forbid me to interpret
FTLN 0140 That you are so.
MACBETH FTLN 0141 50 Speak if you can. What are you?
FIRST WITCH
FTLN 0142 All hail, Macbeth! Hail to thee, Thane of Glamis!
SECOND WITCH
FTLN 0143 All hail, Macbeth! Hail to thee, Thane of Cawdor!
THIRD WITCH
FTLN 0144 All hail, Macbeth, that shalt be king hereafter!
BANQUO
FTLN 0145 Good sir, why do you start and seem to fear
FTLN 0146 55 Things that do sound so fair?-I' th' name of truth,
FTLN 0147 Are you fantastical, or that indeed
FTLN 0148 Which outwardly you show? My noble partner
FTLN 0149 You greet with present grace and great prediction
FTLN 0150 Of noble having and of royal hope,
FTLN 0151 60 That he seems rapt withal. To me you speak not.
FTLN 0152 If you can look into the seeds of time
FTLN 0153 And say which grain will grow and which will not,
FTLN 0154 Speak, then, to me, who neither beg nor fear
FTLN 0155 Your favors nor your hate.
FIRST WITCH FTLN 0156 65 Hail!
SECOND WITCH FTLN 0157 Hail!
THIRD WITCH FTLN 0158 Hail!
FIRST WITCH
FTLN 0159 Lesser than Macbeth and greater.
SECOND WITCH
FTLN 0160 Not so happy, yet much happier.
THIRD WITCH
FTLN 0161 70 Thou shalt get kings, though thou be none.
FTLN 0162 So all hail, Macbeth and Banquo!
FIRST WITCH
FTLN 0163 Banquo and Macbeth, all hail!
MACBETH
FTLN 0164 Stay, you imperfect speakers. Tell me more.
FTLN 0165 By Sinel's death I know I am Thane of Glamis.
FTLN 0166 75 But how of Cawdor? The Thane of Cawdor lives
FTLN 0167 A prosperous gentleman, and to be king
FTLN 0168 Stands not within the prospect of belief,
FTLN 0169 No more than to be Cawdor. Say from whence
FTLN 0170 You owe this strange intelligence or why
FTLN 0171 80 Upon this blasted heath you stop our way
FTLN 0172 With such prophetic greeting. Speak, I charge you.
Witches vanish.
BANQUO
FTLN 0173 The earth hath bubbles, as the water has,
FTLN 0174 And these are of them. Whither are they vanished?
MACBETH
FTLN 0175 Into the air, and what seemed corporal melted,
FTLN 0176 85 As breath into the wind. Would they had stayed!
BANQUO
FTLN 0177 Were such things here as we do speak about?
FTLN 0178 Or have we eaten on the insane root
FTLN 0179 That takes the reason prisoner?
MACBETH
FTLN 0180 Your children shall be kings.
BANQUO FTLN 0181 90 You shall be king.
MACBETH
FTLN 0182 And Thane of Cawdor too. Went it not so?
BANQUO
FTLN 0183 To th' selfsame tune and words.-Who's here?

ROSS
FTLN 0184 The King hath happily received, Macbeth,
FTLN 0185 The news of thy success, and, when he reads
FTLN 0186 95 Thy personal venture in the rebels' fight,
FTLN 0187 His wonders and his praises do contend
FTLN 0188 Which should be thine or his. Silenced with that,
FTLN 0189 In viewing o'er the rest o' th' selfsame day
FTLN 0190 He finds thee in the stout Norweyan ranks,
FTLN 0191 100 Nothing afeard of what thyself didst make,
FTLN 0192 Strange images of death. As thick as tale
FTLN 0193 post with post, and every one did bear
FTLN 0194 Thy praises in his kingdom's great defense,
FTLN 0195 And poured them down before him.
ANGUS FTLN 0196 105 We are sent
FTLN 0197 To give thee from our royal master thanks,
FTLN 0198 Only to herald thee into his sight,
FTLN 0199 Not pay thee. Came
ROSS
FTLN 0200 And for an earnest of a greater honor,
FTLN 0201 110 He bade me, from him, call thee Thane of Cawdor,
FTLN 0202 In which addition, hail, most worthy thane,
FTLN 0203 For it is thine.
BANQUO FTLN 0204 What, can the devil speak true?
MACBETH
FTLN 0205 The Thane of Cawdor lives. Why do you dress me
FTLN 0206 115 In borrowed robes?
ANGUS FTLN 0207 Who was the Thane lives yet,
FTLN 0208 But under heavy judgment bears that life
FTLN 0209 Which he deserves to lose. Whether he was
FTLN 0210 combined
FTLN 0211 120 With those of Norway, or did line the rebel
FTLN 0212 With hidden help and vantage, or that with both
FTLN 0213 He labored in his country's wrack, I know not;
FTLN 0214 But treasons capital, confessed and proved,
FTLN 0215 Have overthrown him.
MACBETH FTLN 0216 125 Glamis and Thane of Cawdor!
FTLN 0217 The greatest is behind. Thanks
FTLN 0218 for your pains.
FTLN 0219 Do you not hope your children
FTLN 0220 shall be kings,
FTLN 0221 130 When those that gave the Thane of Cawdor to me
FTLN 0222 Promised no less to them?
BANQUO FTLN 0223 That, trusted home,
FTLN 0224 Might yet enkindle you unto the crown,
FTLN 0225 Besides the Thane of Cawdor. But 'tis strange.
FTLN 0226 135 And oftentimes, to win us to our harm,
FTLN 0227 The instruments of darkness tell us truths,
FTLN 0228 Win us with honest trifles, to betray 's
FTLN 0229 In deepest consequence.-
FTLN 0230 Cousins, a word, I pray you.
MACBETH FTLN 0231 140 Two truths are told
FTLN 0232 As happy prologues to the swelling act
FTLN 0233 Of the imperial theme.-I thank you, gentlemen.
FTLN 0234 This supernatural soliciting
FTLN 0235 Cannot be ill, cannot be good. If ill,
FTLN 0236 145 Why hath it given me earnest of success
FTLN 0237 Commencing in a truth? I am Thane of Cawdor.
FTLN 0238 If good, why do I yield to that suggestion
FTLN 0239 Whose horrid image doth unfix my hair
FTLN 0240 And make my seated heart knock at my ribs
FTLN 0241 150 Against the use of nature? Present fears
FTLN 0242 Are less than horrible imaginings.
FTLN 0243 My thought, whose murder yet is but fantastical,
FTLN 0244 Shakes so my single state of man
FTLN 0245 That function is smothered in surmise,
FTLN 0246 155 And nothing is but what is not.
BANQUO FTLN 0247 Look how our partner's rapt.
MACBETH
FTLN 0248 If chance will have me king, why, chance may
FTLN 0249 crown me
FTLN 0250 Without my stir.
BANQUO FTLN 0251 160 New honors come upon him,
FTLN 0252 Like our strange garments, cleave not to their mold
FTLN 0253 But with the aid of use.
MACBETH FTLN 0254 Come what come may,
FTLN 0255 Time and the hour runs through the roughest day.
BANQUO
FTLN 0256 165 Worthy Macbeth, we stay upon your leisure.
MACBETH
FTLN 0257 Give me your favor. My dull brain was wrought
FTLN 0258 With things forgotten. Kind gentlemen, your pains
FTLN 0259 Are registered where every day I turn
FTLN 0260 The leaf to read them. Let us toward the King.
FTLN 0261 170 Think upon what hath chanced,
FTLN 0262 and at more time,
FTLN 0263 The interim having weighed it, let us speak
FTLN 0264 Our free hearts each to other.
BANQUO FTLN 0265 Very gladly.
MACBETH FTLN 0266 175 Till then, enough.-Come, friends.
They exit.

Flourish. Enter King , Duncan Lennox, Malcolm,
Donalbain, and Attendants.

DUNCAN Is execution done on Cawdor?
FTLN 0267 not Are
FTLN 0268 Those in commission yet returned?
MALCOLM FTLN 0269 My liege,
FTLN 0270 They are not yet come back. But I have spoke
FTLN 0271 5 With one that saw him die, who did report
FTLN 0272 That very frankly he confessed his treasons,
FTLN 0273 Implored your Highness' pardon, and set forth
FTLN 0274 A deep repentance. Nothing in his life
FTLN 0275 Became him like the leaving it. He died
FTLN 0276 10 As one that had been studied in his death
FTLN 0277 To throw away the dearest thing he owed
FTLN 0278 As 'twere a careless trifle.
DUNCAN FTLN 0279 There's no art
FTLN 0280 To find the mind's construction in the face.
FTLN 0281 15 He was a gentleman on whom I built
FTLN 0282 An absolute trust.

Enter Macbeth, Banquo, Ross, and Angus.

FTLN 0283 O worthiest cousin,
FTLN 0284 The sin of my ingratitude even now
FTLN 0285 Was heavy on me. Thou art so far before
FTLN 0286 20 That swiftest wing of recompense is slow
FTLN 0287 To overtake thee. Would thou hadst less deserved,
FTLN 0288 That the proportion both of thanks and payment
FTLN 0289 Might have been mine! Only I have left to say,
FTLN 0290 More is thy due than more than all can pay.
MACBETH
FTLN 0291 25 The service and the loyalty I owe
FTLN 0292 In doing it pays itself. Your Highness' part
FTLN 0293 Is to receive our duties, and our duties
FTLN 0294 Are to your throne and state children and servants,
FTLN 0295 Which do but what they should by doing everything
FTLN 0296 30 Safe toward your love and honor.
DUNCAN FTLN 0297 Welcome hither.
FTLN 0298 I have begun to plant thee and will labor
FTLN 0299 To make thee full of growing.-Noble Banquo,
FTLN 0300 That hast no less deserved nor must be known
FTLN 0301 35 No less to have done so, let me enfold thee
FTLN 0302 And hold thee to my heart.
BANQUO FTLN 0303 There, if I grow,
FTLN 0304 The harvest is your own.
DUNCAN FTLN 0305 My plenteous joys,
FTLN 0306 40 Wanton in fullness, seek to hide themselves
FTLN 0307 In drops of sorrow.-Sons, kinsmen, thanes,
FTLN 0308 And you whose places are the nearest, know
FTLN 0309 We will establish our estate upon
FTLN 0310 Our eldest, Malcolm, whom we name hereafter
FTLN 0311 45 The Prince of Cumberland; which honor must
FTLN 0312 Not unaccompanied invest him only,
FTLN 0313 But signs of nobleness, like stars, shall shine
FTLN 0314 On all deservers.-From hence to Inverness
FTLN 0315 And bind us further to you.
MACBETH
FTLN 0316 50 The rest is labor which is not used for you.
FTLN 0317 I'll be myself the harbinger and make joyful
FTLN 0318 The hearing of my wife with your approach.
FTLN 0319 So humbly take my leave.
DUNCAN FTLN 0320 My worthy Cawdor.
MACBETH
FTLN 0321 55 The Prince of Cumberland! That is a step
FTLN 0322 On which I must fall down or else o'erleap,
FTLN 0323 For in my way it lies. Stars, hide your fires;
FTLN 0324 Let not light see my black and deep desires.
FTLN 0325 The eye wink at the hand, yet let that be
FTLN 0326 60 Which the eye fears, when it is done, to see.

DUNCAN
FTLN 0327 True, worthy Banquo. He is full so valiant,
FTLN 0328 And in his commendations I am fed:
FTLN 0329 It is a banquet to me.-Let's after him,
FTLN 0330 Whose care is gone before to bid us welcome.
FTLN 0331 65 It is a peerless kinsman.
Flourish. They exit.

Enter Macbeth's Wife, alone, with a letter.

LADY MACBETH FTLN 0332 They met me in the
FTLN 0333 day of success, and I have learned by the perfect'st
FTLN 0334 report they have more in them than mortal knowledge.
FTLN 0335 When I burned in desire to question them further, they
FTLN 0336 5 made themselves air, into which they vanished.
FTLN 0337 Whiles I stood rapt in the wonder of it came missives
FTLN 0338 from the King, who all-hailed me "Thane of Cawdor,"
FTLN 0339 by which title, before, these Weïrd Sisters saluted me
FTLN 0340 and referred me to the coming on of time with "Hail,
FTLN 0341 10 king that shalt be." This have I thought good to deliver
FTLN 0342 thee, my dearest partner of greatness, that thou
FTLN 0343 might'st not lose the dues of rejoicing by being ignorant
FTLN 0344 of what greatness is promised thee. Lay it to thy
FTLN 0345 heart, and farewell.
FTLN 0346 15 Glamis thou art, and Cawdor, and shalt be
FTLN 0347 What thou art promised. Yet do I fear thy nature;
FTLN 0348 It is too full o' th' milk of human kindness
FTLN 0349 To catch the nearest way. Thou wouldst be great,
FTLN 0350 Art not without ambition, but without
FTLN 0351 20 The illness should attend it. What thou wouldst
FTLN 0352 highly,
FTLN 0353 That wouldst thou holily; wouldst not play false
FTLN 0354 And yet wouldst wrongly win. Thou 'dst have, great
FTLN 0355 Glamis,
FTLN 0356 25 That which cries "Thus thou must do," if thou have
FTLN 0357 it,
FTLN 0358 And that which rather thou dost fear to do,
FTLN 0359 Than wishest should be undone. Hie thee hither,
FTLN 0360 That I may pour my spirits in thine ear
FTLN 0361 30 And chastise with the valor of my tongue
FTLN 0362 All that impedes thee from the golden round,
FTLN 0363 Which fate and metaphysical aid doth seem
FTLN 0364 To have thee crowned withal.
Enter Messenger.

FTLN 0365 What is your tidings?
MESSENGER
FTLN 0366 35 The King comes here tonight.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 0367 Thou 'rt mad to say it.
FTLN 0368 Is not thy master with him, who, were 't so,
FTLN 0369 Would have informed for preparation?
MESSENGER
FTLN 0370 So please you, it is true. Our thane is coming.
FTLN 0371 40 One of my fellows had the speed of him,
FTLN 0372 Who, almost dead for breath, had scarcely more
FTLN 0373 Than would make up his message.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 0374 Give him tending.
FTLN 0375 He brings great news. Messenger exits.
FTLN 0376 45 The raven himself is hoarse
FTLN 0377 That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan
FTLN 0378 Under my battlements. Come, you spirits
FTLN 0379 That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,
FTLN 0380 And fill me from the crown to the toe top-full
FTLN 0381 50 Of direst cruelty. Make thick my blood.
FTLN 0382 Stop up th' access and passage to remorse,
FTLN 0383 That no compunctious visitings of nature
FTLN 0384 Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between
FTLN 0385 Th' effect and it. Come to my woman's breasts
FTLN 0386 55 And take my milk for gall, you murd'ring ministers,
FTLN 0387 Wherever in your sightless substances
FTLN 0388 You wait on nature's mischief. Come, thick night,
FTLN 0389 And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell,
FTLN 0390 That my keen knife see not the wound it makes,
FTLN 0391 60 Nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark
FTLN 0392 To cry "Hold, hold!"

FTLN 0393 Great Glamis, worthy Cawdor,
FTLN 0394 Greater than both by the all-hail hereafter!
FTLN 0395 Thy letters have transported me beyond
FTLN 0396 65 This ignorant present, and I feel now
FTLN 0397 The future in the instant.
MACBETH FTLN 0398 My dearest love,
FTLN 0399 Duncan comes here tonight.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 0400 And when goes hence?
MACBETH
FTLN 0401 70 Tomorrow, as he purposes.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 0402 O, never
FTLN 0403 Shall sun that morrow see!
FTLN 0404 Your face, my thane, is as a book where men
FTLN 0405 May read strange matters. To beguile the time,
FTLN 0406 75 Look like the time. Bear welcome in your eye,
FTLN 0407 Your hand, your tongue. Look like th' innocent
FTLN 0408 flower,
FTLN 0409 But be the serpent under 't. He that's coming
FTLN 0410 Must be provided for; and you shall put
FTLN 0411 80 This night's great business into my dispatch,
FTLN 0412 Which shall to all our nights and days to come
FTLN 0413 Give solely sovereign sway and masterdom.
MACBETH
FTLN 0414 We will speak further.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 0415 Only look up clear.
FTLN 0416 85 To alter favor ever is to fear.
FTLN 0417 Leave all the rest to me.

Hautboys and Torches. Enter King , Duncan Malcolm,
Donalbain, Banquo, Lennox, Macduff, Ross, Angus, and
Attendants.

DUNCAN The temple-haunting ,By his loved ,Where they
FTLN 0418 This castle hath a pleasant seat. The air
FTLN 0419 Nimbly and sweetly recommends itself
FTLN 0420 Unto our gentle senses.
BANQUO FTLN 0421 This guest of summer,
FTLN 0422 5 does approve,
FTLN 0423 that the heaven's breath
FTLN 0424 Smells wooingly here. No jutty, frieze,
martlet FTLN 0425 Buttress, nor coign of vantage, but this bird
FTLN 0426 Hath made his pendant bed and procreant cradle.
FTLN 0427 mansionry 10 breed and haunt, I have
FTLN 0428 observed,
FTLN 0429 The air is delicate. most

DUNCAN FTLN 0430 See, see our honored hostess!-
FTLN 0431 The love that follows us sometime is our trouble,
FTLN 0432 15 Which still we thank as love. Herein I teach you
FTLN 0433 How you shall bid God 'ild us for your pains
FTLN 0434 And thank us for your trouble.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 0435 All our service,
FTLN 0436 In every point twice done and then done double,
FTLN 0437 20 Were poor and single business to contend
FTLN 0438 Against those honors deep and broad wherewith
FTLN 0439 Your Majesty loads our house. For those of old,
FTLN 0440 And the late dignities heaped up to them,
FTLN 0441 We rest your hermits.
DUNCAN FTLN 0442 25 Where's the Thane of Cawdor?
FTLN 0443 We coursed him at the heels and had a purpose
FTLN 0444 To be his purveyor; but he rides well,
FTLN 0445 And his great love, sharp as his spur, hath helped
FTLN 0446 him
FTLN 0447 30 To his home before us. Fair and noble hostess,
FTLN 0448 We are your guest tonight.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 0449 Your servants ever
FTLN 0450 Have theirs, themselves, and what is theirs in compt
FTLN 0451 To make their audit at your Highness' pleasure,
FTLN 0452 35 Still to return your own.
DUNCAN FTLN 0453 Give me your hand.

FTLN 0454 Conduct me to mine host. We love him highly
FTLN 0455 And shall continue our graces towards him.
FTLN 0456 By your leave, hostess.

Hautboys. Torches. Enter a Sewer and divers Servants
with dishes and service over the stage.

MACBETH But here, upon this bank and
FTLN 0457 If it were done when 'tis done, then 'twere well
FTLN 0458 It were done quickly. If th' assassination
FTLN 0459 Could trammel up the consequence and catch
FTLN 0460 With his surcease success, that but this blow
FTLN 0461 5 Might be the be-all and the end-all here,
FTLN 0462 of time,
FTLN 0463 We'd jump the life to come. But in these cases
FTLN 0464 We still have judgment here, that we but teach
FTLN 0465 Bloody instructions, which, being taught, return
FTLN 0466 shoal 10 To plague th' inventor. This even-handed justice
FTLN 0467 Commends th' ingredience of our poisoned chalice
FTLN 0468 To our own lips. He's here in double trust:
FTLN 0469 First, as I am his kinsman and his subject,
FTLN 0470 Strong both against the deed; then, as his host,
FTLN 0471 15 Who should against his murderer shut the door,
FTLN 0472 Not bear the knife myself. Besides, this Duncan
FTLN 0473 Hath borne his faculties so meek, hath been
FTLN 0474 So clear in his great office, that his virtues
FTLN 0475 Will plead like angels, trumpet-tongued, against
FTLN 0476 20 The deep damnation of his taking-off;
FTLN 0477 And pity, like a naked newborn babe
FTLN 0478 Striding the blast, or heaven's cherubin horsed
FTLN 0479 Upon the sightless couriers of the air,
FTLN 0480 Shall blow the horrid deed in every eye,
FTLN 0481 25 That tears shall drown the wind. I have no spur
FTLN 0482 To prick the sides of my intent, but only
FTLN 0483 Vaulting ambition, which o'erleaps itself
FTLN 0484 And falls on th' other-

FTLN 0485 How now, what news? Who dares
LADY MACBETH
FTLN 0486 30 He has almost supped. Why have you left the
FTLN 0487 chamber?
MACBETH
FTLN 0488 Hath he asked for me?
LADY MACBETH FTLN 0489 Know you not he has?
MACBETH
FTLN 0490 We will proceed no further in this business.
FTLN 0491 35 He hath honored me of late, and I have bought
FTLN 0492 Golden opinions from all sorts of people,
FTLN 0493 Which would be worn now in their newest gloss,
FTLN 0494 Not cast aside so soon.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 0495 Was the hope drunk
FTLN 0496 40 Wherein you dressed yourself? Hath it slept since?
FTLN 0497 And wakes it now, to look so green and pale
FTLN 0498 At what it did so freely? From this time
FTLN 0499 Such I account thy love. Art thou afeard
FTLN 0500 To be the same in thine own act and valor
FTLN 0501 45 As thou art in desire? Wouldst thou have that
FTLN 0502 Which thou esteem'st the ornament of life
FTLN 0503 And live a coward in thine own esteem,
FTLN 0504 Letting "I dare not" wait upon "I would,"
FTLN 0505 Like the poor cat i' th' adage?
MACBETH FTLN 0506 50 Prithee, peace.
FTLN 0507 I dare do all that may become a man.
FTLN 0508 more is none.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 0509 What beast was 't,
FTLN 0510 then,
FTLN 0511 55 That made you break this enterprise to me?
FTLN 0512 When you durst do it, then you were a man;
FTLN 0513 And to be more than what you were, you would
FTLN 0514 Be so much more the man. Nor time nor place
FTLN 0515 Did then adhere, and yet you would make both.
FTLN 0516 60 They have made themselves, and that their fitness
FTLN 0517 now
FTLN 0518 Does unmake you. I have given suck, and know
FTLN 0519 How tender 'tis to love the babe that milks me.
FTLN 0520 I would, while it was smiling in my face,
FTLN 0521 65 Have plucked my nipple from his boneless gums
FTLN 0522 And dashed the brains out, had I so sworn as you
FTLN 0523 Have done to this.
MACBETH FTLN 0524 If we should fail-
LADY MACBETH FTLN 0525 do We fail?
FTLN 0526 70 But screw your courage to the sticking place
FTLN 0527 And we'll not fail. When Duncan is asleep
FTLN 0528 (Whereto the rather shall his day's hard journey
FTLN 0529 Soundly invite him), his two chamberlains
FTLN 0530 Will I with wine and wassail so convince
FTLN 0531 75 That memory, the warder of the brain,
FTLN 0532 Shall be a fume, and the receipt of reason
FTLN 0533 A limbeck only. When in swinish sleep
FTLN 0534 Their drenchèd natures lies as in a death,
FTLN 0535 What cannot you and I perform upon
FTLN 0536 80 Th' unguarded Duncan? What not put upon
FTLN 0537 His spongy officers, who shall bear the guilt
FTLN 0538 Of our great quell?
MACBETH FTLN 0539 Bring forth men-children only,
FTLN 0540 For thy undaunted mettle should compose
FTLN 0541 85 Nothing but males. Will it not be received,
FTLN 0542 When we have marked with blood those sleepy two
FTLN 0543 Of his own chamber and used their very daggers,
FTLN 0544 That they have done 't?
LADY MACBETH FTLN 0545 Who dares receive it other,
FTLN 0546 90 As we shall make our griefs and clamor roar
FTLN 0547 Upon his death?
MACBETH FTLN 0548 I am settled and bend up
FTLN 0549 Each corporal agent to this terrible feat.
FTLN 0550 Away, and mock the time with fairest show.
FTLN 0551 95 False face must hide what the false heart doth
FTLN 0552 know.
They exit.

Enter Banquo, and Fleance with a torch before him.

BANQUO FTLN 0553 How goes the night, boy?
FLEANCE
FTLN 0554 The moon is down. I have not heard the clock.
BANQUO FTLN 0555 And she goes down at twelve.
FLEANCE FTLN 0556 I take 't 'tis later, sir.
BANQUO
FTLN 0557 5 Hold, take my sword.
FTLN 0558 There's husbandry in heaven;
FTLN 0559 Their candles are all out. Take thee that too.
FTLN 0560 A heavy summons lies like lead upon me,
FTLN 0561 And yet I would not sleep. Merciful powers,
FTLN 0562 10 Restrain in me the cursèd thoughts that nature
FTLN 0563 Gives way to in repose.

Enter Macbeth, and a Servant with a torch.

FTLN 0564 Give me my sword.-Who's With Tarquin's ravishing ,Moves like a ghost. Thou Hear not my steps, which they
FTLN 0565 there?
MACBETH FTLN 0566 A friend.
BANQUO
FTLN 0567 15 What, sir, not yet at rest? The King's abed.
FTLN 0568 He hath been in unusual pleasure, and
FTLN 0569 Sent forth great largess to your offices.
FTLN 0570 This diamond he greets your wife withal,
FTLN 0571 By the name of most kind hostess, and shut up
FTLN 0572 20 In measureless content.

MACBETH FTLN 0573 Being unprepared,
FTLN 0574 Our will became the servant to defect,
FTLN 0575 Which else should free have wrought.
BANQUO FTLN 0576 All's well.
FTLN 0577 25 I dreamt last night of the three Weïrd Sisters.
FTLN 0578 To you they have showed some truth.
MACBETH FTLN 0579 I think not of
FTLN 0580 them.
FTLN 0581 Yet, when we can entreat an hour to serve,
FTLN 0582 30 We would spend it in some words upon that
FTLN 0583 business,
FTLN 0584 If you would grant the time.
BANQUO FTLN 0585 At your kind'st leisure.
MACBETH
FTLN 0586 If you shall cleave to my consent, when 'tis,
FTLN 0587 35 It shall make honor for you.
BANQUO FTLN 0588 So I lose none
FTLN 0589 In seeking to augment it, but still keep
FTLN 0590 My bosom franchised and allegiance clear,
FTLN 0591 I shall be counseled.
MACBETH FTLN 0592 40 Good repose the while.
BANQUO FTLN 0593 Thanks, sir. The like to you.

MACBETH
FTLN 0594 Go bid thy mistress, when my drink is ready,
FTLN 0595 She strike upon the bell. Get thee to bed.

FTLN 0596 Is this a dagger which I see before me,
FTLN 0597 45 The handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch
FTLN 0598 thee.
FTLN 0599 I have thee not, and yet I see thee still.
FTLN 0600 Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible
FTLN 0601 To feeling as to sight? Or art thou but
FTLN 0602 50 A dagger of the mind, a false creation
FTLN 0603 Proceeding from the heat-oppressèd brain?
FTLN 0604 I see thee yet, in form as palpable
FTLN 0605 As this which now I draw.
FTLN 0606 Thou marshal'st me the way that I was going,
FTLN 0607 55 And such an instrument I was to use.
FTLN 0608 Mine eyes are made the fools o' th' other senses
FTLN 0609 Or else worth all the rest. I see thee still,
FTLN 0610 And, on thy blade and dudgeon, gouts of blood,
FTLN 0611 Which was not so before. There's no such thing.
FTLN 0612 60 It is the bloody business which informs
FTLN 0613 Thus to mine eyes. Now o'er the one-half world
FTLN 0614 Nature seems dead, and wicked dreams abuse
FTLN 0615 The curtained sleep. Witchcraft celebrates
FTLN 0616 Pale Hecate's off'rings, and withered murder,
FTLN 0617 65 Alarumed by his sentinel, the wolf,
FTLN 0618 Whose howl's his watch, thus with his stealthy pace,
FTLN 0619 towards his
FTLN 0620 design
FTLN 0621 and firm-set earth,
FTLN 0622 70 walk, for fear
FTLN 0623 Thy very stones prate of my whereabouts
FTLN 0624 And take the present horror from the time,
FTLN 0625 Which now suits with it. Whiles I threat, he lives.
FTLN 0626 Words to the heat of deeds too cold breath gives.
A bell rings.
FTLN 0627 75 I go, and it is done. The bell invites me.
FTLN 0628 Hear it not, Duncan, for it is a knell
FTLN 0629 That summons thee to heaven or to hell.
He exits. strides sure way

LADY MACBETH
FTLN 0630 That which hath made them drunk hath made me
FTLN 0631 bold.
FTLN 0632 What hath quenched them hath given me fire.
FTLN 0633 Hark!-Peace.
FTLN 0634 5 It was the owl that shrieked, the fatal bellman,
FTLN 0635 Which gives the stern'st good-night. He is about it.
FTLN 0636 The doors are open, and the surfeited grooms
FTLN 0637 Do mock their charge with snores. I have drugged
FTLN 0638 their possets,
FTLN 0639 10 That death and nature do contend about them
FTLN 0640 Whether they live or die.
MACBETH FTLN 0641 Who's there? what, ho!
LADY MACBETH
FTLN 0642 Alack, I am afraid they have awaked,
FTLN 0643 And 'tis not done. Th' attempt and not the deed
FTLN 0644 15 Confounds us. Hark!-I laid their daggers ready;
FTLN 0645 He could not miss 'em. Had he not resembled
FTLN 0646 My father as he slept, I had done 't.

FTLN 0647 My husband? She exits the daggers.
MACBETH
FTLN 0648 I have done the deed. Didst thou not hear a noise?
LADY MACBETH
FTLN 0649 20 I heard the owl scream and the crickets cry.
FTLN 0650 Did not you speak?
MACBETH FTLN 0651 When?
LADY MACBETH FTLN 0652 Now.
MACBETH FTLN 0653 As I descended?
LADY MACBETH FTLN 0654 25 Ay.
MACBETH FTLN 0655 Hark!-Who lies i' th' second chamber?
LADY MACBETH FTLN 0656 Donalbain.
MACBETH FTLN 0657 This is a sorry sight.
LADY MACBETH
FTLN 0658 A foolish thought, to say a sorry sight.
MACBETH
FTLN 0659 30 There's one did laugh in 's sleep, and one cried
FTLN 0660 "Murder!"
FTLN 0661 That they did wake each other. I stood and heard
FTLN 0662 them.
FTLN 0663 But they did say their prayers and addressed them
FTLN 0664 35 Again to sleep.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 0665 There are two lodged together.
MACBETH
FTLN 0666 One cried "God bless us" and "Amen" the other,
FTLN 0667 As they had seen me with these hangman's hands,
FTLN 0668 List'ning their fear. I could not say "Amen"
FTLN 0669 40 When they did say "God bless us."
LADY MACBETH FTLN 0670 Consider it not so deeply.
MACBETH
FTLN 0671 But wherefore could not I pronounce "Amen"?
FTLN 0672 I had most need of blessing, and "Amen"
FTLN 0673 Stuck in my throat.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 0674 45 These deeds must not be thought
FTLN 0675 After these ways; so, it will make us mad.
MACBETH
FTLN 0676 Methought I heard a voice cry "Sleep no more!
FTLN 0677 Macbeth does murder sleep"-the innocent sleep,
FTLN 0678 Sleep that knits up the raveled sleave of care,
FTLN 0679 50 The death of each day's life, sore labor's bath,
FTLN 0680 Balm of hurt minds, great nature's second course,
FTLN 0681 Chief nourisher in life's feast.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 0682 What do you mean?
MACBETH
FTLN 0683 Still it cried "Sleep no more!" to all the house.
FTLN 0684 55 "Glamis hath murdered sleep, and therefore
FTLN 0685 Cawdor
FTLN 0686 Shall sleep no more. Macbeth shall sleep no more."
LADY MACBETH
FTLN 0687 Who was it that thus cried? Why, worthy thane,
FTLN 0688 You do unbend your noble strength to think
FTLN 0689 60 So brainsickly of things. Go get some water
FTLN 0690 And wash this filthy witness from your hand.-
FTLN 0691 Why did you bring these daggers from the place?
FTLN 0692 They must lie there. Go, carry them and smear
FTLN 0693 The sleepy grooms with blood.
MACBETH FTLN 0694 65 I'll go no more.
FTLN 0695 I am afraid to think what I have done.
FTLN 0696 Look on 't again I dare not.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 0697 Infirm of purpose!
FTLN 0698 Give me the daggers. The sleeping and the dead
FTLN 0699 70 Are but as pictures. 'Tis the eye of childhood
FTLN 0700 That fears a painted devil. If he do bleed,
FTLN 0701 I'll gild the faces of the grooms withal,
FTLN 0702 For it must seem their guilt.

MACBETH FTLN 0703 Whence is that
FTLN 0704 75 knocking?
FTLN 0705 How is 't with me when every noise appalls me?
FTLN 0706 What hands are here! Ha, they pluck out mine eyes.
FTLN 0707 Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood
FTLN 0708 Clean from my hand? No, this my hand will rather
FTLN 0709 80 The multitudinous seas incarnadine,
FTLN 0710 Making the green one red. with Knock within.

PORTER FTLN 0725 Here's a knocking indeed! If a man were
FTLN 0726 porter of hell gate, he should have old turning the
FTLN 0727 key. Knock, knock, knock! Who's there, i'
FTLN 0728 th' name of Beelzebub? Here's a farmer that hanged
FTLN 0729 5 himself on th' expectation of plenty. Come in time!
FTLN 0730 Have napkins enough about you; here you'll sweat
FTLN 0731 for 't. Knock, knock! Who's there, in th'
FTLN 0732 other devil's name? Faith, here's an equivocator
FTLN 0733 that could swear in both the scales against either
FTLN 0734 10 scale, who committed treason enough for God's
FTLN 0735 sake yet could not equivocate to heaven. O, come in,
FTLN 0736 equivocator. Knock, knock, knock! Who's
FTLN 0737 there? Faith, here's an English tailor come hither for
FTLN 0738 stealing out of a French hose. Come in, tailor. Here
FTLN 0739 15 you may roast your goose. Knock, knock!
FTLN 0740 Never at quiet.-What are you?-But this place is
FTLN 0741 too cold for hell. I'll devil-porter it no further. I had
FTLN 0742 thought to have let in some of all professions that go
FTLN 0743 the primrose way to th' everlasting bonfire.
FTLN 0744 20 Anon, anon!

to The Porter opens the door Macduff and Lennox.

FTLN 0745 I pray you, remember the porter.
MACDUFF
FTLN 0746 Was it so late, friend, ere you went to bed
FTLN 0747 That you do lie so late?
PORTER FTLN 0748 Faith, sir, we were carousing till the second
FTLN 0749 25 cock, and drink, sir, is a great provoker of three
FTLN 0750 things.
MACDUFF FTLN 0751 What three things does drink especially
FTLN 0752 provoke?
PORTER FTLN 0753 Marry, sir, nose-painting, sleep, and urine.
FTLN 0754 30 Lechery, sir, it provokes and unprovokes. It provokes
FTLN 0755 the desire, but it takes away the performance.
FTLN 0756 Therefore much drink may be said to be an
FTLN 0757 equivocator with lechery. It makes him, and it
FTLN 0758 mars him; it sets him on, and it takes him off; it
FTLN 0759 35 persuades him and disheartens him; makes him
FTLN 0760 stand to and not stand to; in conclusion, equivocates
FTLN 0761 him in a sleep and, giving him the lie, leaves
FTLN 0762 him.
MACDUFF FTLN 0763 I believe drink gave thee the lie last night.
PORTER FTLN 0764 40 That it did, sir, i' th' very throat on me; but I
FTLN 0765 requited him for his lie, and, I think, being too
FTLN 0766 strong for him, though he took up my legs sometime,
FTLN 0767 yet I made a shift to cast him.
MACDUFF FTLN 0768 Is thy master stirring?

MACDUFF FTLN 0797 O horror, horror, horror!
FTLN 0798 Tongue nor heart cannot conceive nor name thee!
MACBETH AND LENNOX FTLN 0799 75 What's the matter?
MACDUFF
FTLN 0800 Confusion now hath made his masterpiece.
FTLN 0801 Most sacrilegious murder hath broke ope
FTLN 0802 The Lord's anointed temple and stole thence
FTLN 0803 The life o' th' building.
MACBETH FTLN 0804 80 What is 't you say? The life?
LENNOX FTLN 0805 Mean you his Majesty?
MACDUFF
FTLN 0806 Approach the chamber and destroy your sight
FTLN 0807 With a new Gorgon. Do not bid me speak.
FTLN 0808 See and then speak yourselves.
Macbeth and Lennox exit.
FTLN 0809 85 Awake, awake!
FTLN 0810 Ring the alarum bell.-Murder and treason!
FTLN 0811 Banquo and Donalbain, Malcolm, awake!
FTLN 0812 Shake off this downy sleep, death's counterfeit,
FTLN 0813 And look on death itself. Up, up, and see
FTLN 0814 90 The great doom's image. Malcolm, Banquo,
FTLN 0815 As from your graves rise up and walk like sprites
FTLN 0816 To countenance this horror.-Ring the bell.

LADY MACBETH FTLN 0817 What's the business,
FTLN 0818 That such a hideous trumpet calls to parley
FTLN 0819 95 The sleepers of the house? Speak, speak!
MACDUFF FTLN 0820 O gentle lady,
FTLN 0821 'Tis not for you to hear what I can speak.
FTLN 0822 The repetition in a woman's ear
FTLN 0823 Would murder as it fell.

MACBETH
FTLN 0831 Had I but died an hour before this chance,
FTLN 0832 I had lived a blessèd time; for from this instant
FTLN 0833 There's nothing serious in mortality.
FTLN 0834 110 All is but toys. Renown and grace is dead.
FTLN 0835 The wine of life is drawn, and the mere lees
FTLN 0836 Is left this vault to brag of.

Enter Malcolm and Donalbain.

DONALBAIN FTLN 0837 What is amiss?
MACBETH FTLN 0838 You are, and do not know 't.
FTLN 0839 115 The spring, the head, the fountain of your blood
FTLN 0840 Is stopped; the very source of it is stopped.
MACDUFF
FTLN 0841 Your royal father's murdered.
MALCOLM FTLN 0842 O, by whom?
LENNOX
FTLN 0843 Those of his chamber, as it seemed, had done 't.
FTLN 0844 120 Their hands and faces were all badged with blood.
FTLN 0845 So were their daggers, which unwiped we found
FTLN 0846 Upon their pillows. They stared and were distracted.
FTLN 0847 No man's life was to be trusted with them.
MACBETH
FTLN 0848 O, yet I do repent me of my fury,
FTLN 0849 125 That I did kill them.
MACDUFF FTLN 0850 Wherefore did you so?
MACBETH
FTLN 0851 Who can be wise, amazed, temp'rate, and furious,
FTLN 0852 Loyal, and neutral, in a moment? No man.
FTLN 0853 Th' expedition of my violent love
FTLN 0854 130 Outrun the pauser, reason. Here lay Duncan,
FTLN 0855 His silver skin laced with his golden blood,
FTLN 0856 And his gashed stabs looked like a breach in nature
FTLN 0857 For ruin's wasteful entrance; there the murderers,
FTLN 0858 Steeped in the colors of their trade, their daggers
FTLN 0859 135 Unmannerly breeched with gore. Who could refrain
FTLN 0860 That had a heart to love, and in that heart
FTLN 0861 Courage to make 's love known?
LADY MACBETH FTLN 0862 Help me hence, ho!
MACDUFF
FTLN 0863 Look to the lady.
MALCOLM FTLN 0864 140 Why do we hold our
FTLN 0865 tongues,
FTLN 0866 That most may claim this argument for ours?
DONALBAIN
FTLN 0867 What should be spoken here, where our fate,
FTLN 0868 Hid in an auger hole, may rush and seize us?
FTLN 0869 145 Let's away. Our tears are not yet brewed.
MALCOLM
FTLN 0870 Nor our strong sorrow upon the foot of motion.
BANQUO FTLN 0871 Look to the lady.

FTLN 0872 And when we have our naked frailties hid,
FTLN 0873 That suffer in exposure, let us meet
FTLN 0874 150 And question this most bloody piece of work
FTLN 0875 To know it further. Fears and scruples shake us.
FTLN 0876 In the great hand of God I stand, and thence
FTLN 0877 Against the undivulged pretense I fight
FTLN 0878 Of treasonous malice.
MACDUFF FTLN 0879 155 And so do I.
ALL FTLN 0880 So all.
MACBETH
FTLN 0881 Let's briefly put on manly readiness
FTLN 0882 And meet i' th' hall together.
ALL FTLN 0883 Well contented.

MALCOLM
FTLN 0884 160 What will you do? Let's not consort with them.
FTLN 0885 To show an unfelt sorrow is an office
FTLN 0886 Which the false man does easy. I'll to England.
DONALBAIN
FTLN 0887 To Ireland I. Our separated fortune
FTLN 0888 Shall keep us both the safer. Where we are,
FTLN 0889 165 There's daggers in men's smiles. The near in blood,
FTLN 0890 The nearer bloody.
MALCOLM FTLN 0891 This murderous shaft that's shot
FTLN 0892 Hath not yet lighted, and our safest way
FTLN 0893 Is to avoid the aim. Therefore to horse,
FTLN 0894 170 And let us not be dainty of leave-taking
FTLN 0895 But shift away. There's warrant in that theft
FTLN 0896 Which steals itself when there's no mercy left.

Enter Macbeth's Lady and a Servant.

FTLN 1124 10 How now, my lord, why do you keep alone,
FTLN 1125 Of sorriest fancies your companions making,
FTLN 1126 Using those thoughts which should indeed have died
FTLN 1127 With them they think on? Things without all remedy
FTLN 1128 Should be without regard. What's done is done.
MACBETH
FTLN 1129 15 We have scorched the snake, not killed it.
FTLN 1130 She'll close and be herself whilst our poor malice
FTLN 1131 Remains in danger of her former tooth.
FTLN 1132 But let the frame of things disjoint, both the worlds
FTLN 1133 suffer,
FTLN 1134 20 Ere we will eat our meal in fear, and sleep
FTLN 1135 In the affliction of these terrible dreams
FTLN 1136 That shake us nightly. Better be with the dead,
FTLN 1137 Whom we, to gain our peace, have sent to peace,
FTLN 1138 Than on the torture of the mind to lie
FTLN 1139 25 In restless ecstasy. Duncan is in his grave.
FTLN 1140 After life's fitful fever he sleeps well.
FTLN 1141 Treason has done his worst; nor steel nor poison,
FTLN 1142 Malice domestic, foreign levy, nothing
FTLN 1143 Can touch him further.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 1144 30 Come on, gentle my lord,
FTLN 1145 Sleek o'er your rugged looks. Be bright and jovial
FTLN 1146 Among your guests tonight.
MACBETH FTLN 1147 So shall I, love,
FTLN 1148 And so I pray be you. Let your remembrance
FTLN 1149 35 Apply to Banquo; present him eminence
FTLN 1150 Both with eye and tongue: unsafe the while that we
FTLN 1151 Must lave our honors in these flattering streams
FTLN 1152 And make our faces vizards to our hearts,
FTLN 1153 Disguising what they are.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 1154 40 You must leave this.
MACBETH
FTLN 1155 O, full of scorpions is my mind, dear wife!
FTLN 1156 Thou know'st that Banquo and his Fleance lives.
LADY MACBETH
FTLN 1157 But in them nature's copy's not eterne.
MACBETH
FTLN 1158 There's comfort yet; they are assailable.
FTLN 1159 45 Then be thou jocund. Ere the bat hath flown
FTLN 1160 His cloistered flight, ere to black Hecate's summons
FTLN 1161 The shard-born beetle with his drowsy hums
FTLN 1162 Hath rung night's yawning peal, there shall be done
FTLN 1163 A deed of dreadful note.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 1164 50 What's to be done?
MACBETH
FTLN 1165 Be innocent of the knowledge, dearest chuck,
FTLN 1166 Till thou applaud the deed.-Come, seeling night,
FTLN 1167 Scarf up the tender eye of pitiful day
FTLN 1168 And with thy bloody and invisible hand
FTLN 1169 55 Cancel and tear to pieces that great bond
FTLN 1170 Which keeps me pale. Light thickens, and the crow
FTLN 1171 Makes wing to th' rooky wood.
FTLN 1172 Good things of day begin to droop and drowse,
FTLN 1173 Whiles night's black agents to their preys do
FTLN 1174 60 rouse.-
FTLN 1175 Thou marvel'st at my words, but hold thee still.
FTLN 1176 Things bad begun make strong themselves by ill.
FTLN 1177 So prithee go with me.

Banquet prepared. Enter Macbeth, Lady , Macbeth
Ross, Lennox, Lords, and Attendants.

MACBETH
FTLN 1211 You know your own degrees; sit down. At first
FTLN 1212 And last, the hearty welcome.
LORDS FTLN 1213 Thanks to your Majesty.
MACBETH
FTLN 1214 Ourself will mingle with society
FTLN 1215 5 And play the humble host.
FTLN 1216 Our hostess keeps her state, but in best time
FTLN 1217 We will require her welcome.
LADY MACBETH
FTLN 1218 Pronounce it for me, sir, to all our friends,
FTLN 1219 For my heart speaks they are welcome.

MACBETH
FTLN 1220 10 See, they encounter thee with their hearts' thanks.
FTLN 1221 Both sides are even. Here I'll sit i' th' midst.
FTLN 1222 Be large in mirth. Anon we'll drink a measure
FTLN 1223 The table round. There's
FTLN 1224 blood upon thy face.
MURDERER FTLN 1225 15 'Tis Banquo's then.
MACBETH
FTLN 1226 'Tis better thee without than he within.
FTLN 1227 Is he dispatched?
MURDERER
FTLN 1228 My lord, his throat is cut. That I did for him.
MACBETH
FTLN 1229 Thou art the best o' th' cutthroats,
FTLN 1230 20 Yet he's good that did the like for Fleance.
FTLN 1231 If thou didst it, thou art the nonpareil.
MURDERER
FTLN 1232 Most royal sir, Fleance is 'scaped.
MACBETH
FTLN 1233 Then comes my fit again. I had else been perfect,
FTLN 1234 Whole as the marble, founded as the rock,
FTLN 1235 25 As broad and general as the casing air.
FTLN 1236 But now I am cabined, cribbed, confined, bound in
FTLN 1237 To saucy doubts and fears.-But Banquo's safe?
MURDERER
FTLN 1238 Ay, my good lord. Safe in a ditch he bides,
FTLN 1239 With twenty trenchèd gashes on his head,
FTLN 1240 30 The least a death to nature.
MACBETH FTLN 1241 Thanks for that.
FTLN 1242 There the grown serpent lies. The worm that's fled
FTLN 1243 Hath nature that in time will venom breed,
FTLN 1244 No teeth for th' present. Get thee gone. Tomorrow
FTLN 1245 35 We'll hear ourselves again. Murderer exits.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 1246 My royal lord,
FTLN 1247 You do not give the cheer. The feast is sold
FTLN 1248 That is not often vouched, while 'tis a-making,
FTLN 1249 'Tis given with welcome. To feed were best at home;
FTLN 1250 40 From thence, the sauce to meat is ceremony;
FTLN 1251 Meeting were bare without it.

Enter the Ghost of Banquo, and sits in Macbeth's place.

MACBETH FTLN 1252 Sweet remembrancer!- Too terrible for the ear. The
FTLN 1253 Now, good digestion wait on appetite
FTLN 1254 And health on both!
LENNOX FTLN 1255 45 May 't please your Highness sit.
MACBETH
FTLN 1256 Here had we now our country's honor roofed,
FTLN 1257 Were the graced person of our Banquo present,
FTLN 1258 Who may I rather challenge for unkindness
FTLN 1259 Than pity for mischance.
ROSS FTLN 1260 50 His absence, sir,
FTLN 1261 Lays blame upon his promise. Please 't your
FTLN 1262 Highness
FTLN 1263 To grace us with your royal company?
MACBETH
FTLN 1264 The table's full.
LENNOX FTLN 1265 55 Here is a place reserved, sir.
MACBETH FTLN 1266 Where?
LENNOX
FTLN 1267 Here, my good lord. What is 't that moves your
FTLN 1268 Highness?
MACBETH
FTLN 1269 Which of you have done this?
LORDS FTLN 1270 60 What, my good lord?
MACBETH
FTLN 1271 Thou canst not say I did it. Never shake
FTLN 1272 Thy gory locks at me.
ROSS
FTLN 1273 Gentlemen, rise. His Highness is not well.
LADY MACBETH
FTLN 1274 Sit, worthy friends. My lord is often thus
FTLN 1275 65 And hath been from his youth. Pray you, keep seat.
FTLN 1276 The fit is momentary; upon a thought
FTLN 1277 He will again be well. If much you note him
FTLN 1278 You shall offend him and extend his passion.
FTLN 1279 Feed and regard him not.
FTLN 1280 70 Are you a man?
MACBETH
FTLN 1281 Ay, and a bold one, that dare look on that
FTLN 1282 Which might appall the devil.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 1283 O, proper stuff!
FTLN 1284 This is the very painting of your fear.
FTLN 1285 75 This is the air-drawn dagger which you said
FTLN 1286 Led you to Duncan. O, these flaws and starts,
FTLN 1287 Impostors to true fear, would well become
FTLN 1288 A woman's story at a winter's fire,
FTLN 1289 Authorized by her grandam. Shame itself!
FTLN 1290 80 Why do you make such faces? When all's done,
FTLN 1291 You look but on a stool.
MACBETH
FTLN 1292 Prithee, see there. Behold, look! Lo,
FTLN 1293 how say you?
FTLN 1294 Why, what care I? If thou canst nod, speak too.-
FTLN 1295 85 If charnel houses and our graves must send
FTLN 1296 Those that we bury back, our monuments
FTLN 1297 Shall be the maws of kites.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 1298 What, quite unmanned in folly?
MACBETH
FTLN 1299 If I stand here, I saw him.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 1300 90 Fie, for shame!
MACBETH
FTLN 1301 Blood hath been shed ere now, i' th' olden time,
FTLN 1302 Ere humane statute purged the gentle weal;
FTLN 1303 Ay, and since too, murders have been performed
FTLN 1304 has been
FTLN 1305 95 That, when the brains were out, the man would die,
FTLN 1306 And there an end. But now they rise again
FTLN 1307 With twenty mortal murders on their crowns
FTLN 1308 And push us from our stools. This is more strange
FTLN 1309 Than such a murder is.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 1310 100 My worthy lord,
FTLN 1311 Your noble friends do lack you.
MACBETH FTLN 1312 I do forget.-
FTLN 1313 Do not muse at me, my most worthy friends.
FTLN 1314 I have a strange infirmity, which is nothing
FTLN 1315 105 To those that know me. Come, love and health to
FTLN 1316 all.
FTLN 1317 Then I'll sit down.-Give me some wine. Fill full. time

FTLN 1318 I drink to th' general joy o' th' whole table
FTLN 1319 And to our dear friend Banquo, whom we miss.
FTLN 1320 110 Would he were here! To all, and him we thirst,
FTLN 1321 And all to all.
LORDS FTLN 1322 Our duties, and the pledge.

MACBETH
FTLN 1323 Avaunt, and quit my sight! Let the earth hide thee.
FTLN 1324 Thy bones are marrowless; thy blood is cold;
FTLN 1325 115 Thou hast no speculation in those eyes
FTLN 1326 Which thou dost glare with.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 1327 Think of this, good
FTLN 1328 peers,
FTLN 1329 But as a thing of custom. 'Tis no other;
FTLN 1330 120 Only it spoils the pleasure of the time.
MACBETH FTLN 1331 What man dare, I dare.
FTLN 1332 Approach thou like the rugged Russian bear,
FTLN 1333 The armed rhinoceros, or th' Hyrcan tiger;
FTLN 1334 Take any shape but that, and my firm nerves
FTLN 1335 125 Shall never tremble. Or be alive again
FTLN 1336 And dare me to the desert with thy sword.
FTLN 1337 If trembling I inhabit then, protest me
FTLN 1338 The baby of a girl. Hence, horrible shadow!
FTLN 1339 Unreal mock'ry, hence!
FTLN 1340 130 Why so, being gone,
FTLN 1341 I am a man again.-Pray you sit still.
LADY MACBETH
FTLN 1342 You have displaced the mirth, broke the good
FTLN 1343 meeting
FTLN 1344 With most admired disorder.
MACBETH FTLN 1345 135 Can such things be
FTLN 1346 And overcome us like a summer's cloud,
FTLN 1347 Without our special wonder? You make me strange
FTLN 1348 Even to the disposition that I owe
FTLN 1349 When now I think you can behold such sights
FTLN 1350 140 And keep the natural ruby of your cheeks
FTLN 1351 When mine is blanched with fear.
ROSS FTLN 1352 What sights, my
FTLN 1353 lord?
LADY MACBETH
FTLN 1354 I pray you, speak not. He grows worse and worse.
FTLN 1355 145 Question enrages him. At once, good night.
FTLN 1356 Stand not upon the order of your going,
FTLN 1357 But go at once.
LENNOX FTLN 1358 Good night, and better health
FTLN 1359 Attend his Majesty.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 1360 150 A kind good night to all.

MACBETH
FTLN 1361 It will have blood, they say; blood will have blood.
FTLN 1362 Stones have been known to move, and trees to
FTLN 1363 speak.
FTLN 1364 Augurs and understood relations have
FTLN 1365 155 By maggot pies and choughs and rooks brought
FTLN 1366 forth
FTLN 1367 The secret'st man of blood.-What is the night?
LADY MACBETH
FTLN 1368 Almost at odds with morning, which is which.
MACBETH
FTLN 1369 How say'st thou that Macduff denies his person
FTLN 1370 160 At our great bidding?
LADY MACBETH FTLN 1371 Did you send to him, sir?
MACBETH
FTLN 1372 I hear it by the way; but I will send.
FTLN 1373 There's not a one of them but in his house
FTLN 1374 I keep a servant fee'd. I will tomorrow
FTLN 1375 165 (And betimes I will) to the Weïrd Sisters.
FTLN 1376 More shall they speak, for now I am bent to know
FTLN 1377 By the worst means the worst. For mine own good,
FTLN 1378 All causes shall give way. I am in blood
FTLN 1379 Stepped in so far that, should I wade no more,
FTLN 1380 170 Returning were as tedious as go o'er.
FTLN 1381 Strange things I have in head that will to hand,
FTLN 1382 Which must be acted ere they may be scanned.
LADY MACBETH
FTLN 1383 You lack the season of all natures, sleep.
MACBETH
FTLN 1384 Come, we'll to sleep. My strange and self-abuse
FTLN 1385 175 Is the initiate fear that wants hard use.
FTLN 1386 We are yet but young in deed.

Enter a Doctor of Physic and a Waiting-Gentlewoman.

DOCTOR FTLN 2036 I have two nights watched with you but can
FTLN 2037 perceive no truth in your report. When was it she
FTLN 2038 last walked?
GENTLEWOMAN FTLN 2039 Since his Majesty went into the field, I
FTLN 2040 5 have seen her rise from her bed, throw her nightgown
FTLN 2041 upon her, unlock her closet, take forth paper,
FTLN 2042 fold it, write upon 't, read it, afterwards seal it, and
FTLN 2043 again return to bed; yet all this while in a most fast
FTLN 2044 sleep.
DOCTOR FTLN 2045 10 A great perturbation in nature, to receive at
FTLN 2046 once the benefit of sleep and do the effects of
FTLN 2047 watching. In this slumb'ry agitation, besides her
FTLN 2048 walking and other actual performances, what at any
FTLN 2049 time have you heard her say?
GENTLEWOMAN FTLN 2050 15 That, sir, which I will not report after
FTLN 2051 her.
DOCTOR FTLN 2052 You may to me, and 'tis most meet you
FTLN 2053 should.
GENTLEWOMAN FTLN 2054 Neither to you nor anyone, having no
FTLN 2055 20 witness to confirm my speech.

FTLN 2056 Lo you, here she comes. This is her very guise and,
FTLN 2057 upon my life, fast asleep. Observe her; stand close.
DOCTOR FTLN 2058 How came she by that light?
GENTLEWOMAN FTLN 2059 Why, it stood by her. She has light by
FTLN 2060 25 her continually. 'Tis her command.
DOCTOR FTLN 2061 You see her eyes are open.
GENTLEWOMAN FTLN 2062 Ay, but their sense are shut.
DOCTOR FTLN 2063 What is it she does now? Look how she rubs
FTLN 2064 her hands.
GENTLEWOMAN FTLN 2065 30 It is an accustomed action with her to
FTLN 2066 seem thus washing her hands. I have known her
FTLN 2067 continue in this a quarter of an hour.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 2068 Yet here's a spot.
DOCTOR FTLN 2069 Hark, she speaks. I will set down what comes
FTLN 2070 35 from her, to satisfy my remembrance the more
FTLN 2071 strongly.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 2072 Out, damned spot, out, I say! One. Two.
FTLN 2073 Why then, 'tis time to do 't. Hell is murky. Fie, my
FTLN 2074 lord, fie, a soldier and afeard? What need we fear
FTLN 2075 40 who knows it, when none can call our power to
FTLN 2076 account? Yet who would have thought the old man
FTLN 2077 to have had so much blood in him?
DOCTOR FTLN 2078 Do you mark that?
LADY MACBETH FTLN 2079 The Thane of Fife had a wife. Where is
FTLN 2080 45 she now? What, will these hands ne'er be clean? No
FTLN 2081 more o' that, my lord, no more o' that. You mar all
FTLN 2082 with this starting.
DOCTOR FTLN 2083 Go to, go to. You have known what you should
FTLN 2084 not.
GENTLEWOMAN FTLN 2085 50 She has spoke what she should not,
FTLN 2086 I am sure of that. Heaven knows what she has
FTLN 2087 known.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 2088 Here's the smell of the blood still. All
FTLN 2089 the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little
FTLN 2090 55 hand. O, O, O!
DOCTOR FTLN 2091 What a sigh is there! The heart is sorely
FTLN 2092 charged.
GENTLEWOMAN FTLN 2093 I would not have such a heart in my
FTLN 2094 bosom for the dignity of the whole body.
DOCTOR FTLN 2095 60 Well, well, well.
GENTLEWOMAN FTLN 2096 Pray God it be, sir.
DOCTOR FTLN 2097 This disease is beyond my practice. Yet I have
FTLN 2098 known those which have walked in their sleep,
FTLN 2099 who have died holily in their beds.
LADY MACBETH FTLN 2100 65 Wash your hands. Put on your nightgown.
FTLN 2101 Look not so pale. I tell you yet again, Banquo's
FTLN 2102 buried; he cannot come out on 's grave.
DOCTOR FTLN 2103 Even so?
LADY MACBETH FTLN 2104 To bed, to bed. There's knocking at the
FTLN 2105 70 gate. Come, come, come, come. Give me your
FTLN 2106 hand. What's done cannot be undone. To bed, to
FTLN 2107 bed, to bed.
DOCTOR FTLN 2108 Will she go now to bed?
GENTLEWOMAN FTLN 2109 Directly.
DOCTOR
FTLN 2110 75 Foul whisp'rings are abroad. Unnatural deeds
FTLN 2111 Do breed unnatural troubles. Infected minds
FTLN 2112 To their deaf pillows will discharge their secrets.
FTLN 2113 More needs she the divine than the physician.
FTLN 2114 God, God forgive us all. Look after her.
FTLN 2115 80 Remove from her the means of all annoyance
FTLN 2116 And still keep eyes upon her. So, good night.
FTLN 2117 My mind she has mated, and amazed my sight.
FTLN 2118 I think but dare not speak.
GENTLEWOMAN FTLN 2119 Good night, good doctor.

Drum and Colors. Enter Menteith, Caithness, Angus, Lennox,
and Soldiers.

MENTEITH
FTLN 2120 The English power is near, led on by Malcolm,
FTLN 2121 His uncle Siward, and the good Macduff.
FTLN 2122 Revenges burn in them, for their dear causes
FTLN 2123 Would to the bleeding and the grim alarm
FTLN 2124 5 Excite the mortified man.
ANGUS FTLN 2125 Near Birnam Wood
FTLN 2126 Shall we well meet them. That way are they coming.
CAITHNESS
FTLN 2127 Who knows if Donalbain be with his brother?
LENNOX
FTLN 2128 For certain, sir, he is not. I have a file
FTLN 2129 10 Of all the gentry. There is Siward's son
FTLN 2130 And many unrough youths that even now
FTLN 2131 Protest their first of manhood.
MENTEITH FTLN 2132 What does the tyrant?
CAITHNESS
FTLN 2133 Great Dunsinane he strongly fortifies.
FTLN 2134 15 Some say he's mad; others that lesser hate him
FTLN 2135 Do call it valiant fury. But for certain
FTLN 2136 He cannot buckle his distempered cause
FTLN 2137 Within the belt of rule.
ANGUS FTLN 2138 Now does he feel
FTLN 2139 20 His secret murders sticking on his hands.
FTLN 2140 Now minutely revolts upbraid his faith-breach.
FTLN 2141 Those he commands move only in command,
FTLN 2142 Nothing in love. Now does he feel his title
FTLN 2143 Hang loose about him, like a giant's robe
FTLN 2144 25 Upon a dwarfish thief.
MENTEITH FTLN 2145 Who, then, shall blame
FTLN 2146 His pestered senses to recoil and start
FTLN 2147 When all that is within him does condemn
FTLN 2148 Itself for being there?
CAITHNESS FTLN 2149 30 Well, march we on
FTLN 2150 To give obedience where 'tis truly owed.
FTLN 2151 Meet we the med'cine of the sickly weal,
FTLN 2152 And with him pour we in our country's purge
FTLN 2153 Each drop of us.
LENNOX FTLN 2154 35 Or so much as it needs
FTLN 2155 To dew the sovereign flower and drown the weeds.
FTLN 2156 Make we our march towards Birnam.
They exit marching.

MACBETH
FTLN 2157 Bring me no more reports. Let them fly all.
FTLN 2158 Till Birnam Wood remove to Dunsinane
FTLN 2159 I cannot taint with fear. What's the boy Malcolm?
FTLN 2160 Was he not born of woman? The spirits that know
FTLN 2161 5 All mortal consequences have pronounced me thus:
FTLN 2162 "Fear not, Macbeth. No man that's born of woman
FTLN 2163 Shall e'er have power upon thee." Then fly, false
FTLN 2164 thanes,
FTLN 2165 And mingle with the English epicures.
FTLN 2166 10 The mind I sway by and the heart I bear
FTLN 2167 Shall never sag with doubt nor shake with fear.

FTLN 2168 The devil damn thee black, thou cream-faced loon! Will cheer me ever or
FTLN 2169 Where got'st thou that goose-look?
SERVANT FTLN 2170 There is ten thousand-
MACBETH FTLN 2171 15 Geese, villain?
SERVANT FTLN 2172 Soldiers, sir.
MACBETH
FTLN 2173 Go prick thy face and over-red thy fear,
FTLN 2174 Thou lily-livered boy. What soldiers, patch?
FTLN 2175 Death of thy soul! Those linen cheeks of thine
FTLN 2176 20 Are counselors to fear. What soldiers, whey-face?
SERVANT FTLN 2177 The English force, so please you.
MACBETH
FTLN 2178 Take thy face hence.
FTLN 2179 Seyton!-I am sick at heart
FTLN 2180 When I behold-Seyton, I say!-This push
FTLN 2181 25 me now.
FTLN 2182 I have lived long enough. My way of life
FTLN 2183 Is fall'n into the sere, the yellow leaf,
FTLN 2184 And that which should accompany old age,
FTLN 2185 As honor, love, obedience, troops of friends,
FTLN 2186 30 I must not look to have, but in their stead
FTLN 2187 Curses, not loud but deep, mouth-honor, breath
FTLN 2188 Which the poor heart would fain deny and dare
FTLN 2189 not.-
FTLN 2190 Seyton! disseat

SEYTON Cure
FTLN 2191 35 What's your gracious pleasure?
MACBETH FTLN 2192 What news more?
SEYTON
FTLN 2193 All is confirmed, my lord, which was reported.
MACBETH
FTLN 2194 I'll fight till from my bones my flesh be hacked.
FTLN 2195 Give me my armor.
SEYTON FTLN 2196 40 'Tis not needed yet.
MACBETH FTLN 2197 I'll put it on.
FTLN 2198 Send out more horses. Skirr the country round.
FTLN 2199 Hang those that talk of fear. Give me mine
FTLN 2200 armor.-
FTLN 2201 45 How does your patient, doctor?
DOCTOR FTLN 2202 Not so sick, my lord,
FTLN 2203 As she is troubled with thick-coming fancies
FTLN 2204 That keep her from her rest.
MACBETH FTLN 2205 of that.
FTLN 2206 50 Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased,
FTLN 2207 Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow,
FTLN 2208 Raze out the written troubles of the brain,
FTLN 2209 And with some sweet oblivious antidote
FTLN 2210 Cleanse the stuffed bosom of that perilous stuff
FTLN 2211 55 Which weighs upon the heart?
DOCTOR FTLN 2212 Therein the patient
FTLN 2213 Must minister to himself.
MACBETH
FTLN 2214 Throw physic to the dogs. I'll none of it.-
FTLN 2215 Come, put mine armor on. Give me my staff.

FTLN 2216 her 60 Seyton, send out.-Doctor, the thanes fly from
FTLN 2217 me.-
FTLN 2218 Come, sir, dispatch.-If thou couldst, doctor, cast
FTLN 2219 The water of my land, find her disease,
FTLN 2220 And purge it to a sound and pristine health,
FTLN 2221 65 I would applaud thee to the very echo
FTLN 2222 That should applaud again.-Pull 't off, I say.-
FTLN 2223 What rhubarb, senna, or what purgative drug
FTLN 2224 Would scour these English hence? Hear'st thou of
FTLN 2225 them?
DOCTOR
FTLN 2226 70 Ay, my good lord. Your royal preparation
FTLN 2227 Makes us hear something.
MACBETH FTLN 2228 Bring it after me.-
FTLN 2229 I will not be afraid of death and bane
FTLN 2230 Till Birnam Forest come to Dunsinane.
DOCTOR
FTLN 2231 75 Were I from Dunsinane away and clear,
FTLN 2232 Profit again should hardly draw me here.
They exit.

Drum and Colors. Enter Malcolm, Siward, Macduff,
Siward's son, Menteith, Caithness, Angus, and Soldiers,
marching.

MALCOLM
FTLN 2233 Cousins, I hope the days are near at hand
FTLN 2234 That chambers will be safe.
MENTEITH FTLN 2235 We doubt it nothing.
SIWARD
FTLN 2236 What wood is this before us?
MENTEITH FTLN 2237 5 The Wood of Birnam.
MALCOLM
FTLN 2238 Let every soldier hew him down a bough
FTLN 2239 And bear 't before him. Thereby shall we shadow
FTLN 2240 The numbers of our host and make discovery
FTLN 2241 Err in report of us.
SOLDIER FTLN 2242 10 It shall be done.
SIWARD
FTLN 2243 We learn no other but the confident tyrant
FTLN 2244 Keeps still in Dunsinane and will endure
FTLN 2245 Our setting down before 't.
MALCOLM FTLN 2246 'Tis his main hope;
FTLN 2247 15 For, where there is advantage to be given,
FTLN 2248 Both more and less have given him the revolt,
FTLN 2249 And none serve with him but constrainèd things
FTLN 2250 Whose hearts are absent too.
MACDUFF FTLN 2251 Let our just censures
FTLN 2252 20 Attend the true event, and put we on
FTLN 2253 Industrious soldiership.
SIWARD FTLN 2254 The time approaches
FTLN 2255 That will with due decision make us know
FTLN 2256 What we shall say we have and what we owe.
FTLN 2257 25 Thoughts speculative their unsure hopes relate,
FTLN 2258 But certain issue strokes must arbitrate;
FTLN 2259 Towards which, advance the war.
They exit marching.

Enter Macbeth, Seyton, and Soldiers, with Drum and
Colors.

MACBETH
FTLN 2260 Hang out our banners on the outward walls.
FTLN 2261 The cry is still "They come!" Our castle's strength
FTLN 2262 Will laugh a siege to scorn. Here let them lie
FTLN 2263 Till famine and the ague eat them up.
FTLN 2264 5 Were they not forced with those that should be
FTLN 2265 ours,
FTLN 2266 We might have met them dareful, beard to beard,
FTLN 2267 And beat them backward home.
A cry within of women.
FTLN 2268 What is that noise?
SEYTON
FTLN 2269 10 It is the cry of women, my good lord.
MACBETH
FTLN 2270 I have almost forgot the taste of fears.
FTLN 2271 The time has been my senses would have cooled
FTLN 2272 To hear a night-shriek, and my fell of hair
FTLN 2273 Would at a dismal treatise rouse and stir
FTLN 2274 15 As life were in 't. I have supped full with horrors.
FTLN 2275 Direness, familiar to my slaughterous thoughts,
FTLN 2276 Cannot once start me.

FTLN 2277 Wherefore was that cry?
SEYTON FTLN 2278 The Queen, my lord, is dead.
MACBETH FTLN 2279 20 She should have died hereafter.
FTLN 2280 There would have been a time for such a word.
FTLN 2281 Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow
FTLN 2282 Creeps in this petty pace from day to day
FTLN 2283 To the last syllable of recorded time,
FTLN 2284 25 And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
FTLN 2285 The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
FTLN 2286 Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
FTLN 2287 That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
FTLN 2288 And then is heard no more. It is a tale
FTLN 2289 30 Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
FTLN 2290 Signifying nothing.

FTLN 2291 Thou com'st to use thy tongue: thy story quickly.
MESSENGER FTLN 2292 Gracious my lord,
FTLN 2293 I should report that which I say I saw,
FTLN 2294 35 But know not how to do 't.
MACBETH FTLN 2295 Well, say, sir.
MESSENGER
FTLN 2296 As I did stand my watch upon the hill,
FTLN 2297 I looked toward Birnam, and anon methought
FTLN 2298 The Wood began to move.
MACBETH FTLN 2299 40 Liar and slave!
MESSENGER
FTLN 2300 Let me endure your wrath if 't be not so.
FTLN 2301 Within this three mile may you see it coming.
FTLN 2302 I say, a moving grove.
MACBETH FTLN 2303 If thou speak'st false,
FTLN 2304 45 Upon the next tree shall thou hang alive
FTLN 2305 Till famine cling thee. If thy speech be sooth,
FTLN 2306 I care not if thou dost for me as much.-
FTLN 2307 I pull in resolution and begin
FTLN 2308 To doubt th' equivocation of the fiend,
FTLN 2309 50 That lies like truth. "Fear not till Birnam Wood
FTLN 2310 Do come to Dunsinane," and now a wood
FTLN 2311 Comes toward Dunsinane.-Arm, arm, and out!-
FTLN 2312 If this which he avouches does appear,
FTLN 2313 There is nor flying hence nor tarrying here.
FTLN 2314 55 I 'gin to be aweary of the sun
FTLN 2315 And wish th' estate o' th' world were now
FTLN 2316 undone.-
FTLN 2317 Ring the alarum bell!-Blow wind, come wrack,
FTLN 2318 At least we'll die with harness on our back.

Drum and Colors. Enter Malcolm, Siward, Macduff, and
their army, with boughs.

MALCOLM
FTLN 2319 Now near enough. Your leafy screens throw down
FTLN 2320 And show like those you are.-You, worthy uncle,
FTLN 2321 Shall with my cousin, your right noble son,
FTLN 2322 Lead our first battle. Worthy Macduff and we
FTLN 2323 5 Shall take upon 's what else remains to do,
FTLN 2324 According to our order.
SIWARD FTLN 2325 Fare you well.
FTLN 2326 Do we but find the tyrant's power tonight,
FTLN 2327 Let us be beaten if we cannot fight.
MACDUFF
FTLN 2328 10 Make all our trumpets speak; give them all breath,
FTLN 2329 Those clamorous harbingers of blood and death.

Alarums continued.

MACBETH
FTLN 2366 Why should I play the Roman fool and die
FTLN 2367 On mine own sword? Whiles I see lives, the gashes
FTLN 2368 Do better upon them.

MACDUFF FTLN 2369 Turn, hellhound, turn!
MACBETH
FTLN 2370 5 Of all men else I have avoided thee.
FTLN 2371 But get thee back. My soul is too much charged
FTLN 2372 With blood of thine already.
MACDUFF FTLN 2373 I have no words;
FTLN 2374 My voice is in my sword, thou bloodier villain
FTLN 2375 10 Than terms can give thee out. Fight. Alarum.
MACBETH FTLN 2376 Thou losest labor.
FTLN 2377 As easy mayst thou the intrenchant air
FTLN 2378 With thy keen sword impress as make me bleed.
FTLN 2379 Let fall thy blade on vulnerable crests;
FTLN 2380 15 I bear a charmèd life, which must not yield
FTLN 2381 To one of woman born.
MACDUFF FTLN 2382 Despair thy charm,
FTLN 2383 And let the angel whom thou still hast served
FTLN 2384 Tell thee Macduff was from his mother's womb
FTLN 2385 20 Untimely ripped.
MACBETH
FTLN 2386 Accursèd be that tongue that tells me so,
FTLN 2387 For it hath cowed my better part of man!
FTLN 2388 And be these juggling fiends no more believed
FTLN 2389 That palter with us in a double sense,
FTLN 2390 25 That keep the word of promise to our ear
FTLN 2391 And break it to our hope. I'll not fight with thee.
MACDUFF FTLN 2392 Then yield thee, coward,
FTLN 2393 And live to be the show and gaze o' th' time.
FTLN 2394 We'll have thee, as our rarer monsters are,
FTLN 2395 30 Painted upon a pole, and underwrit
FTLN 2396 "Here may you see the tyrant."
MACBETH FTLN 2397 I will not yield
FTLN 2398 To kiss the ground before young Malcolm's feet
FTLN 2399 And to be baited with the rabble's curse.
FTLN 2400 35 Though Birnam Wood be come to Dunsinane
FTLN 2401 And thou opposed, being of no woman born,
FTLN 2402 Yet I will try the last. Before my body
FTLN 2403 I throw my warlike shield. Lay on, Macduff,
FTLN 2404 And damned be him that first cries "Hold! Enough!"
They exit fighting. Alarums.

enter fighting, and Macbeth slain. exits carrying off Macbeth's body.Enter, with Drum and Colors, Malcolm, Siward, Ross, They is
Thanes, and Soldiers. Macduff
Retreat and flourish.

Enter Macduff with Macbeth's head.

MACDUFF
FTLN 2430 65 Hail, King! for so thou art. Behold where stands
FTLN 2431 Th' usurper's cursèd head. The time is free.
FTLN 2432 I see thee compassed with thy kingdom's pearl,
FTLN 2433 That speak my salutation in their minds,
FTLN 2434 Whose voices I desire aloud with mine.
FTLN 2435 70 Hail, King of Scotland!
ALL FTLN 2436 Hail, King of Scotland!
MALCOLM
FTLN 2437 We shall not spend a large expense of time
FTLN 2438 Before we reckon with your several loves
FTLN 2439 And make us even with you. My thanes and
FTLN 2440 75 kinsmen,
FTLN 2441 Henceforth be earls, the first that ever Scotland
FTLN 2442 In such an honor named. What's more to do,
FTLN 2443 Which would be planted newly with the time,
FTLN 2444 As calling home our exiled friends abroad
FTLN 2445 80 That fled the snares of watchful tyranny,
FTLN 2446 Producing forth the cruel ministers
FTLN 2447 Of this dead butcher and his fiend-like queen
FTLN 2448 (Who, as 'tis thought, by self and violent hands,
FTLN 2449 Took off her life)-this, and what needful else
FTLN 2450 85 That calls upon us, by the grace of grace,
FTLN 2451 We will perform in measure, time, and place.
FTLN 2452 So thanks to all at once and to each one,
FTLN 2453 Whom we invite to see us crowned at Scone.
Flourish. All exit.

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It is hard to imagine a world without Shakespeare. Since their composition four hundred years ago, Shakespeare's plays and poems have traveled the globe, inviting those who see and read his works to make them their own.

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Actors and audiences during Elizabethan times

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Shakespeare’s theater | Folger Shakespeare Library

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History of The Globe and other theaters in London where Shakespeare's company, the Lord Chamberlain's Men, performed, audience experiences in playhouses, expectations for actors, costumes and other staging choices.

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Good for plot synopsis, analysis of themes, and historical information!

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Free Will, Witches, Murder, and Macbeth, Part 1: Crash Course Literature 409

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Recent movie trailer for Macbeth

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Macbeth Official US Release Trailer (2015) - Michael Fassbender War Drama HD

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Are the witches figments of Macbeth's imagination, or are they real?

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To say that the witches in William Shakespeare's "Macbeth" play crucial roles in the drama would be an understatement. Without the witches, there would simply be no story to tell, as they move the plot.

During the play, the Macbeth witches make five key predictions:

1. Macbeth will become Thane of Cawdor.

2. Banquo's children will become kings.

3. They advise Macbeth to "beware Macduff."

4. Macbeth cannot be harmed by anyone "of woman born."

5. Macbeth cannot be beaten until "Great Birnam Wood to high Dunsinane shall come."

Four of these predictions are realized during the action, but one is not. Although Banquo's children do not become kings during the course of the play, they do escape murder and could return at some point in the future. At the end of the play, it is left for the audience members to decide whether they believe the "Macbeth" witches.

Although the witches appear to have great skill at prophesying, it's not certain whether their prophecies are preordained. If not, do they simply encourage Macbeth to become active in constructing his own fate? It is perhaps part of Macbeth's character to shape his life according to the predictions-whereas Banquo does not. This might explain why the only prophecy not realized by the end of the play relates directly to Banquo and cannot be shaped by Macbeth (although Macbeth would also have little control over the "Great Birnam Wood" prediction).

The witches in "Macbeth" are important because they provide Macbeth's call to action. The witches' prophesies also affect Lady Macbeth, albeit indirectly when Macbeth writes his wife about seeing the "weird sisters," as he calls them. After reading his letter, she's ready right away to plot to murder the king and worries her husband will be too "full o' th' milk of human kindness" to commit such an act. Although he doesn't think he can do such a thing, Lady Macbeth has no question in her mind that they would succeed. Her ambition steels him. Thus, the witches' influence on Lady Macbeth only increases their effect on Macbeth himself-and, by extension, the entire plot of the play. The Macbeth witches provide the dynamism that has made " Macbeth" one of Shakespeare's most popular and intense plays.

Shakespeare used a number of devices to create a sense of otherness and malevolence for the Macbeth witches. For example, the witches speak in rhyming couplets, which distinguishes them from all other characters. This poetic device has made their lines among the play's most memorable. Also, the Macbeth witches are said to have beards, making them difficult to identify as either gender. Last, they are always accompanied by storms and bad weather. Collectively, these traits give them an otherworldly cast.

By writing the Macbeth witches as he did, Shakespeare is asking an age-old question: Are our lives already mapped out for us, or do we have a hand in what happens?

At the end of the play, the audience is forced to consider the extent to which the characters have control over their own lives. The debate over free will versus God's preordained plan for humanity has been debated for centuries and continues to be debated today.

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The Witches in Shakespeare's 'Macbeth' Drive the Plot

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To say that the witches in William Shakespeare's "Macbeth" play crucial roles in the drama would be an understatement. Without the witches, there would simply be no story to tell, as they move the plot. During the play, the Macbeth witches make five key predictions: Macbeth will become Thane of Cawdor.

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What is her role in the play?

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Lady Macbeth is one of Shakespeare's most famous and frightening female characters. When we first see her, she is already plotting Duncan's murder, and she is stronger, more ruthless, and more ambitious than her husband. She seems fully aware of this and knows that she will have to push Macbeth into committing murder. At one point, she wishes that she were not a woman so that she could do it herself.

This theme of the relationship between gender and power is key to Lady Macbeth's character: her husband implies that she is a masculine soul inhabiting a female body, which seems to link masculinity to ambition and violence. Shakespeare, however, seems to use her, and the witches, to undercut Macbeth's idea that "undaunted mettle should compose / Nothing but males" (1.7.73-74). These crafty women use female methods of achieving power-that is, manipulation-to further their supposedly male ambitions. Women, the play implies, can be as ambitious and cruel as men, yet social constraints deny them the means to pursue these ambitions on their own.

Lady Macbeth manipulates her husband with remarkable effectiveness, overriding all his objections; when he hesitates to murder, she repeatedly questions his manhood until he feels that he must commit murder to prove himself. Lady Macbeth's remarkable strength of will persists through the murder of the king-it is she who steadies her husband's nerves immediately after the crime has been perpetrated.

Afterward, however, Lady Macbeth begins a slow slide into madness-just as ambition affects her more strongly than Macbeth before the crime, so does guilt plague her more strongly afterward. By the close of the play, she has been reduced to sleepwalking through the castle, desperately trying to wash away an invisible bloodstain. Once the sense of guilt comes home to roost, Lady Macbeth's sensitivity becomes a weakness, and she is unable to cope. Significantly, she (apparently) kills herself, signaling her total inability to deal with the legacy of their crimes.

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Lady Macbeth Character Analysis in Macbeth | SparkNotes

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A detailed description and in-depth analysis of Lady Macbeth in Macbeth.

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Part of understanding Macbeth, is understanding that it is a tragedy.

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William Shakespeare! The epitome of English literature is great, not only because of his writing skills, but also because of his art of borrowing, combining, and recreating something new with a twist. His true excellence reflects through his tragic plays which are read and performed even today. Let us try to find out the characteristics of his tragedies that made them stand out from other literary works.

Last Updated: Mar 26, 2018

Show me a hero and I will write you a tragedy ~ F. Scott Fitzgerald

I think the above quote applies very well to William Shakespeare's works, for he has created such beautiful pieces of literature in the form of tragedies. However, the attempt of putting his works under a category is quite difficult because every work of art created by him is an experiment to create something different from the previous ones, and he achieved success every time. There are certain aspects that he has followed consistently in each of his tragedies and we shall look at each of them in detail for different Shakespearean tragedies.

Shakespearean tragedies are highly influenced by Greek drama and Aristotle's notion of tragedy. It was Aristotle who had first described the genre in his 'Poetics' which is followed even today to analyze modern drama. Take a look at the following characteristics shared by most Shakespearean plays.

Most of the tragedies written by Shakespeare are revenge and ambition tragedies. For instance, Othello, Hamlet, King Lear, and Macbeth are dark tragedies showing revenge and ambition. However, there is an exception to this in the form of a romantic tragedy, which is Romeo and Juliet. Unlike the revenge/ambition tragedy, there are two tragic characters in Romeo and Juliet. Romeo becomes impulsive and acts without thinking about consequences, which causes the separation and ultimately the death of the two lovers. In each revenge/ambition tragedy, there are some noticeable features which are typical of a Shakespearean play.

Any piece of literature, or any art form for that matter, is successful when it evokes pity, fear, and other such emotions in the audience. It is known as catharsis, where the audience feels sympathy for the character and empathize with his/her sufferings. If the play has the capacity to move the audience by its plot, people who are reading the play or watching it in the theater can identify with the characters and feel that they have similar experiences in their life.

A tragic story (Shakespearean) can be divided into four parts and they are as follows:

1. Exposition: Exposition is the beginning of the play where the reader/audience gets to know the characters and their traits, the general setting of the story, the major conflict in the story and most importantly, the tragic flaw of the hero. Normally, exposition begins and ends in the first act itself, however, sometimes there are some characters who enter late into the story.

2. Rising Action: Rising action develops through the second act and extends up to the third and the fourth act. This is the time when the plot gathers momentum and the action increases. The plot eventually reaches the crisis where the hero makes a decision that changes the course of the play, sealing his own fate. For example, Macbeth kills Duncan in act II whereas Lear's foolish decision to divide the kingdom occurs in act I. This is how the location of the crisis differs from play to play. By the end of the rising action, the hero is left alone for the rest of the story.

3. Falling Action: From the beginning of the fourth act, the opposite forces become active and start an open resist. They also start plotting
the removal of the hero as a result of which the power of the tragic hero starts declining.

4. Resolution: In the last and final act, the opposite forces reach the full power and defeat the isolated tragic hero. This is the time when the hero recognizes his faults, yet, cannot do anything about it.

Shakespeare wrote 10 tragedies in all namely, Antony and Cleopatra, Coriolanus, Hamlet, Julius Caesar, King Lear, Macbeth, Othello, Romeo and Juliet, Timon of Athens and Titus Andronicus, out of which the four dark tragedies, Hamlet, Macbeth, Romeo and Juliet, and King Lear are the most admired. Apart from tragedies, important works of Shakespeare include romantic comedies, historical plays and 154 love sonnets.

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7 Essential Characteristics That Define a Shakespearean Tragedy

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William Shakespeare! The epitome of English literature is great, not only because of his writing skills, but also because of his art of borrowing, combining, and recreating something new with a twist. His true excellence reflects through his tragic plays which are read and performed even today.

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How might you direct this scene?

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Staging Itis an interactive film maker for desktop and tablet devices. It allows you to understand Shakespeare's text from a director's point of view and virtually stage a scene at the Globe theatre. Actors are filmed performing a moment of a play on the Globe stage. Each line of their speech is shot four times, each time performed in different ways (happy, flirtatious, defensive, etc.)

This scene is an extract from Act 2 Scene 1 of Macbeth - 'Is this a dagger...'

Supporting Activities are available in the downloads section below. Students can access Staging It at home via the Globe website: shakespearesglobe.com/stagingit

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Macbeth: Staging It - "Is this a dagger"

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Staging It is an interactive film maker for desktop and tablet devices. It allows you to understand Shakespeare's text from a director's point of view and virtually stage a scene at the Globe theatre. Actors are filmed performing a moment of a play on the Globe stage.

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Keep in mind:

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As well as looking at how we've staged Macbeth, which you can do in the Investigate section, it's important to think about what you would do if you were staging the play. And, if you can, to perform parts of it yourself.

We encourage you to look at the play, or scenes in the play, and think through the decisions a director makes with their actors:

Where is the play set?

How are the characters connected?

What do the characters want?

Here you can find some key things to think about before staging the play yourself. Even if you're working towards an exam or preparing for an assignment, it's important to think about different ways of reading lines or words and taking a look at the key decisions a director needs to make could really help your essay responses.

There are certain things that every director and creative team have to consider. The way you answer the following questions below can create incredibly different interpretations of the play.

How can you help modern audiences to believe in the witches and the supernatural?

Is the magic used by the witches real?

How much do the characters in the play believe in magic and witchcraft? For example, when Macbeth sees Banquo's ghost, would other characters believe such a thing was possible?

How will you stage the witches? What do they look like?

How will you show the apparition of the dagger? Is it something visible to the audience, or is it in Macbeth's mind?

How do people become thanes or lords?

How much loyalty to the king is expected and how do people react to him?

What kind of rule did King Duncan have and how is Macbeth's different?

How is the English kingdom different to the Scottish one?

Are there visual ways that status is shown to others? For example, does the king wear a crown?

What is the role of women in this society and how conventional are Lady Macbeth and Lady Macduff?

How important is prowess in battle? Macbeth is made Thane of Cawdor for his success in battle but what are the other thanes like?

What was the war against the rebellious forces like? How have they been fighting? Why did those people rebel?

How much has warfare affected the country and the king's court?

The play starts and ends with fighting. Will you stage these conflicts differently and how?

In the text, most of the deaths happen offstage, apart from Banquo's. How much violence do you want to show on the stage?

Within each of these choices, there are lots of key moments and scenes to explore.

Going back through the Investigate section and looking at the different performances we've had at the RSC, think about these three areas:

Can you see how each director has presented the supernatural? Why do you think they have made these choices?

How is the hierarchy and status of characters shown? Has this affected the design of set and costume?

How are the men presented as warriors and how do they fight?

To explore a particular production in even more detail take a look at the Casebooks for the 1976 and 1999 productions.

This page looks at some of the key decisions a director makes.

Challenge your students to think about how they would want to tell the story of Macbeth. How would they respond to the questions here?

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Performing Macbeth - Key Decisions | Shakespeare Learning Zone | Royal Shakespeare Company

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As well as looking at how we've staged Macbeth, which you can do in the Investigate section, it's important to think about what you would do if you were staging the play. And, if you can, to perform parts of it yourself.