Macbeth
Macbeth, tragedy in five acts by William Shakespeare, written sometime in 1606–07 and published in the First Folio of 1623 from a playbook or a transcript of one. Some portions of the original text are corrupted or missing from the published edition. The play is the shortest of Shakespeare’s tragedies, without diversions or subplots. It chronicles Macbeth’s seizing of power and subsequent destruction, both his rise and his fall the result of blind ambition.
The Historical Record
Some scholars believe that Macbeth should be read in light of the Gunpowder Plot, a failed conspiracy to assassinate English King James I in 1605. Many themes in the play reflect the attempted overthrow: treason, regicide, usurpation, and retribution. The Witches’ prediction about Banquo begetting kings is also thought to be a reference to James I, whose family claimed to have descended from a Banquo or Banquho, the Thane of Lochaber.
Plot
The Witches’ prophecies and the murder of Duncan
Macbeth and Banquo, who are generals serving King Duncan of Scotland, meet the Weird Sisters, three Witches who prophesy that Macbeth will become Thane (lord) of Cawdor, then king, and that Banquo will beget kings. Soon thereafter Macbeth discovers that he has indeed been made Thane of Cawdor, which leads him to believe the rest of the prophecy. When King Duncan chooses this moment to honor Macbeth by visiting his castle at Inverness, both Macbeth and his ambitious wife, Lady Macbeth, realize that the moment has arrived for them to carry out a plan of regicide that they have long contemplated. Spurred by his wife, Macbeth kills Duncan, and the murder is discovered when Macduff, the Thane of Fife, arrives to call on the king. Duncan’s sons, Malcolm and Donalbain, flee the country, fearing for their lives. Their speedy departure seems to implicate them in the crime, and Macbeth becomes king.
The murder of Banquo
Worried by the Witches’ prophecy that Banquo’s heirs instead of Macbeth’s progeny will be kings, Macbeth arranges the death of Banquo, though Banquo’s son, Fleance, escapes. Banquo’s ghost haunts Macbeth, and Lady Macbeth is driven to madness by her guilt.
“Beware Macduff” and the death of Macbeth
The “Curse” of Macbeth
In the theatrical world, a superstition persists that speaking the play’s name aloud in a theater invokes a curse. Instead, it is referred to as “the Scottish play.” Indeed, stagings of Macbeth seem to be prone to disaster. According to legend, Shakespeare had to play Lady Macbeth on short notice in the first production after the actor cast in the role died unexpectedly. Some subsequent stagings have been dogged by accidents of varying degrees—for instance, falling stage weights narrowly missed Laurence Olivier in 1937 at the Old Vic theater in London.
The Witches assure Macbeth that he will be safe until Birnam Wood comes to Dunsinane and that no man “of woman born” shall harm him. Learning that Macduff is joining Malcolm’s army, Macbeth orders the slaughter of Macduff’s wife and children. Lady Macbeth dies, possibly by suicide, and Macbeth muses on the essential futility of life:
Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.
When the army, using branches from Birnam Wood as camouflage, advances on the castle, Macbeth sees the prophecy being fulfilled: Birnam Wood has indeed come to Dunsinane. Macbeth is killed in battle by Macduff, who was “from his mother’s womb untimely ripped” by cesarean section and in that quibbling sense was not “of woman born.” Malcolm becomes the rightful king.
For a discussion of this play within the context of Shakespeare’s entire corpus, see William Shakespeare: Shakespeare’s plays and poems.
