The Tragedy of Macbeth

by

William Shakespeare

You Don’t Know Billy • William Shakespeare is lauded as

perhaps the most prolific and influential writer in the history of the English language. Why?– He was one of the first people

to initiate the tradition of dramatic literature in English.

– Prose was just starting to be used in plays as Shakespeare was born.

– He invented and brought thousands of new words into Modern English, including:

• "madcap", "bandit", "lackluster", "puking", “bedroom”,"rant“, “arouse”, “besmirch”, “summit”, “torture”, “Olympian”, “swagger”, “misplaced”, “lonely”, “hurry”, “reliance”, “obscene”, “radiance”… to name but a few!

The Man That Would Be Shakespeare

What made him famous:• Started out performing

with “The Lord Chamberlain’s Men”

• Gave him a chance to write a play

• Henry IV, Pt. 1- It stunk but they gave him another shot-he succeeded

Shakespeare’s Time Line• 1564 He was born on April 23 in Stratford-

on-Avon.

Shakespeare’s Childhood Home-Stratford

· 1583 The Shakespeare's had their first child, Susanna.

· 1584 The twins were born- Hamnet, a boy and Judith

· 1586 At Age 22, he left for London to seek his fortune

• 1594 Age 30 Shakespeare wrote Romeo and Juliet based on The Tragical Historye of Romeus and Juliet (1562).

• 1609 He published his Sonnets• 1616 Shakespeare died at the age of 52 after

having written fourteen comedies, eleven histories, and twelve tragedies - a total of thirty-seven plays.

• 1623 Completed works were published seven years after his death. This was known as the First Folio.

• Sample of Shakespeare’s original manuscripts.

• Sketch from the First Folio

Family background

• He was born to a middle class family. • His father, John, was a prosperous glove

maker, who later became the mayor of Stratford.

• Mother was Mary Arden, who was of a socially prominent family.

• Both parents were illiterate

His Education• Attended Stratford Grammar School.• Studied Latin and the ancients.• He was not unlike any other child of the

times!• He was never discovered by any of his

teachers.• All of the teachers of his school were

Oxford graduates.

His Married Life

• 1582 at 18 he married Anne Hathaway who was 26 at the time.

• She was the daughter of a local farmer.

• The Shakespeare’s son, Hamnet, died at the age of eleven. He was Shakespeare’s only son.

• 1592 for unclear reasons he left his family to live in London.

Life of a Playwright• During Shakespeare’s days, the

life of a playwright was hardly deemed worthy!

• The years between his marriage and departure for London are called the “Lost Years.” Little known about what he did.

• First gained status when he performed for Queen Elizabeth I (with whom he was very popular)

• By 1594 six of his plays were written and produced.

• Originally, his plays were not written to be read as literature, but as consumable materials.

• Manuscripts were not circulated due to the fact that the content could be stolen and this was their livelihood.

• It is a known fact that Shakespeare borrowed widely from many sources.

• 1594 He performed and wrote for a group of actors called the Lord Chamberlain’s Men.

• Most of his performances were done for royalty.

Retirement/Demise

• 1612 at age 48, Shakespeare returned to Stratford, in partial retirement. He divided his time between Stratford and London.

• He died in 1616, at the relatively young age of 52. He is buried inside Stratford’s Holy Trinity Church. Outside the church stands the only statue with an accurate likeness.

London 1600• Open gutters, raw sewage, and rotting garbage

were the case in most major cities of the time.• Conditions caused the outbreak of the Bubonic

plague (black death)• Bubonic plague was rampant from 1563 to 1603.• 1592 the plague hit London hard and the theatres

were closed down. During this time is when Shakespeare wrote most of his poetry.

The Theatre• Theatres were a considerable source of concern

for the authorities due to the fact that those who attended the theatre were not of favorable stature.

• Called the groundlings - stood in the dirt of the main floor.

• They were immoral, a source of contagion, and used profanity.

• Were also seen as extremely antagonistic. (Which the actors encouraged.)

• Authorities were constantly afraid of subversion and propaganda in the actors’ speeches which might cause a state of tension or even revolt.

• Theatres were thus located on the outskirts of the city in the slums. This area was called the liberties- paradise for thieves and pickpockets.

• People often left their jobs early lured by the diversions of the Liberties.

For the Groundlings…

- It was built to hold 2,000 people but often housed an audience as big as 3,000 people

- The stage was only five feet from the closest groundlings, but the actors had to compete with weather and crowd noise, so their speech had to be loud and clear.

The Globe was a twenty-sided, open-air amphitheatre

Original Old Globe Theatre

The Globe Theater 1599

Burned in 1613

When in a play...• Only men were permitted

to perform• Boys or effeminate men

were used to play the women

• Costumes were often the company’s most valuable asset

• Costumes were made by the company, bought in London, or donated by courtiers

The Cost of a Show• 1 shilling to stand• 2 shillings to sit in the

balcony• 1 shilling was 10% of

their weekly income• Broadway Today:

–$85 Orchestra–$160 Balcony–5% of a teacher’s

weekly salary

The King’s Men• In 1603, King James I comes to power and takes

Shakespeare’s acting company, the Lord Chamberlain’s Men, as his own The King’s Men.

• In general, Elizabethan stage actors had about two weeks to rehearse and then put on each new play. The strain on the actors’ memory was enormous-- the use of iambic pentameter and blank verse were extremely helpful to memorization because they are sound patterns that are very close to natural human speech.– A line of iambic pentameter is basically the length of

one human breath.

Macbeth: The Historical Context

• Macbeth is supposed to have been written sometime between 1603 and 1606, after The King’s Men gained King James’s patronage.

• It is the play which best represents the relationship between Shakespeare and the King.

• King James claimed to be a descendant of Banquo, with only eight kings in between them.

• James was also famous for his obsessions with the Divine Right Theory and with witchcraft, two big themes that Shakespeare incorporates into the play.

King James I

Historical Context,Continued…

• Shakespeare took the basic story of Duncan and Macbeth from Hollinshed’s Chronicles, which dates the reign of these two Scottish monarchs between 1034 - 1057.

• Because he had to please his patron, Shakespeare made the character of Macbeth much more villainous than he probably was. (Shakespeare used the same flattery to please his Tudor patrons in Richard III)

• King Duncan of Scotland–Honest and good

• Malcolm & Donalbain–Sons of the King–Malcolm is the eldest son

• Macbeth–Duncan’s most courageous general–Ambition to become king corrupts him

• Banquo– General and Macbeth’s best friend– An actual ancestor of King James I

• Lady Macbeth– As ambitious as her husband– A dark force behind his evil deeds

• Macduff– Scottish general, suspects Macbeth of major

corruption and wrongdoing– Macbeth has his family murdered– Swears vengeance

The “Macbeth Curse”• It is believed to be bad luck to

even squeak the word ‘Macbeth’ in a theatre

• Usually referred to as The Scottish Play or “MacBee”

• Legend has it that devastating events will occur if the name is mentioned.

• Def. “Man of high standard who falls from that high because of a flaw that has affected many” - Aristotle

• Macbeth is one of the most famous examples of the tragic hero.

So what really happens?

• Good guy goes bad• Guy wants power• Married to a pushy control freak• She wants power• Kills people- LOTS of people• Gets power• Gets paranoid (a.k.a. goes crazy)• Ticks off a lot of people• Want more power! Kill! Kill!• Gets what’s coming to him in the end

Macbeth’s Legacy• There are several very famous lines taken from Macbeth,

the most famous of these would have to be:– The Wyrd(Weird) Sisters’ “Double, double toil and

trouble: Fire, burn; and cauldron, bubble.” (Act IV, Scene I)

Shakespeare wrote:•Comedies•Histories•Tragedies

Tragedy (Shakespearean)• Drama where the central character/s

suffer disaster/great misfortune– In many tragedies, downfall results

from>•Fate•Character flaw/Tragic flaw•Combination of the two

Dramatic Foil• A character whose purpose

is to compliment or contrast particular traits of the main character–Benvolio for Tybalt

• in Romeo & Juliet

Monologue• One person speaking on stage

> may be other character on stage too–ex > the Prince of Verona

commanding the Capulets and Montagues to cease feuding

Soliloquy• Long speech expressing the

thoughts of a character alone on stage. In R & J, Romeo gives a soliloquy after the servant has fled and Paris has died.

Aside•Words spoken, usually in

an undertone to the audience not intended to be heard by all characters

Pun• Shakespeare loved to use them!!!

–Humorous use of a word with two meanings > sometimes missed by the reader because of Elizabethan language and sexual innuendo

Dramatic Irony•A contradiction between

what a character thinks and what the reader/audience knows to be true

Verbal Irony•Words used to suggest the opposite of what is meant

Situational Irony•An event occurs that

directly contradicts the expectations of the characters, the reader, or the audience

Comic Relief• Use of comedy within literature

that is comedy to provide “relief” from seriousness or sadness.

• In Macbeth, look for moments of comic relief that help “relieve” the tragedy of the situation especially when the Porter speaks.

Iambic Pentameter• A common meter in poetry

consisting of an unrhymed line with five feet or accents.

Blank Verse• Unrhymed poetry written in

iambic pentameter

Theme• The theme of a literary work is its central

message, concern, or purpose. A theme can usually be expressed as a generalization, or general statement, about people or life. The theme may be stated directly by the writer although it is more often presented indirectly. When the theme is stated indirectly, the reader must figure out the theme by looking carefully at what the work reveals about the people or about life.

Motif• a significant phrase, image,

description, idea, or other element repeated throughout a literary work and related to the theme.

• For example, in Shakespeare’s Macbeth, blood and overreaching ambition are two motifs that recur.

THE

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