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Explore the depths of Shakespeare's tragic play, 'Macbeth,' delving into the dramatic structure, characters, and the historical context behind this riveting tale of ambition, power, and downfall.
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Shakespeare’s Tragedies They are all pretty much the same, with slight differences.
Definition • A tragedy is a dramatic play of human actions that produces exceptional suffering, ending in the death of a tragic hero. • A tragic hero is the main character in a tragedy who makes an error in his actions that leads to his or her downfall. It can also be a flawed character trait.
Macbeth • Macbeth is a tragic hero because of a flawed character: he is ambitious. • His over ambition causes him to make poor decisions which eventually lead to his death.
Dramatic Structure • In a Shakespearean drama, each of the five acts corresponds with the following five components. • Introduction • Complication • Climax • Falling Action • Catastrophe
Introduction • Provides exposition. • Creates tone. • Defines setting. • Reveals main conflict. • Introduces some characters.
Complication • Rising action. • Building of tension caused by conflict of opposing forces.
Climax • The peak of action and emotional intensity. • From this point on, action and intensity must necessarily decline. • Sometimes referred to as the turning point.
Falling Action • Stresses action from the forces opposing the protagonist. • Suspense must be maintained while the action moves swiftly and logically towards the disaster, the tragedy.
Catastrophe • Moment marking the protagonist’s tragic downfall, often culminating in that character’s death. • Order is restored at the end. • Audience is satisfies that characters have been suitably rewarded or punished.
Macbeth • Based on a true story. • Much of the factual content was altered to please King James I. • Play is about James’s ancestors, Banquo and Fleance, and how they inherited the throne of Scotland. • Shakespeare altered the fact that Banquo actually helped Macbeth kill Duncan because it would have been a huge insult to insinuate to James that his ancestors gained the throne through murder.
Macbeth • James wrote a book about witchcraft, Daemonologie, and participated in several trials of witchcraft. • Shakespeare’s inclusion of the witchcraft motif is an appeal to James’s interests.
The Real Macbeth • Duncan was an unpopular king. • In 1040, after Duncan’s death, possibly by Macbeth, Macbeth was elected High-King. • Ruled for 17 years. • Duncan’s son, Malcolm, invaded Scotland. • Macbeth was killed in August of 1057.
Macbeth and Language • Written in blank verse • In general, written in iambic pentameter
Curse of Macbeth • In 1604 Will Shakespeare in his zeal to please King James I, an authority on demonology, cast caution and imagination aside and for the opening scene of Macbeth's Act IV he reproduced a 17th century black-magic ritual, a sort of how-to for budding witches. Without changing an ingredient, Old Will provided his audience with step-by-step instructions in the furtive art of spell casting: • "Round around the cauldron go;In the poison'd entrails throw.Toad, that under cold stoneDays and nights has thirty-oneSwelter'd venum sleeping got.Boil thou first i' the charmed pot"...And so on. • The ritual's practitioners were not amused by this detailed public exposure of their witchcraft, and it is said that as punishment they cast an everlasting spell on the play, turning it into the most ill-starred of all theatrical productions. It is so unlucky that by comparison to Macbeth's nearly 400-year history of unmitigated disaster, Murphy's Law appears exceedingly optimistic.
