This article continues on from the first article in this series of articles on the themes of Macbeth.
To read the first article please click on this link, Macbeth: The Themes.
In the first article we touched upon two of the most fundamental themes of the play namely
- Power and Ambition
- Struggle between morality and immorality / Strength
This will be covered in more depth in following articles including with direct quotes from the play. However in today’s article we will talk about the theme of the supernatural in the play.
THE SUPERNATURAL
The importance of the supernatural in Macbeth cannot be dismissed and to understand its significance we need to have a wider and deeper understanding of English society at the time of Shakespeare. We use the word English because Scotland was still a different country back then and it was only a century later that England and Scotland merged to become part of the same state. We need to be more acquainted with England at the time the play was written even though it it set in Scotland.
Elizabeth I, the queen of England at the beginning of Shakespeare’s life died in 1603 and with the absence of any direct heir, as Elizabeth had no children, king James VI of Scotland was chosen to come down from Scotland and go to London to become the king of England, he was then called James I of England as he was the first king of England to bear the name James. James I was a man who was a firm believer in the existence of the supernatural and in particular witchcraft in its deeply evil nature in his eyes. In the modern world this may be not be taken seriously by some but at that time society was far more conservative including being far more religious and the widespread belief in the supernatural.
James I patronized Shakespeare’s theatre company, i.e. he supported it. Shakespeare like any other Englishman at that time had to be in the good books of the king and Macbeth can be said to be heavily influenced by Shakespeare’s desire to please the king and this includes the depiction of witchcraft as something extremely dark and disturbing.
This has an importance far greater than that of a writer trying to impress the king but also takes on a political significance as James I needed support to convince people in England to support his very strong anti-witchcraft policies including the Witchcraft of 1604 which made witchcraft punishable by death even if no one had been killed as a result of the alleged witchcraft.
Thus James I may have been totally delighted by someone as influential as Shakespeare depicting witchcraft as totally evil and malevolent to the English publish, with the resultant increase in support for James’ anti-witchcraft campaign. James a few years earlier whilst in Scotland has written a work on witches called ‘Daemonologie’ which contained details of their dark arts and would have been no doubt pleased to see Shakespeare’s play reinforcing his message.
Act I, the first scene.
So imagine the king at the time of the play and the English elite coming to watch the performance and the first scene that they see is of the three witches with the scene culminating in the words:
“Fair is foul, and foul is fair Hover through the fog and filthy air.“
These words are interesting because the deeply Christian audience at the time would clearly have seen that the witches did not believe in normal morality or in morality at all. ‘Foul’ means bad, and ‘fair’ means good or just. To say ‘Evil is good and good is evil’ would mean essentially there is no such thing as morality and a person who has no morality cannot be said to be a good person, we use the term ‘amoral’ to describe a person with no morals or sense of right and wrong. Thus in the audience’s eyes the amoral nature of the witches is established from the very beginning.
Shakespeare also uses the word ‘fog’. ‘Fog’ is something which is unclear and that reflects the nature of the witches and black magic. It is shrouded in mystery, nothing surrounding it is clear. Also the word ‘filthy’ is not all indicative of the air but also of their character and the nature of the witches and the supernatural in general. They are associated with mystery and filth from the beginning. They ‘hover’ through the air. They are not easy to pin down and to capture. They are elusive. Thus when they are finally caught they should be ‘dealt with’ as James I wanted them to as per his law of 1604 which instituted the death sentence for all acts of witchcraft.
In the third scene we see the first witch refer to a woman who refuses to give her food i.e. chestnuts. In return the first witch plans on a revenge which is totally disproportionate to this denial of chestnuts but to inflict a severe punishment not on the lady but her husband who has absolutely nothing to do with the act. The first witch utters the word.
“Her husband has sailed off to Aleppo as master of a ship called the Tiger. I’ll sail there in a kitchen strainer, turn myself into a tailless rat, and do things to him—“
Shakespeare taps in to the belief in the supernatural then and the idea that witches possess the ability to transform their bodies in to that of animals. The reference to the sailor and the ship once again connects with the life of James I who himself in 1589 was sailing in a ship to go and collect his new wife Anne from Denmark. He himself had to go there in person to Denmark as his wife had tried to sail to Scotland to be with him but failed due to very severe storms which were attributed to witchcraft.
Various women accused of being witches were executed later on in Scotland in relation to this event. Thus when James sees witches talking of the harm they will inflict on a sailor he may well have felt that Shakespeare is referring to this rather traumatic and important event in his life and this would endear the playwright, Shakespeare, even more to the king which of course would result in continued support and patronage.
The other two witches in this scene have control of various winds, that is another allusion to Anne’s (James’ wife) failed initial attempts to sail to Scotland due to very strong storms, these powerful winds and storms it being said later on being the work of witches. They, the other two witches, tell the first witch they will supply her with winds.
The witch later on goes to say of this sailor:
Macbeth then says:
This is very ironic since far from being ‘fair’ (good) the witches are evil creatures from whom no good will come as the audience already knows. Banquo then asks the witches to inform him about his future, which may be the greatest act of folly he ever committed. For it is in this questioning of the witches that they plant the ultimate seeds of his death at the hands of his, at the time of the scene, friend Macbeth. The witches after each hailing Banquo say:
1st WITCH – Lesser than Macbeth and greater.
3rd WITCH – Thou shalt get kings, though thou be none. So all hail, Macbeth and Banquo!
The audience are intrigued as they watch this play with the esoteric words of the witches.. Shakespeare’s genius is at work as the witches have uttered statements which seem to talk of things which are mutually exclusive, but we know that witches as portrayed in folklore are creatures that have knowledge we do not, and by the fact that, unbeknown to both Macbeth and Banquo, Macbeth has already been declared Thane of Cawdor by the king.
The earth hath bubbles, as the water has,
And these are of them. Whither are they vanished?
Macbeth
Into the air, and what seemed corporal melted,
As breath into the wind. Would they had stayed!
As breath into the wind. Would they had stayed!
Useful vocabulary for students.
1. Solicit – to seek the help of or ask questions e.g. Banquo solicits the witches for their prophecy of his future.
2. Duality – when something exists in two e.g. life and death, good and bad.
3. Latent – Something existing inside something and maybe not active, but could be activated. For example someone may generally be peaceful but there is a ‘latent violent streak’ within him if he is provoked. Macbeth may have been a ‘good person’ in general but his lust for power existed inside him and was brought out by his wife.
4. Analogy – A comparison between two different things e.g. Banquo uses the analogy of the earth producing bubbles and the witches.
5. Patronage – When someone supports e.g. provides money or other assistance, James I patronised Shakespeare’s theatre company.
6. Oxymoron – Something which is a contradiction e.g. ‘a dead alive man’ as it is impossible to be both.
7. Intermediate – In the middle of two things, so a building being constructed is in an intermediate stage between just being an idea and being an actual fully completed building.
8. Valiant – brave, especially in a military context.
9. Feat – a great achievement or action e.g. ‘The knight carried out great feats of bravery’.
10. Oblivion – a state of being totally forgotten, unremembered.
11. Esoteric – not understood clearly, mysterious, only known by a few, sometimes in connection to the supernatural.
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