The Tragedy of Macbeth

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1. ACT I.

   Three witches meet Macbeth and Banquo on the heath and prophesy that Macbeth will be king and Banquo the father of kings. When part of the prophecy comes instantly true, Macbeth writes to his wife; she resolves that King Duncan, coming as their guest that very night, must die, and overrides her husband's doubts.

   1. Scene 1 — An open Place. Thunder and Lightning.

      Three witches meet in thunder and lightning, agree to meet Macbeth 'upon the heath,' and chant their keynote paradox: 'Fair is foul, and foul is fair.'

   2. Scene 2 — A Camp near Forres.

      A wounded sergeant and then Ross report to King Duncan how Macbeth and Banquo crushed the rebel Macdonwald and the invading Norwegians. Duncan orders the treacherous Thane of Cawdor executed and gives his title to Macbeth.

   3. Scene 3 — A heath.

      The witches greet Macbeth as Thane of Glamis, Thane of Cawdor, and 'king hereafter,' and tell Banquo he will father kings though never reign himself. When Ross arrives confirming the Cawdor title, Macbeth's thoughts leap at once to murder.

   4. Scene 4 — Forres. A Room in the Palace.

      Duncan thanks Macbeth and Banquo for their service, then names his son Malcolm heir to the throne (Prince of Cumberland). Macbeth marks the prince as 'a step / On which I must fall down, or else o'erleap.'

   5. Scene 5 — Inverness. A Room in Macbeth's Castle.

      Lady Macbeth reads her husband's letter about the prophecy, fears he is 'too full o' the milk of human kindness,' and calls on spirits to 'unsex' her and fill her with cruelty. Learning Duncan will sleep under their roof, she resolves on his murder.

   6. Scene 6 — The same. Before the Castle.

      Duncan arrives at Macbeth's castle of Inverness, praising its 'pleasant seat' and sweet air, while Lady Macbeth receives him with elaborate courtesy — a scene heavy with dramatic irony.

   7. Scene 7 — The same. A Lobby in the Castle.

      Alone, Macbeth weighs the deed and nearly draws back — Duncan is his kinsman, his guest, and a good king. Lady Macbeth shames his manhood, lays out her plan to drug the grooms and frame them, and steels him to the murder.

2. ACT II.

   Macbeth murders Duncan in the night and, unnerved, botches the staging; the drunken Porter's clowning gives way to the discovery of the body, and Duncan's sons flee abroad, drawing suspicion onto themselves. Outside, omens of disordered nature attend the crime, and Macbeth goes to be crowned at Scone.

   1. Scene 1 — Inverness. Court within the Castle.

      This long scene runs the heart of the tragedy together (the standard 2.1-2.3). Macbeth sees a phantom dagger and, at the bell, murders the sleeping Duncan, returning horror-struck — 'Macbeth does murder sleep.' Knocking drives a drunken Porter to play the gate of hell; Macduff and Lennox arrive, discover the body, and Macbeth kills the grooms. Sensing daggers in men's smiles, Malcolm and Donalbain flee to England and Ireland.

   2. Scene 2 — The same. Without the Castle.

      Ross and an Old Man trade reports of unnatural portents — darkness at noon, an owl killing a falcon, Duncan's horses devouring each other. Macduff brings word that the king's sons are suspected of bribing the murderers, and that Macbeth has gone to Scone to be crowned.

3. ACT III.

   Now king, Macbeth turns on Banquo, whose promised royal line threatens him, and has him murdered — but Fleance escapes. Banquo's ghost shatters the coronation banquet, and Macbeth resolves to return to the witches, while the thanes begin to murmur of tyranny and Macduff slips away to England.

   1. Scene 1 — Forres. A Room in the Palace.

      Fearing the prophecy that Banquo's heirs will reign, Macbeth probes Banquo's movements, then hires two murderers and works them up to kill Banquo and his son Fleance that night.

   2. Scene 2 — The same. Another Room in the Palace.

      Macbeth and his wife are both gnawed by insecurity — 'we have scotch'd the snake, not kill'd it.' He hints darkly at 'a deed of dreadful note' to come but keeps her 'innocent of the knowledge.'

   3. Scene 3 — The same. A Park or Lawn, with a gate leading to the Palace.

      The two murderers, joined by a mysterious third, ambush Banquo and Fleance. They kill Banquo, but Fleance escapes into the dark — leaving the royal line of the prophecy alive.

   4. Scene 4 — The same. A Room of state in the Palace. A banquet

      At the state banquet, the Ghost of Banquo, visible only to Macbeth, takes his seat; Macbeth raves at it while Lady Macbeth strains to cover for him, then hurries the guests away. Shaken, he resolves to seek out the witches.

   5. Scene 5 — The heath.

      Hecate, goddess of witchcraft, scolds the three witches for dealing with Macbeth without her and plans to use illusions to lure him to his ruin. (The scene and its song are widely thought to be a later addition by Thomas Middleton.)

   6. Scene 6 — Forres. A Room in the Palace.

      Lennox and another lord speak in heavy irony of Macbeth's 'tyrant' reign and the suspicious deaths. Macduff has fled to England to join Malcolm and the English king in raising an army against Macbeth.

4. ACT IV.

   The witches show Macbeth apparitions whose riddling promises make him feel invincible, capped by a vision of Banquo's royal descendants. Enraged that Macduff has fled, Macbeth has his wife and children butchered; in England, Macduff learns of the slaughter and joins Malcolm's invasion.

   1. Scene 1 — A dark Cave. In the middle, a Caldron Boiling.

      At the cauldron the witches conjure three apparitions: 'beware Macduff'; that 'none of woman born' shall harm Macbeth; and that he is safe till Birnam Wood comes to Dunsinane. A show of eight kings (Banquo's line) follows. Macbeth resolves to seize Macduff's castle and kill his family.

   2. Scene 2 — Fife. A Room in Macduff's Castle.

      At Fife, the abandoned Lady Macduff bitterly questions her husband's flight in a tender, sharp exchange with her young son. Murderers burst in, kill the boy before her eyes, and pursue her as she flees.

   3. Scene 3 — England. Before the King's Palace.

      In England, Malcolm tests Macduff's honesty by feigning monstrous vices before revealing his true virtue. An English Doctor tells of King Edward curing the 'King's Evil' by his touch. Ross arrives with the news that Macduff's wife and children are slaughtered; grief turns Macduff to vengeance, and the invasion is set.

5. ACT V.

   Lady Macbeth, broken by guilt, sleepwalks and dies; Macbeth, deserted and clinging to the witches' promises, fortifies Dunsinane. Malcolm's army hides behind boughs cut from Birnam Wood, the prophecies turn against Macbeth, and Macduff — not born of woman in the ordinary way — kills him, restoring Malcolm to the throne.

   1. Scene 1 — Dunsinane. A Room in the Castle.

      A Doctor and Gentlewoman watch Lady Macbeth walk in her sleep, rubbing her hands to wash out a blood-spot that will not go — 'Out, damned spot!' — and muttering of the murders. The Doctor concludes her disease is beyond his cure: 'More needs she the divine than the physician.'

   2. Scene 2 — The Country near Dunsinane.

      Scottish thanes — Menteith, Caithness, Angus, Lennox — march to meet Malcolm's English army near Birnam Wood, noting how Macbeth's followers obey only out of fear and that his title hangs loose 'like a giant's robe / Upon a dwarfish thief.'

   3. Scene 3 — Dunsinane. A Room in the Castle.

      Defiant amid desertions, Macbeth clings to the prophecy that none of woman born can harm him, calls for his armour, and rages at the Doctor, who admits he cannot 'minister to a mind diseas'd.'

   4. Scene 4 — Country nearDunsinane: a Wood in view.

      Before Birnam Wood, Malcolm orders every soldier to cut a leafy bough and carry it as camouflage, unknowingly beginning to fulfil the prophecy that the wood will come to Dunsinane.

   5. Scene 5 — Dunsinane. Within the castle.

      Word comes that the queen is dead, prompting Macbeth's bleak meditation on the emptiness of life — 'To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow.' Then a messenger reports the impossible: Birnam Wood appears to be moving toward the castle.

   6. Scene 6 — The same. A Plain before the Castle.

      Reaching the castle, Malcolm's army throws down its leafy screen and the assault begins under Siward and Macduff.

   7. Scene 7 — The same. Another part of the Plain.

      On the field, Macbeth kills the young Siward, still trusting that no man of woman born can defeat him, while Macduff searches the battle for him alone.

   8. Scene 8 — The same. Another part of the field.

      Macduff reveals he was 'from his mother's womb / Untimely ripp'd' — not born of woman in the ordinary sense — and the last prophecy collapses. He kills Macbeth and bears in his head; Malcolm is hailed King of Scotland and order is restored.

Characters

• Macbeth protagonist

  A Scottish general and Thane of Glamis, kinsman to King Duncan. Hailed by three witches as future king, and goaded by his wife, he murders Duncan in his own castle and seizes the throne, then kills again and again to secure it. Brave but morally undone, he hardens into a tyrant as guilt, paranoia, and the witches' equivocal prophecies drive him to ruin.

• Lady Macbeth deuteragonist

  Macbeth's wife, fiercely ambitious and, at first, the more ruthless of the two. She calls on spirits to 'unsex' her, shames her husband into killing Duncan, and steadies him afterward. But guilt corrodes her: she sleepwalks, compulsively washing imagined blood from her hands, and dies, apparently by her own hand, before the play ends.

• Banquo major

  A Scottish general who hears the witches with Macbeth: they promise that Banquo, though never king himself, will father a line of kings. Honorable where Macbeth is corruptible, he is murdered on Macbeth's order, but his son Fleance escapes. His Ghost returns silently to haunt Macbeth at the banquet (3.4). The historical Banquo was claimed as ancestor of the Stuart kings.

• Macduff major

  Thane of Fife, a Scottish nobleman who distrusts Macbeth and flees to England to join Malcolm. In his absence Macbeth has his wife and children slaughtered. 'Not of woman born' but delivered by caesarean section, Macduff is the man the prophecy did not protect Macbeth against: he kills the tyrant in single combat.

• Duncan supporting

  The gracious and trusting King of Scotland, who rewards Macbeth's battlefield valor with the title Thane of Cawdor. He is Macbeth's guest and kinsman when Macbeth murders him in his sleep, an act the play frames as the gravest violation of hospitality, kinship, and divinely ordained kingship.

• Malcolm major

  Duncan's elder son and named heir (Prince of Cumberland). He flees to England after his father's murder, raises an army with Macduff and the English king, and tests Macduff's loyalty by feigning monstrous vices. He leads the force that hides behind Birnam boughs and is hailed King of Scotland at the play's close.

• Donalbain minor

  Duncan's younger son. Sensing danger after his father's murder, he flees to Ireland while his brother Malcolm flees to England, the brothers parting so that 'where we are there's daggers in men's smiles.'

• Fleance minor

  Banquo's young son, who escapes the murderers sent to kill him and his father. His survival keeps alive the witches' promise that Banquo's descendants will reign, the line that Shakespeare's audience identified with the Stuart dynasty of King James I.

• First Witch supporting

  One of the three 'weird sisters' (from Old English 'wyrd', fate) who meet Macbeth on the heath and prophesy his rise. Bearded, equivocal, and uncanny, the witches embody the witchcraft beliefs Shakespeare's audience took seriously and King James I wrote about in his 'Daemonologie'.

• Second Witch supporting

  The second of the three weird sisters, who senses by 'the pricking of my thumbs' that 'something wicked this way comes.' With her sisters she conjures the apparitions whose ambiguous prophecies lure Macbeth to his destruction.

• Third Witch supporting

  The third weird sister. With her sisters she greets Macbeth with the titles Thane of Glamis, Thane of Cawdor, and 'king hereafter,' setting the tragedy in motion.

• Hecate minor

  The classical goddess of witchcraft, moon, and the underworld, here the mistress of the three witches, whom she chides for trafficking with Macbeth without her. Her two scenes (3.5 and part of 4.1), with their songs, are widely judged to be later interpolations by Thomas Middleton rather than Shakespeare's own.

• Lady Macduff supporting

  Macduff's wife, abandoned at the castle of Fife when her husband flees to England. Bitter at being left undefended, she is murdered along with her children on Macbeth's order, an atrocity the play stages to mark how far the tyrant has fallen.

• Macduff's Son minor

  Macduff's young son (the 'Boy' of the cast list). Precociously sharp in his exchange with his mother about traitors and honest men, he is stabbed by Macbeth's murderers before her eyes, defending his absent father to the last.

• Ross supporting

  A Scottish nobleman (Thane of Ross) who carries news through the play: he brings Macbeth word of the Cawdor title, reports omens, and bears to Macduff in England the grief-stricken news of his family's slaughter.

• Lennox supporting

  A Scottish nobleman who attends Macbeth and gradually sees through him. His heavily ironic speech in 3.6 voices the thanes' growing suspicion that Macbeth, not the fled princes, is behind the murders.

• Menteith minor

  A Scottish nobleman who joins the rebel forces gathering against Macbeth near Dunsinane in Act 5.

• Angus minor

  A Scottish nobleman who, with Ross, first brings Macbeth the king's thanks, and later joins the revolt, observing that Macbeth now feels 'his title hang loose about him, like a giant's robe upon a dwarfish thief.'

• Caithness minor

  A Scottish nobleman who joins the army marching on Dunsinane to overthrow Macbeth.

• Siward supporting

  Earl of Northumberland and general of the English forces that Malcolm and Macduff lead against Macbeth. A blunt old soldier, he receives the news of his son's death with stern stoicism: since the boy died facing his foe, 'why then, God's soldier be he.'

• Young Siward minor

  Siward's son, an English soldier who confronts Macbeth in the final battle and is killed by him, dying 'like a man.'

• Seyton minor

  An officer attending on Macbeth in Act 5, who reports the queen's death and arms his master for the final battle. His name (homophone of 'Satan') is sometimes read as a grim pun.

• Porter minor

  The drunken gatekeeper of Macbeth's castle, who imagines himself the porter of hell-gate in a bawdy comic monologue (2.3) immediately after Duncan's murder. His riff on the 'equivocator' alludes to the Gunpowder Plot trials of 1606.

• Old Man minor

  An aged Scotsman who, in 2.4, exchanges reports of the unnatural portents accompanying Duncan's murder, an eclipse, a falcon killed by an owl, Duncan's horses eating each other, marking how the regicide has disordered nature itself.

• Doctor minor

  Two unnamed physicians share this speech-prefix. The English Doctor (4.3) briefly describes King Edward the Confessor curing scrofula by his royal touch (the 'King's Evil'). The Scottish Doctor of Physic (5.1, 5.3) observes Lady Macbeth sleepwalking and concludes her disease is beyond his art: 'more needs she the divine than the physician.'

• Gentlewoman minor

  Lady Macbeth's waiting-woman, who in 5.1 has watched her mistress rise and sleepwalk, and summons the Doctor to witness it, but will not repeat the incriminating words she has heard.

• Soldier minor

  A wounded sergeant (the 'bloody man' of 1.2) who reports to Duncan how Macbeth and Banquo turned the battle against the rebel Macdonwald and the Norwegian invaders, introducing Macbeth as a hero before we meet him.

• First Murderer minor

  The leader of the hired killers Macbeth sets on Banquo and Fleance (3.1, 3.3). He reports back to Macbeth that Banquo is dead but Fleance has escaped.

• Second Murderer minor

  The second of the assassins hired to kill Banquo and Fleance.

• Third Murderer minor

  A third killer who joins the ambush of Banquo in 3.3, unexpected by the other two, his identity an old textual puzzle.

• Murderer minor

  An unnumbered murderer; the prefix covers the killers Macbeth sends to slaughter Lady Macduff and her children in their castle (4.2).

• Both Murderers ensemble

  Speech-prefix for the first and second murderers speaking in unison as they take Macbeth's commission against Banquo.

• Apparition minor

  The three spirits the witches conjure for Macbeth in 4.1: an armed Head ('beware Macduff'), a bloody Child ('none of woman born / shall harm Macbeth'), and a crowned Child with a tree ('Macbeth shall never vanquish'd be until / Great Birnam wood to high Dunsinane hill / shall come against him'). Each prophecy is true but equivocal.

• Song ensemble

  Cue label for the witches' song 'Black spirits' (4.1), one of two song cues (with 'Come away' in 3.5) belonging to the Hecate scenes that scholars generally attribute to Thomas Middleton rather than Shakespeare.

• Lord minor

  A Scottish lord who, in 3.6, trades guarded news with Lennox about Macduff's flight to England and the gathering of forces against Macbeth.

• Lords ensemble

  The assembled thanes and nobles attending Macbeth, chiefly at the banquet in 3.4.

• Servant minor

  Various attendants and serving-men who carry messages and announce arrivals through the play.

• Attendant minor

  An attendant who waits on Macbeth and admits visitors.

• Messenger minor

  Various messengers who bring news, including the warning to Lady Macduff that comes too late and the report that Birnam wood appears to be moving toward Dunsinane.

• Soldiers ensemble

  The English and Scottish soldiers of the army that marches on Dunsinane in Act 5.

• All ensemble

  Speech-prefix for characters speaking in unison, most memorably the three witches chanting together ('Fair is foul, and foul is fair'; the 'Double, double, toil and trouble' refrain).

Cross-references

• Folger Shakespeare
• MIT plain text
• Wikipedia