Focus on MacbethJohn Russell Brown First published in 1982. Macbeth exercises a strange influence over readers and theatre audiences: the words of the text offer no easy clue to meaning or significance and in dramatic structure the play is very different from other Shakespearean tragedies. Many kinds of study are needed in order to understand the tragedy of Macbeth and this book provides a wide range of studies that respect the individuality of the text and examine it from different viewpoints. Contents include: Themes and Structure; Characterization and Narrative, Visual Effects, Performance in the Eighteenth, Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries; Historical and Political Background; Role of Witchcraft; Game Theory. Contributors include: John Russell Brown, Derek Russell Davis, Gareth Lloyd Evans, R A Foakes, Michael Goldman, Robin Grove, Peter Hall, Michael Hawkins, Brian Morris, D J Palmer, Marvin Rosenberg and Peter Stallybrass. |
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... fears and horrible imaginings. He attributes the suggestion or image to 'supernatural soliciting', as if the Weird Sisters have incited or importuned him, and are responsible for the disturbance of his mind; but they have merely ...
... fears and horrible imaginings. He attributes the suggestion or image to 'supernatural soliciting', as if the Weird Sisters have incited or importuned him, and are responsible for the disturbance of his mind; but they have merely ...
Page 13
... fears Arc less than horrible imaginings : My thought , whose murder yet is but fantastical , Shakes so my single state of man That function is smother'd in surmise , And nothing is but what is not ( I.iii . 134-42 ) The ' horrid image ...
... fears Arc less than horrible imaginings : My thought , whose murder yet is but fantastical , Shakes so my single state of man That function is smother'd in surmise , And nothing is but what is not ( I.iii . 134-42 ) The ' horrid image ...
Page 19
... fears in Banquo Stick deep ; and in his royalty of nature Reigns that which would be fear'd . ( III.i.48-50 ) The ' bloody instructions ' he gives the murderers return to plague him in the banquet scene , when the ghost of Banquo sits ...
... fears in Banquo Stick deep ; and in his royalty of nature Reigns that which would be fear'd . ( III.i.48-50 ) The ' bloody instructions ' he gives the murderers return to plague him in the banquet scene , when the ghost of Banquo sits ...
Page 20
... fear . Macbeth can boast with reason ' What man dare , I dare ' ( III.iv.99 ) , for he has achieved a most ... fears ' ( III.iv.24-5 ) . ยท The banquet scene brings him to an important recognition about his condition : I am in blood Stepp ...
... fear . Macbeth can boast with reason ' What man dare , I dare ' ( III.iv.99 ) , for he has achieved a most ... fears ' ( III.iv.24-5 ) . ยท The banquet scene brings him to an important recognition about his condition : I am in blood Stepp ...
Page 22
... fear , his conscience and sense of guilt as well as his deep desire and compulsion to achieve the ultimate in killing . Now , in seeking out the Witches , and demanding to see the worst they can show , he is no longer afraid of such ...
... fear , his conscience and sense of guilt as well as his deep desire and compulsion to achieve the ultimate in killing . Now , in seeking out the Witches , and demanding to see the worst they can show , he is no longer afraid of such ...
Contents
7 | |
The kingdom the power and the glory | 30 |
visual effects in Macbeth | 54 |
Macbeth and Lady Macbeth in the eighteenth | 73 |
194680 at StratforduponAvon | 87 |
Multiplying villainies of nature | 113 |
History politics and Macbeth | 155 |
Macbeth and witchcraft | 189 |
Hurt minds | 210 |
Directing Macbeth | 231 |
Afterword | 249 |
Index | 255 |
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Common terms and phrases
action actor ambiguity ambition appearance attempt audience Banquo becomes begins beliefs blood bring called Cawdor character comes course critics crown dagger death deed doubt drama Duncan effect Elizabethan England English evil experience expression face fact fear feel final further ghost given gives going hand head Holinshed horror human husband ideas imagination important interest issue James killing kind king Lady Macbeth later less lines living look Macduff Malcolm means mind moral movement murder nature never opening particular performance perhaps play political present production question reality relation role royal scene seems seen sense Shake Shakespeare significant society soliloquy speak speech stage success suggestion Thane theatre thing thou thought tragedy turn visual wife witchcraft witches woman women