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. |
From inside the book
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... stage - histories of Othello , King Lear and Macbeth , and is completing one of Hamlet . Peter Stallybrass is Lecturer in English at the University of Sussex . Introduction In recent years three productions of Macbeth have filled viii ...
... stage - histories of Othello , King Lear and Macbeth , and is completing one of Hamlet . Peter Stallybrass is Lecturer in English at the University of Sussex . Introduction In recent years three productions of Macbeth have filled viii ...
Page 8
... stage hell - mouth , Shakespeare expresses dramatically through his presentation of Macbeth that subtler idea of hell verbalised in Mephistopheles ' description of it as ' being depriv'd of everlasting bliss ' ( Scene III , 1.82 ) ...
... stage hell - mouth , Shakespeare expresses dramatically through his presentation of Macbeth that subtler idea of hell verbalised in Mephistopheles ' description of it as ' being depriv'd of everlasting bliss ' ( Scene III , 1.82 ) ...
Page 17
... vision of his soliloquy here is made actual on the stage , and character- istically , this moment of triumph is also the moment when his sense of terror and guilt are maximised : I am afraid to think what I have done ; 17 Images of death.
... vision of his soliloquy here is made actual on the stage , and character- istically , this moment of triumph is also the moment when his sense of terror and guilt are maximised : I am afraid to think what I have done ; 17 Images of death.
Page 20
... stage the cause of Macbeth's fear . Macbeth can boast with reason ' What man dare , I dare ' ( III.iv.99 ) , for he has achieved a most ' terrible feat ' in killing Duncan and Banquo ; but the consequences include something he had not ...
... stage the cause of Macbeth's fear . Macbeth can boast with reason ' What man dare , I dare ' ( III.iv.99 ) , for he has achieved a most ' terrible feat ' in killing Duncan and Banquo ; but the consequences include something he had not ...
Page 21
... stage and the audience . The first , an armed head , both suggests Macduff ( ' Beware the thane of Fife ' ) , and anticipates the bringing on of the head of the dead Macbeth at the end of the play . The second , a bloody child , seems ...
... stage and the audience . The first , an armed head , both suggests Macduff ( ' Beware the thane of Fife ' ) , and anticipates the bringing on of the head of the dead Macbeth at the end of the play . The second , a bloody child , seems ...
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