Macbeth. William Shakespeare

       Second Witch

      Paddock calls. 10

       Third Witch

      Anon!

       All

      Fair is foul, and foul is fair:

      Hover through the fog and filthy air.

      [WITCHES vanish.]

      ACT I SCENE I

      This short opening scene gives an immediate impression of mystery, horror and uncertainty. These witches would have been truly frightening to an audience in Shakespeare’s day, many of whom would have seen, or at the very least known about, women burnt at the stake for selling themselves to the Devil. Macbeth is introduced by name by the Third Witch, and this raises questions in the audience’s mind – who is he? And what can these disgusting hags want with him?

      3. hurlyburly the confused noise of storm and battle. Thunder was produced for the Elizabethan stage by rolling cannon-balls. Nowadays the same effect is produced by shaking sheets of metal, or through electronic and digital sound equipment.

      4. lost and won the first of many apparent contradictions and confusions (see line 12 of this scene). The words can mean ‘decided one way or the other’.

      9. Graymalkin a name for a grey cat, which was a common ‘familiar’ of witches. A familiar was a demon which attended and assisted a witch; these spirits usually took some rather sinister form.

      10. Paddock a toad. This is the Second Witch’s familiar. Sounds were probably made off-stage to represent the calls of these familiar spirits, though it is difficult to imagine what sound a toad was supposed to make.

      11. Anon! I am coming at once.

      12. This line is a kind of motto for the witches. They delight in a reversal of all the normal values. Macbeth seems to involve himself with them by echoing the phrase in Act I, Scene iii, line 39.

      13. fog and filthy air this may have been produced by burning resin under the stage; again, in today’s theatre if an effect is required it is more likely to be produced by smoke machine, dry ice or something similar.

       Scene II

       A camp near Forres

      [Alarum within. Enter KING DUNCAN, MALCOLM, DONALBAIN, LENNOX with ATTENDANTS, meeting a bleeding SERGEANT.]

       Duncan

      What bloody man is that? He can report,

      As seemeth by his plight, of the revolt

      The newest state.

       Malcolm

      This is the sergeant

      Who like a good and hardy soldier fought

      ‘Gainst my captivity. Hail, brave friend! 5

      Say to the King the knowledge of the broil

      As thou didst leave it.

       Sergeant

      Doubtful it stood,

      As two spent swimmers that do cling together

      And choke their art. The merciless Macdonwald –

      Worthy to be a rebel, for to that 10

      The multiplying villainies of nature

      Do swarm upon him – from the Western Isles

      Of kerns and gallowglasses is supplied;

      And Fortune, on his damned quarrel smiling,

      Show’d like a rebel’s whore. But all’s too weak; 15

      For brave Macbeth – well he deserves that name –

      Disdaining Fortune, with his brandish’d steel

      Which smok’d with bloody execution,

      Like valour’s minion, carv’d out his passage

      Till he fac’d the slave; 20

      Which ne’er shook hands, nor bade farewell to him,

      Till he unseam’d him from the nave to th’ chaps,

      And fix’d his head upon our battlements.

       Duncan

      O valiant cousin! worthy gentleman!

       Sergeant

      As whence the sun gins his reflection 25

      Shipwrecking storms and direful thunders break,

      So from that spring whence comfort seem’d to come

      Discomfort swells. Mark, King of Scotland, mark:

      No sooner justice had, with valour arm’d,

      Compell’d these skipping kerns to trust their heels, 30

      But the Norweyan lord, surveying vantage,

      With furbish’d arms and new supplies of men,

      Began a fresh assault.

       Duncan

      Dismay’d not this

      Our captains, Macbeth and Banquo?

       Sergeant

      Yes;

      As sparrows eagles, or the hare the lion. 35

      If I say sooth, I must report they were

      As cannons overcharg’d with double cracks;

      So they doubly redoubled strokes upon the foe.

      Except they meant to bathe in reeking wounds,

      Or memorize another Golgotha, 40

      I cannot tell –

      But I am faint; my gashes cry for help.

       Duncan

      So well thy words become thee as thy wounds;

      They smack of honour both. – Go get him surgeons.

      [Exit SERGEANT, attended. Enter ROSS.]

      Who comes here?

       Malcolm

      The worthy Thane of Ross. 45

       Lennox

      What a haste looks through his eyes!

      So should he look that seems to speak things strange.

       Ross

      God save the King!

       Duncan

      Whence cam’st thou, worthy thane?

       Ross

      From Fife, great King

      Where the Norweyan banners flout the sky 50

      And fan our people cold.

      Norway himself, with terrible numbers,

      Assisted by that most disloyal traitor

      The