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Macbeth was a favourite of the seventeenth-century diarist Samuel Pepys, who saw the play on 5 November 1664 ("admirably acted"), 28 December 1666 ("most excellently acted"), ten days later on 7 January 1667 ("though I saw it lately, yet [it] appears a most excellent play in all respects"), on 19 April 1667 ("one of the best plays for a stage ...
Lord Macbeth, the Thane of Glamis and quickly the Thane of Cawdor, is the title character and main protagonist in William Shakespeare's Macbeth (c. 1603–1607). The character is loosely based on the historical king Macbeth of Scotland and is derived largely from the account in Holinshed's Chronicles (1577), a compilation of British history.
After Macbeth slays the young Siward, Macduff charges into the main castle and confronts Macbeth. Although Macbeth believes that he cannot be killed by any man born of a woman, he soon learns that Macduff was "from his mother's womb / Untimely ripped" (Act V Scene 8 lines 2493/2494) — meaning that Macduff was born by caesarean section. The ...
The traditional origin is said to be a curse set upon the play by a coven of witches, angry at Shakespeare for using a real spell. [2] One hypothesis for the origin of this superstition is that Macbeth, being a popular play, was commonly put on by theatres in financial trouble, or that the high production costs of Macbeth put theatres in financial trouble.
Macbeth tells his wife of the prophecies. Lady Macbeth prays to the dark spirits for guidance. When Macbeth says Duncan will stay overnight, she urges him to kill the King to fulfill the prophecy. A feast is held, where the King pronounces Malcolm his heir. Macbeth hesitates but Lady Macbeth persuades him to kill Duncan while she drugs his ...
Some regard her as becoming more powerful than Macbeth when she does this, because she is able to manipulate him into doing what she wants. After Macbeth becomes a murderous tyrant, she is driven to madness by guilt over their crimes and kills herself offstage. Lady Macbeth is a powerful presence in the play, most notably in the first two acts.
In the discussion of Macbeth, it is Macbeth's unity of character that is significant. [302] In many chapters, he emphasises the dominant mood, a unifying theme, the "character" of the play as a whole. [303] In, again, Macbeth, the entire play "is done upon a stronger and more systematic principle of contrast than any other of Shakespear's plays."
Lady Macbeth has also become famous in her own right. In his 1865 novel Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District, Nikolai Leskov updated The Tragedy of Macbeth so that it takes place among the Imperial Russian merchant class. In a twist on the source, however, Leskov reverses the gender roles: the woman is the murderer and the man is the instigator.