First off, what could be more appropriate than reading about
witches a week before Halloween? Now, Shakespeare was definitely a fan of
incorporating supernatural elements into his plays, but for some reason, the
witches and the presence of Hecate in act three of Macbeth, seem a little odd to me. It could be because they are in
the context of a tragedy and we typically do not associate these kinds of gimmicky
devices in that type of genre, right? Supernatural forces are also at play in Hamlet, but yet, the ghost does not come
off as gimmicky (sorry, can’t think of another word to use.) There is a
believable component to him. One thing that makes the witches seem kind of
silly is their language. They speak in rhymes, which I always have a hard time
taking seriously.
“Double, double toil
and trouble.” How does this line not take you back to your childhood? I did not
even know that line was from Macbeth,
which I thought was pretty cool, but somehow it got turned into a children’s
Halloween movie.
Don’t get me wrong, I love the incorporation of the
supernatural elements. It is much more entertaining than a very dry tragedy,
but I still take the play slightly less serious when the witches come into
play. In spite of it, Macbeth definitely take the witches and their apparitions
very seriously. In fact, their prophesies are what cause his murderous,
downward spiral in the first place. So what exactly is the intended reaction of
the audience supposed to be? Am I the only one who feels that the presence of
the witches makes the play slightly less serious? Or is what is supposed to be
the tragedy, that something like the words of a witch, are what prompts such
tragic events to unfold?
Interesting that you should say this, Krystle. I had similar thoughts when when we watched the apparition scene in class. The singing really threw me off. I was tempted to laugh a little at first, because the idea of the witches being musical is not something I associate with them.
ReplyDeleteI feel that us as the reader, or the observer, seeing the witches as these out of place figures makes Macbeth seem even more insane. We would not see these witches as someone that could foretell our prophecy, so why is Macbeth killing people over what they said? Macbeth' choices seem extremely tragic (get it because it's a tragedy) to us because he murders his friends simply because of what these random three witches said in the woods.
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