The Witches Macbeth

I know I am not alone among those who are always intrigued by the role of the witches in Macbeth. They have become such iconic figures that they are one of the easier ways to distinguish the play from the others of Shakespeare, but there is so much more to them than that.

Opening with the witches is an effective device because it sets the mood to be eerie and unnerving, similar to how the ghost functions at the beginning of Hamlet. Both of these supernatural phenomenon prophetically appeal to the titular character in order to drive the plot of the play. 

However, the witches are in some ways less mysterious than the ghost of King Hamlet, because early in the first act their prophecies are confirmed to at least hold grains of truth, revealed first to the audience and then to the characters of the play. It is significant that Macbeth's first words of the play "So foul and fair a day I have not seen" echo back to the witches' line in scene 1:"Fair is foul, and foul is fair." This immediate correlation between Macbeth and the witches indicates the power of their prophecies and anticipates the power they will have over Macbeth. Macbeth is much more stricken by the words of the witches than his friend Banquo, who begs to be included in the witches' predictions but does not feel as consumed by them as Macbeth. 

Shakespeare's use of paradox and prophecy together is a brilliant literary combination of techniques, because it entices the subjects (or perhaps victims) into obsessing over their respective futures, trying to accommodate the details of their lives to those described by the witches. Needless to say, it won't end well for anyone, because, you know, that's what happens in tragedies and also whenever witches or prophecies are involved.  

   

Bathing in Marriage

The Wife of Bath is a character that plays to and simultaneously questions our 21st century feminist sensibilities. While the Wife does undermine some patriarchal traditions and values with one hand, she is constantly helping to reaffirm them with her other. As a result, it is difficult to discern whether she is supposed to be a heroic figure of liberation or merely a hyperbolic caricature of over sexualized women.

In her prelude, the Wife of Bath tells the story of a knight who came across a beautiful young maid, and he was so stricken that he just had to rape her. This detail of the story indicates that our dear Wife believes men are primarily driven by their sexual urges, and cannot control them.

King Arthur, who rules Britain at the time of the story, sentences the knight to death. However, the queen and her ladies decide to save the knight, if he can return to the court with the answer to a difficult question: what do women want most in the world? Because the queen takes authority over the king, the Wife is demonstrating the power of women can have over their husbands.

This theme recurs when the knight arrives again with a hideous old hag, who promised the knight that, in return for his devotion, she will give him the answer. He agrees, and tells the court that what women want most in the world is to control their husbands. The queen and her ladies accept the answer, sparing the knight's life, However, when the old, ugly women strong-arms the knight to marry her, he is distraught. In their wedding bed, the women proposes that she could be beautiful and unfaithful, or loyal and hideous. In the end, he lets her decide, which is all that she wanted, and thus becomes gorgeous and true, and they live happily ever after.

While the Wife demonstrates the power of women, this power is still only qualified by marriage, which is a patriarchal construct. Furthermore, I just want to point out that the knight who lived happily ever after is still a rapist, which I wish was a thing that only happened in King Arthur's day.  

Does Beowulf Have a Happy Ending?

When I first studied Beowulf in High School, I did not understand why there would be this whole epic poem about a dude who goes and gets himself killed in the end. I have done a lot of reading since I last encountered Beowulf and I think I have a better understanding of the choices the author / authors of Beowulf made in their epic. As my philosophy professor, Dr. Reichard, would say: "Everyone dies at the end of their story."

Still, even with this unpleasant truth in hand, one is left to wonder why the text does not end after Grendel and his mother have been killed: the two creatures who terrorize the Danes for the most part of the text. Typically epic quest poems end at the resolution of the main conflict: The Odyssey ends when there is peace in Ithaca, not when Odysseus dies.

That being said, if we look back at the cultural concerns of the narrator and the characters of Beowulf, it makes sense that we are present for our hero's death. One of the most important characteristics in Beowulf's culture is that a warrior should die a valiant death in battle. Despite the fact that all his troops turned and ran when it came time to face the dragon, Beowulf fought on until his death, with only a shield in hand. In this sense, Beowulf does get the ending that suits him.



Furthermore, Beowulf's demise is anticipated by Hrothgar's long warning regarding the dangers of pride following Beowulf's earlier victory. The fact that Beowulf faces his final foe full of pride indicates that perhaps avoiding hubris is one of the crucial lessons of Beowulf, in that a great person can accomplish many things but will fail as soon as they believe themselves greater than they really are. This seems to coincide with the Christian cultural beliefs than the corresponding Nordic culture, which might mean that Beowulf's battle with the dragon was added to the original text. If so, Beowulf doesn't really get the happy ending, but we all get a neat lesson about being too full of ourselves!