macbeth supernatural

Question 1

what is the theme in supernatural

Answer 1

• anything that is supernatural can lead to chaos
• the witches are causing all the chaos

Question 2

When shall we three meet again? / In thunder, lightning, or in rain?

Answer 2

• ‘three’ is a significant number
• nouns ‘thunder’, ‘lightning’, ‘rain’- pathetic fallacy.
• They are chaotic, unruly forces nature-used to suggest the witches are agents of chaos; they enjoy trouble and destroying the lives of mankind.
• People are tossed about by forces that they cannot control

Question 3

Fair is foul, and foul is fair: / Hover through the fog and filthy air

Answer 3

• The couplet with which the witches take their departure is a confession of their creed; it uses binary opposites.
• All that is good, “fair,” to others is evil, “foul,” to them, and vice versa.
• This applies to both the physical and the moral world
• they rejoice in the “fog and filthy air,” and in every sort of mischief and evil, from killing swine to entrapping human souls.

Question 4

He shall spurn fate, scorn death, and bear his hopes above wisdom, grace and fear; And you all know, security is mortal’s chiefest enemy.

Answer 4

• Banquo gives Macbeth some crucial advice here. He recognises that the witches cannot be trusted.
• They are ‘instruments of darkness’; darkness evokes ideas of secrecy and evil, and hidden motives, while ‘instruments’ suggest they are being used by another.
• The implication here is that they are agents of the Devil who wish mankind ‘harm’.
• B. believes that they will ‘tell us truths’, making a few accurate predictions,​ in order to gain a man’s confidence, ‘to betray us in deepest consequence’- meaning to betray them and interfere with their fate in more important matters.
• His advice foreshadows the witches final predictions in Act 4, where the witches declare that M will ‘spurn fate, scorn death, and bear.
• His hopes ‘bove wisdom, grace and fear: And you all know, security is man’s chiefest enemy’.
• This line reveals that the witches are actively seeking M’s downfall by misleading him with the prophecies which will lead to his over-confident belief that he is indestructible