Supernatural

Question 1

Thesis - supernatural

Answer 1

• Catalysts of chaos
• deliberately mislead macbeth through ambiguous language and speaking in “equivocation”
• shakespears tries to warn against witches and the supernatural
• cautionary tale
• flatter king james
• epitome of chaos
• represents geniune fear in religious jacobean england that witches posed a real threat to distruption of the natural order

Question 2

Paragraph 1 - supernatural

Answer 2

-play opens in medias res - heart of action - with the witches to signify their crafting and controlling role in the play
- witches are agents of chaos who mislead macbeth
“fair is foul and foul is fair”
“beware macduff”
- “hail macbeth..king”
- king james “daemanologie”
- believed he had to go on witch hunts as a supernatural duty as he was ordained by God
- believed according to the chain of being (king being closest to God) it was his duty to rid earth of witchcraft
- three witches compromise and juxtapose the three components of God to portray them as satanic and demonic, appearing displeasing to a religious Jacobean audience, favouring king james beliefs about supernatural “we three”

Question 3

paragraph 2 - supernatural causes guilt

Answer 3

• causes hallucinations
• ” is this a dagger…”
• “gory locks”
• “out damned spot”
• “will all great neptunes ocean’s wash this blood”
  theme - guilt

Question 4

Paragraph 3 - Macbeth and lady macbeth

Answer 4

• became ambitious because of the supernatural
• “come you spirits unsex me here” “vaulting ambition”
• lady macbeth mirrors how the witches speak “Great Glamis, worthy cawdor…hail hereafter” / “Hail macbeth than of glamis” - could be the witches having influence over her or could be her playing on the witches speech to further convince macbeth
  Theme - ambition - divine right of kings

Question 5

“fair is foul and foul is fair”

Answer 5

• ambiguous, introduces idea of appearance vs reality, uncertainty
• direct contrast to greek tragedies (hero tries to avoid fate but fail)
• if macbeth had simply waited to be crowned king ( according to witches prophecies) it would have been “fair” but he chose to distrupt the natural by comitting regicide, which is “foul”
• shows his engulfing ambition
• sends a message to the audience about King James
• parallelism and paradoxical phrase
• fricitive language, audible friction, adds tension and aggression
• concludes/sums up the whole play and what happens when someone is manipulated and takes unnatural proceeds to the next level

Question 6

“meet again” “rain”
“hurly-burly’s done”…“battles lost and won”

Answer 6

Trochaic tetrameter - establishes different from the other characters - mainly speak in iambic pentameter
- rhyming mimics chanting/spells, links them to evil