What’s wrong with Macbeth? – (the accidental birthday issue)

This has already become so complex, I have to make some kind of synopsis of the important issues in “Macbeth” and the decisions I made about the play:

 

TRAGEDY

 

I have always read “Macbeth” as one of the first modern tragedies – where the main protagonist takes a wrong decision with catastrophic consequences and engages our empathy (not necessarily because they are a “good person after all” but because we understand that something like this could have happened to us) – but this is NOT the only way to read it. It is likely that the play is somewhere on a scale between Greek (= fate-driven) and modern (= guilt-driven) tragedy, but where exactly is difficult to establish. (I have also developed a feeling that these assignations are a “crutch” – useful at times but not to be taken too seriously! It will come up again …) Theoretically, it could even be nowhere on that scale because the Macbeths could just as well be seen (and played!) as “medieval” villains, not as “tragic” protagonists. I consider this to be an unlikely reading because of the enormous height of the fall Shakespeare makes Macbeth take, but there is a possibility - and more than a little evidence! - that people have read and might still be reading it like this. “Tragedy” is not just a fact, it involves a DECISION every reader has to take. My infallible proof of the decision I took was that, in my inner “Macbeth”, “Heroes” by David Bowie is playing on the stereo when Lady Macbeth enters to speak with Macbeth before the fatal banquet (- and she switches it off.) I thought it such an obvious decision, but most of the productions I have seen either went against it or didn’t succeed in showing it. So, proof of tragedy is still outstanding …

 

DARKNESS

 

Apart from blood, the most important “matter” in the play is DARKNESS. Quod esset demonstrandum, but the proof would be a waste of blog space because of the omnipresence of references to night/darkness in the play. The really interesting fact is anyway that there is so much more of it in “Macbeth” than in any other of Shakespeare’s thirty-odd plays, and the proof of THAT would definitely go beyond ANY scope, so I have to rely on my recollection of the thirty-five plays I have actually read, so: Quod ERAT demonstrandum (= proved)

 

As the “weird sisters” are INSTRUMENTS OF DARKNESS – which Banquo suspects, but there is confirmation on a plot level because they are instrumental in Macbeth’s decision to commit murder – a relation between them and the darkness is clearly implied. (proved) They have therefore to be central to the play and cannot be marginalized (proved), which they usually are (proved on the basis of my knowledge; empirical proof on a larger scale would be desirable.) So, why do the weird sisters not “work” in the way they are supposed to? They might not merely because of my own expectations being wrong – though I think I’d go with anything except boring! - or it may have something to do with the contradictory semantical issues I have unfolded. It might also just be tradition that is to blame (= that there are things you can and cannot do with the weird sisters)? “We” certainly don’t want to see witches on the stage anymore, but what do “instruments of darkness” look like in the 21st century? (And WHAT is the darkness?)

 

(I am aware that this “proved” thing becomes annoying, but I need to do it to establish where I leave the firm ground of “provability”, which invariably happens.)

 

FATE

 

Fate is certainly a central issue of the play, for plot-reasons and as a general matter of importance in “Shakespeare”. (as proved) The designation of “weird(wyrd!) sisters” for his witches is additional proof. Accordingly, there is a strong logical link – via the weird sisters - between fate and darkness = The weird sisters being instruments of darkness should have something to do with them being in charge of fate.

 

Matters I have to look into further:

 

What exactly is the DARKNESS?

 

The exact “job description” for the sisters as “instruments of darkness”

 

EQUIVOCATION (and its relation with fate)

 

LADY MACBETH

 

THE MACBETHS and their fatal relationship

 

What’s wrong with MACBETH?

 

So, now I am back where I thought I had been already, and, even though there are unsolved issues on previous points, I’ll take up the question which has bothered me for years:

 

WHAT’S WRONG WITH MACBETH?

 

The link between tragedy and Macbeth as the main protagonist has already been established. If I want to read this play as a tragedy - which appears to be such an obvious choice – it should be represented in this way on the stage. All these great, coveted “tragic” roles like Lear, Hamlet and Othello seem to have a “limp” that is more or less difficult to overcome. Apart from Hamlet, Macbeth seems to be the worst. Compared to Hamlet or Lear, he is not even that “coveted”, or at least not equally indispensable to a theatre actor’s CV. Why might that be …?

 

I feel exhausted already, but the best thing to approach this issue would be to do what I have been doing on and off, though never systematically: to examine every single Macbeth I have seen on a stage or a screen and establish what was “wrong” with them. Basically: Why were they all BORING?

 

(To be precise, two of them were not: Christopher Eccleston in my most recent RSC “Macbeth” and James McAvoy in the “Shakespeare Retold”, but they stand out as the exceptions.)

 

The EARLIEST – and one of the first – productions of Macbeth I have seen is the old Polansky film from 1971 which might be a work of art in its own right but didn’t offer me any clues about the play or its protagonist. I don’t remember who played him, nor do I want to because the acting was grotesquely “off”, not only where the lead was concerned; but it doesn’t compare because it was a time where the absence of psychological depth in the acting might have been seen as “naturalism” and which I am quite glad to have “skipped”. I don’t even REMEMBER Lady Macbeth – and this also says a lot. It is quite revealing how seldom I can remember Macbeth and Lady Macbeth TOGETHER on a screen or stage, considering the long and substantial scenes between them in the first three acts of the play. As I stubbornly continue to understand the Macbeths as an item, the absence of the lady from my memories is never a good sign. So, as to a theory of WHO Macbeth is supposed to be, I draw a BLANK, apart from the fact that he seems to be a BRUTE without any regrets about what he has done, or any recognizable psychology, and I am rather sure he WENT MAD – which is often the reason it LOOKS like bad acting … (Great British actors won’t want to believe this, but their attempts at madness are – similar to their attempts at speaking American, or German for that matter! – INVARIABLY doomed to fail.)

 

This is probably quite unfair, but my MEMORIES of the Polanski film are rather close to those of the WORST “Macbeth” I’ve ever seen – and probably the first! - by an American University theatre group when I was still at uni in Munich, so: pre-1996. There is nothing at all to say about it apart from it containing a lot of wild hair and beards – like the Polanski film! – and appallingly bad acting, a lot of shouting, no Lady Macbeth that I remember and definitely MADNESS – a recurring theme very badly in need of being looked into … (I am not chuffed!)

 

Having remembered this, I’ll effortlessly jump to the “Macbeth” with Sean Bean – the second worst production I have seen (on a par with the Polanski version) but with ONE point of interest to it … I might ask myself why these frankly horrible experiences hadn’t put me off my favourite play early on – and why it BECAME my favourite play in the first place before I ever saw it on a stage. I think the first Shakespeare I actually saw - on the telly - was the Derek Jakoby “Hamlet” (with Patrick Stewart as Claudius who was the greater revelation at the time). I am not sure but think we read “Macbeth” at school, in German, and that might actually have been the reason, even though it was in German, so not really Shakespeare. As I wasn’t interested in the English language at the time because we had such bad teachers and never read anything interesting but was very much into stuff like Schiller, it might have been sufficient for me to get thrilled. That it REMAINED my favourite play of all times until the big “revival” post-2013 – though almost on a par with “Richard III” – is more strange. It might not even be such a bad thing that I don’t remember how “Shakespeare” began because it feels as if it had always been there - before I began - like the air I breathe …

 

As I am going about it more in the order of my experience than of when the respective version of the play had been produced, it is actually Sean Bean next. That was in 2004 or – most likely – the beginning of 2005, that is post-Lord of the Rings! I must have seen a decent German production not long before that or afterwards, at Nuremberg theatre, but I don’t remember much apart from a tall, dark, striking Macbeth – rather more like my inner Macbeth than any of the others! – and a stage that was very red. (If it was to symbolize the blood, it didn’t work because that only came to me right now … It certainly isn’t my idea of creating a bloody MESS!) So, the only thing I remember about the Nuremberg “Macbeth” is that it was mostly conventional but less offensive than the one with Sean Bean where bad acting and a severed head – something all the other theatre productions could do without - are basically the only things I remember. (Or didn’t the Ralph Fiennes version have a severed head? Appalling! - If it had, I forgot right away, but I’ll get to check because it will come to the “Cinema” next month, and I’ll definitely see it again because of Indira Varma.) In any case, it was very “literal” and unimaginative. One good thing – there WAS a lady; I remember flowing red hair and very energetic acting. (I should have enjoyed that more than I probably did because this would be the only adequate Lady Macbeth I would see in a long time …)

 

But there must have been at least SOME idea about who Macbeth is supposed to be. I read part of a review because I was looking for a date, and there Sean Bean was quoted in the sense that he played a SOLDIER – so, intentionally rather physical and BRUTAL, not “brainy” at all – and that was probably just what he did. It is on a par with the old BBC adaptation for television with an actor I don’t remember who did the same thing. Macbeth is just this athletic, virile, brutal guy – potentially a villain! – who kills to get to the throne and continues as remorseless and inhuman as he had always been … Taken literally, “The Tragedie of Macbeth” is NOT a tragedy but a slaughter. More than that: it seems to be the “default setting” for this character = what “happens” when nobody can be bothered to think about it further: a murderer who becomes a tyrant and – disputably! – gets mad in the end. It’s the part of Macbeth that remains if we chose not to give a shit about neither what people are saying about him in the beginning, nor what HE is saying, nor any of these fascinating human relationships so carefully displayed … and, above all, it’s such a BORING choice!

 

Anyway, this was the first of several great actors I have seen making a hash of Macbeth, therefore probably the most painful. In 2013 I revived my interest in the play in the wake of the “Hobbit hype” because Richard Armitage mentioned Macbeth as one of the models for his character. (In this sense, Thorin Oakenshield actually became the first convincing Macbeth I have seen, and my “inner Macbeth” – when I started to learn the play by heart – certainly had his voice in it …) Subsequently, I started to collect all the versions of “Macbeth” I could get on DVD – some of which were so horrible I won’t mention them, apart from a very Scottish “Macbeth” with Jason Connery – whom I had down as a terrible actor already since the (great) Robin Hood series … I think I decided there and then that Macbeth is NOT SCOTTISH. Of course he IS Scottish (– nothing against the Scots, on the contrary; Graham McTavish is the only actor I indelibly “casted” for my inner Macbeth, as Macduff -) and probably a BODYBUILDER. I am not joking! (Even Chris Eccleston – my best Macbeth on a stage so far - thought it relevant to show us that Macbeth kept fit and could do some fighting if he had to.) So, MUSCLES are definitely a requirement, and he SHOULDN’T BE OLD.

 

A muscled brute in military garb who can wield a sword convincingly (respectively use a machine gun), or a half-naked Scot with long hair and a wild beard – how could it get any worse? I was in for a surprise when I saw the film from 2010 with Patrick Stewart. He played Macbeth as a twentieth century USURPER and DICTATOR. That is, this was the concept of the film, so this was what he did – and it was BORING!!! As the film was based on Shakespeare’s text, the first three acts virtually got skipped, and of course there was “no” Lady Macbeth. Or, if there was, she didn’t have anything to do as everything was decided from the beginning. The worst thing was, though - which I encountered here for the first time: Macbeth – even though he looked fit to fight! – definitely was AN OLD MAN!

 

I was surprised that the film version of the RSC’s “Macbeth” with Antony Sher which I saw not much later – interestingly the only one that left any traces on the internet or in their shop between 2001 AND 2018! – was so much older than the Patrick Stewart film because, on the surface, it appears so much more sophisticated. (I still have a fondness for it, if only for the reason that it is the only trace Richard Armitage left as a member of the RSC. He played Angus, I believe, and had about two sentences to say and to stand with spread legs all the time so as not to look so much taller than the other soldiers …) But only on the surface; as a new adaptation of the play it is appallingly “empty”. Macbeth is an OLD MAN without illusions or energy or ambition - or wife to speak of (even though she was played by Harriet Walter!) The whole thing is so empty of any kind of interpretation or psychology that this emptiness itself became interesting - almost as if a spell was cast over the play for it to be put to sleep to be kissed awake at a more opportune time. I think it is from this moment that I was actively waiting and hoping for a hero to come and break the spell …

 

Of course I cannot continue to say nothing at all about Ralph Fiennes playing Macbeth, so I will say one sentence. If I am thinking about it, he played him much as Antony Sher did – so, even NOTHING can create a tradition of sorts!? – only that he got PROPERLY mad in the end. (At least I think this was the intention; as I said: it never works!)

 

I know there must be “method” behind the madness, but not even Michael Fassbender could convince me of it, probably because I am still stubbornly denying the necessity. I have no clue what the point is of Macbeth becoming mad – though I am probably not right. I shall have to deal with the madness, but frantically pacing the room like a caged wolf I see as an excuse for NOT dealing with it! There isn’t much more to say for or against the “Macbeth” film with him released in 2015, at least not in its capacity as an adaptation of the play. I don’t even think this was the intention, even though they used a cruelly reductive version of the Shakespeare text. If it was, it was clearly still under the “aesthetic” spell of 2001. Quite like the latest attempt at a film from 2021 with Denzel Washington and Frances McDormand that definitely hit the mark of “totally noncommittal”. Maybe certain texts get so emptied of meaning by endless repetition that the “timelessness setting” no longer works, and this was just happening to “Macbeth”? At least their Macbeth, like Michael Fassbender’s, was still middle-aged …

 

So, back to great OLD MEN playing Macbeth. Interestingly, in “The Hobbit” they made Thorin – the dwarf king with a beard so long that he has to tuck the ends through his belt so as not to tread on them - YOUNGER because they knew this whole story would only WORK if he isn’t already an old king without a crown trying to take it back but the HEIR to the throne who still has a lot to look forward to. In my opinion, it’s exactly the same for Macbeth. The tragedy of Macbeth is valid because he has this fatal decision – and this enormous fall – to take, but it is “bugged”, probably in more than one way. One of them is a “time-bug”.

 

The problem is that, on the stage, there is just NO WAY of showing convincingly how much time has passed. The downfall of Macbeth requires at least a few years - more likely many years - from his access to power until his death. At the end, Macbeth is at least on the brink of old age when he speaks about his “way of life” that “has fallen into the seer, the yellow leaf …” I don’t want to say that the play is bugged from the beginning because on an Elizabethan stage there wouldn’t have been a problem. The same way an “average” Elizabethan would have been perfectly fine with witches, they wouldn’t have been the least bit interested in these finer psychological points “we” find so fascinating in Shakespeare’s text. (This is something I am always trying to ignore whilst being well aware of it!) My idea for dealing with the problem is that Macbeth should be still middle-aged, and the “yellow-leaf” stuff at the end would come out slightly ironical and self-pitying, kind of like a “midlife crisis”.

 

By the way, I HAVE SEEN my perfect “Macbeth”! I have seen it – but it was not by Shakespeare. It must have been shortly after 2013 that I hit upon the “Shakespeare Retold” with James McAvoy. In this story, everything that never works on the stage works because the “time-bug” has been removed. The “ban” on tragedy is lifted. It is the perfect version of this story with Joe Macbeth as YOUNG and ambitious sous chef who is doing all the work and therefore thinks he should inherit from his lazy and conceited employer who is taking all the credit for the new Michelin star. He kills him, of course with the help of his attractive and ambitious wife – brilliantly played by Keeley Hawes – who is the one with the social and management skills but also a chink in her armour because of the loss of their child. (“My” Lady Macbeth until Indira Varma came along!) Banquo, his co-worker and best buddy, is killed by an illegal worker whom Macbeth blackmailed while biking with his son on the heath. It also has the best – and weirdest – “weird sisters”, the only ones I saw that really “worked” because of the great "binmen" idea I already mentioned. Perfect “Macbeth”! I realized only recently how much it has shaped my inner “Macbeth”. Actually, more than it should have!

 

It wasn’t even Macbeth, respectively James McAvoy - who is a genius, but so are/were Sean Bean, Antony Sher, Patrick Stewart, Michael Fassbender and Ralph Fiennes, all of whom I have seen doing incredible things as actors. James McAvoy as such wasn’t that much more interesting as Macbeth, he was just YOUNGER! The main thing was that, for the first time, I could detect an IDEA what this play might be about. I got convinced that Macbeth is about how far somebody would go to advance their career and the consequences of this choice. I still don’t think I am entirely wrong, but there are even bigger things at stake …

 

There was still one “Macbeth” to “sit through” before it gets REALLY interesting. 2018 was clearly a “Macbeth” year. Before we departed for Stratford we saw Rory Kinnear as Macbeth in the “Cinema”. I didn’t expect anything at all because he is one of the most boring actors I know - and got something more. There was actually one scene that was remarkable – psychology-wise – and this is not a mean feat where “Macbeth” is concerned! It was the scene after the murder of Duncan where he displayed the most genuine and devastating REMORSE I have seen on a stage. Therefore I will probably remember him fondly to the end of my days because I don’t suppose that anybody will ever again try and do the OBVIOUS!!! At least I had now proof that it’s not impossible to play WHAT SHAKESPEARE HAS WRITTEN …

 

And there was even a Lady Macbeth in this production: Anne-Marie Duff. She is exceptional, so there was ONE human being on the stage the moment she turned up. But I belief they casted her because she is so great at playing these damaged people – and a Lady Macbeth damaged from the beginning was not at all what I WANTED to see …

 

Then, in the summer of 2018, Claudia and I flew to Birmingham and travelled to Shakespeare’s hometown to meet Irmi - the third member of our “Macbeth Club” that only sits every other decade on special events – to see the RSC’s brand-new “Macbeth” with Christopher Eccleston. I pause just a moment to recall our sitting on a sunny bench opposite the swan-filled river and the theatre where we MIGHT have seen Chris Eccleston on a balcony. I was sceptical at the time but, in retrospect, I think we did … (one of the top moments of my life actually!), and then us meeting Irmi at the “Swan” … Even though my mates were not chuffed, the actual event I recall as a break-through of sorts.

 

A lot of what I described just now I have on DVD but I didn’t watch anything again because I had already dismissed it as unsatisfactory, respectively – for the “Shakespeare Retold” – remembered it really well. But it is a great thing that the RSC still produces DVDs, and of course I had “Macbeth”. It was a really good idea to watch it again as this made me aware what a break-through it actually had been. As I am writing this on Shakespeare’s birthday – after I drank a Limoncello Spritz to commemorate – I toast him vigorously as one of the few people who never cease to surprise me. The experience seemed “patchy” at the time – kind of incomplete - but now I can appreciate this production as an exceptional effort because - without knowing it! - I have come a long way. And - better still, though it didn’t feel so good at first! - in “one fell swoop” it eradicated some of my most persistent errors …

First interlude: Weird sisters?!

 

Having found a very short, sweet and satisfactory answer to the key question about the WEIRD SISTERS, I have skipped all the work I had already done. So, before entering the “final battle” about the Macbeths, I thought I’d give myself a break and walk a path I already cleared – or that was what I thought!

 

The first step of the long journey had been taken years ago, when we went to Stratford to see “Macbeth” with Christopher Eccleston. On this occasion I bought the RSC’s latest edition of the play. In the preface the editors explained their unorthodox spelling of the “weyard sisters”. This was the first time I heard that the weird sisters are NOT, actually, WEIRD.

 

I must say I was a bit disappointed because I liked them “weird” – and my inner “Macbeth” rather relied on the weirdness, aesthetically - they couldn’t be weird enough for my taste - and plot-wise: Why are Macbeth and Banquo usually so little surprised – and confused, maybe even to the point of distraction!? – when they have this run-in with the sisters?

 

In retrospect, it was more than a bit of semantics but a big eye-opener because it awoke my suspicion that nothing about the weird sisters might actually be what it seemed, and I already began to gather “stupid” questions without answering them, which is something I always do. Questions like: Why is Lady Macbeth “always” wearing a green dress? Of course she is not, literally, but I saw it twice now and got the idea that it MIGHT be traditional and might carry some sort of meaning. Probably just bullshit, but I know that it will bother me until I’ve found an answer … (or know why I was asking the question; in this case it made me aware of the importance of TRADITION where “Macbeth” is concerned. All this is “heavily loaded” stuff, most of which has nothing to do with “Shakespeare”.)

 

This is my catalogue of silly questions concerning the sisters:

 

#1 Are the weird sisters really WITCHES?

 

#2 Are the weird sisters really WEIRD?

 

#3 What are they, if they are not WEIRD?

 

#4 Are they really SISTERS (= blood relatives)? (And, if they are, why?)

 

#5 And – if they are not (just) witches - which side are they on?

 

I’ll do the answers before breakfast, but they are only the beginning. In fact, each of them turned out to contain its own little can of worms.

 

#1 Yes and NO.

 

#2 NO (and yes)

 

#3 WYRD.

 

#4 (Emphatically) YES. (Because they say so. For the “real” reason refer to #3!)

 

#5 Anybody’s guess.

 

#1 WITCHES??? Perversely, I always took it that the weird sisters were NOT witches. The reason is probably that nobody ever calls them witches, not event they themselves: “The weird sisters, hand in hand …” (the sisters), “and oftentimes the instruments of darkness tell us truths“ (Banquo), “… by which title before these weird sisters saluted me” (Macbeth), “I dreamt last night of the three weird sisters” (Banquo), “You secret, black, and midnight hags” (Macbeth), “And betimes I will to the weird sisters …” (Macbeth), “Saw you the weird sisters?” (Macbeth).

 

This ambiguity – if it is not just due to a convention of not NAMING witches!? - calls for an explanation, but not the one I chose, unless I believed that a thief is not a thief, even though they have stolen something, just because nobody knows it and can CALL them a thief. There is no doubt that the sisters are practicing black magic and ARE therefore witches. The ambiguity, if intended, is not for the audience, who is in on it at the latest when they are boasting about their dark deeds before they meet with Macbeth and Banquo. In fact, the animal attributes (“graymalkin” and “paddock”) make sure it is in on it from the beginning. It is for the “benefit” of the protagonists. Banquo strongly suspects. He is the one who interrogates them and refers to them as “instruments of darkness”, but, in the end, it might not have made much difference. He is prepared to make them his “oracles as well”, and who knows what would have ensued … Macbeth clearly uses the ambiguity for his own ends. Blinded by ambition, he doesn’t WANT to know. (“Such supernatural soliciting cannot be ill, cannot be good …”)

 

So, witches it is!? - Not quite. There is a another, more potent, argument that there is more to them than just witchcraft … see #3!

 

#2 WEIRD??? The RSC’s editors used the historic spelling “weyard sisters” to avoid the contemporary connotations of “weird” (= (extremely) strange). According to them, the intended meaning was “wayward”, as in “wayward behaviour” = selfish, bad, unpredictable, difficult to control. Great attributes for the sisters! I was instantly persuaded and didn’t even think of checking. In fact, it’s “weyward” (not “weyard”) in the First Folio (– which rather plays into the editor’s argument, but the chutzpah might have raised my suspicion …)

 

As almost anything where the weird sisters are concerned the argument isn’t exactly FALSE, just incomplete and therefore misleading. Something good certainly came of it: I knew now that the weird sisters are not WEIRD. (Although the description – “so withered and so wild in their attire” that they “look not like the inhabitants of the earth” and Banquo’s confusion about their sex might still make them weird enough for me?)

 

Exhausted already … but it’s getting worse! Seems to be a “two coffee problem” …

 

One coffee and three chocolate easter eggs later:

 

#3 WYRD ??? When I started to check on everything I still didn’t understand about “Macbeth”, I also looked into the “weird sisters” and instantly discovered that the RSC put me on the wrong track. We know WHO the weird sisters are – in the first place! It is neither a secret nor open to discussion because we know where they come from. Shakespeare’s source for “Macbeth” was Holinshed’s “Chronicle of Scotland” where the protagonist, returning from the battlefield, meets three women who deliver their prophecies about his future. These women are neither weird nor old hags, they are beautiful noblewomen = the Elizabethan version of the Greek Fates, so, clearly not witches but GODDESSES. IN THE FIRST PLACE, they are neither “weird sisters” nor “wayward sisters” but “WYRD SISTERS” – “wyrd” being the Anglo-Saxon word for “fate”.

 

But again it is not as simple as that! Before I am again starting to cast doubt, I insist on setting it down that the “weird sisters” are neither weird nor wayward nor witches IN THE FIRST PLACE, but age-old, powerful goddesses in charge of the fates of men (and women). (HEATHEN goddesses, mind! Whereas in a Christian universe the one and only God is personally in charge of everything, the Olympian gods were usually rather relaxed about humans – unless their doings concerned them personally! – and thus left the petty details to three industrious occupants of the spinning room. This, in my opinion, muddles the issue of fate in “Macbeth” not just a little bit. See #5!)

 

Now to the “buts”: That the sisters are goddesses in HOLINSHED doesn’t mean that they have to be goddesses ON THE STAGE. As usual, Shakespeare takes the liberty to do with his source exactly as he pleases. In “Macbeth” the sisters are vengeful, irresponsible, mischievous old hags who practice black magic and create havoc, therefore WITCHES and as WAYWARD as they come! ON THE SURFACE, the goddesses probably became witches because the producers of the play wanted to please King James I who became an expert on witchcraft after almost having been shipwrecked crossing the channel, a mishap he attributed to the influence of witches. “The yeasty waves” which “confound and swallow navigation up” would have conjured a rather unpleasant memory. But I don’t believe that this is all there is to the witches. Even if not entirely intended, they certainly developed a life of their own.

 

As the Anglo-Saxon word “wyrd” and the “Elizabethan” word “weyward” have no etymological or semantic connection whatsoever, it stands to reason how they came together in the first place. I suppose it is the influence of witches because “wayward” is exactly what they are, and, I suppose, the expression “wyrd sisters” (approximately pronounced as “word sisters”) wouldn’t have made much more sense to an Elizabethan audience than to an audience of the 21st century. Only the part who had a classic education – respectively an inclination to check Wikipedia – would have known what it meant. Therefore I think it most likely that “weyward” wasn’t a spelling error of the First Folio but the intended meaning. (Which is great but created a semantic “storm in a teacup” due to the mixing of entirely independent contexts.) So, in the end, the RSC was probably “right”, but, again, it’s not as simple as that …

 

#4 SISTERS??? The reason why I don’t care for the RSC’s decision is because it is reductive – with consequences I came to dislike. The reason that the witches are not CALLED “witches” I already explained. (Either there was a convention against naming witches or the ambiguity was intended for the protagonists.) But this doesn’t explain why they are called the “weird SISTERS” by everybody who refers to them = Macbeth, Banquo, and the sisters themselves. This is actually rather noteworthy, and I think the likeliest explanation for this is that they are intended to BE sisters, and this can only be because Shakespeare wanted to keep the semantics of the FATES – who ARE three SISTERS. (Intuitively, this had been important for me from the beginning, so that I liked to imagine the witches of my inner “Macbeth” as weird triplets!)

 

So, using “weird” instead of “wyrd” or “wayward”, in my opinion, I keep both intended semantic contexts alive because the word “weird” didn’t exist before Shakespeare invented the “weird sisters” and therefore the expression constitutes an amalgamation of both contexts. Using “weird”, a new word, I don’t cancel out either meaning. Sorry, I just love this etymological stuff – but there actually is more to it …

 

#5 WITCHES OR NOT - WHICH SIDE ARE THEY ON??? The reason that both contexts have to be kept alive to understand and – which is more contestable! – represent the sisters on the stage is, in my opinion, that FATE is such a central and contested issue in “Macbeth”. In Elizabethan times, fate is probably not as “absolute” as in ancient Greece, but it is a central term of Protestant faith and therefore omnipresent in “Shakespeare”. “Hamlet” is one of these works of fiction that constantly teach me that understanding is overrated; there are much better things one can do with them. It is supposed to be the most “modern” of Shakespeare’s plays; in truth it might have become that much later and originally have been the exact opposite because, as Claudia and I recently established, it is pure Greek tragedy. The protagonist already got into a tragic position before he is actually grown up and in a position to act. Hamlet’s solution, in the end, is total acceptance of fate: “The readiness is all!” Along the way, there certainly is a bit of action but also what always feels like too much monologue on the stage – which basically was the chorus in Greek tragedy: coming to terms with things. In “Macbeth” the fate issue is trickier because “modern” tragedy is all about guilt, not fate, and as soon as “we” start to act, we also become guilty. The problem with Elizabethan tragedy, respectively an Elizabethan “mindset”, is that “Elizabethan” is not just Elizabethan. It is, if anything, a default name for an extremely dynamic social conglomerate, full of factions and irreconcilable contradictions. This is probably one of the features that made “Shakespeare” so versatile and enduring. (The bloody thing doesn’t add up!)

 

The way the three sisters are placed in the play suggests that they have, in some way or other, a part in the tragic development. It suggests that Macbeth would not have become guilty if they hadn’t told him his fate, but this is only clear-cut if we don’t scratch the surface. Beneath it, the sisters are semantically divided. If they really were goddesses and in league with fate, in a world ruled by the one God, they couldn’t be “instruments of darkness”. And they cannot be “wayward” – irresponsible and, in consequence, not to be taken seriously – and “wyrd” – important and influential – at the same time. So, it seems we have to decide – and, doing this, one way or the other, we give them real influence over the story we are going to read. Goddesses or old hags – they are the SPINNERS = makers of text. We might not WANT to grant them this power, but, try as we might, we won’t succeed …

 

Here I’ll come back unexpectedly to the question of the green dress. I haven’t solved this one, but it struck me as a decision that was already made unconsciously before somebody thought of dressing Lady Macbeth. In my opinion, there are a few settings already set before a new “Macbeth” is even thought of. One of them is that Banquo has to be present in the banquet scene. Both Claudia and I tried to change that – and failed. Another seems to be about the weird sisters, and it finds an expression in the RSC’s decision for “wayward”. In Elizabethan times, witches were not a problem. The general public believed in their existence and knew what they could do and in what way they were “instruments of darkness”. There was also no ambiguity about where the darkness came from. In a twenty-first century production of “Macbeth”, I’d be outraged if the sisters were witches. If I see a contemporary production of “Macbeth” I expect to see … do I even know what I expect???

 

At the Dock X the sisters were refugees of war – the least powerful, most marginalized of people. In the “old” RSC production with Antony Sher they were some kind of ragged homeless, if anything even more irrelevant and powerless. In the new one with Christopher Eccleston they were little girls – children, the least powerful part of society from the point of view of generation. The “Shakespeare Retold” with James McAvoy – still my favourite “Macbeth”, though unfortunately without any “Shakespeare” in it - brings the tradition to a head in a very entertaining way: The sisters are binmen, and their prophecies work exactly BECAUSE nobody really listens to them. Binmen are about the basest part of society as to career choice. They are irrelevant. Who listens to the prattle of binmen?!!!

 

So, even BEFORE a new “Macbeth” is thought of, the decision to marginalize the sisters is already made, and I am already in for a new disappointment. At second glance it doesn’t even work, they are too important a structural feature to be obliterated. And the choice what to do with them – apart from marginalizing – is more relevant because it tells us where “we” today locate the DARKNESS. Poverty and destitution make people powerless but threaten society because they lay bare its self-delusions. (Beware the binmen! In fact, they are almost omniscient because they see EVERYTHING!) The powerless immigrants wield an enormous impersonal power to destabilize “western” societies by making the brown filth overflow once more. And children are the most “wayward” of people, basically uncontrollable, selfish, and unreliable. They have to be supervised or referred to institutions. In fact, we couldn’t even imagine a world where children actually were allowed to run free …!!! (Even though it was ALMOST like that when I was a child, but today cars run free everywhere, so children have to stay at home.) But the little girls on the Stratford stage, though creepy enough, were extremely docile. They probably existed only in Macbeth’s imagination, therefore: no real threat. Most importantly: They DIDN’T DO ANYTHING.

 

THIS is one of the settings I’d most definitely change.