Shakespeare's Witches in Macbeth: Power, Prophecy, and Performance

Hello everybody and welcome to today's video. The presence of the three witches is one of the most talked about elements

in McBTH and yet they only appear on stage four times. In this video, we'll take a brief look at each appearance

considering what we learn about these so-called weird sisters. Shakespeare's use of structure with his decision to

open the play with the witches suggests that they will take a significant role in McBTH. Act one, scene one is the

first time the audience gets to see the witches, and we're invited into a mysterious world made all the more

enigmatic by the fact that we arrive at the end of whatever it is they've been doing. The first line we hear is, "When

shall we three meet again? Their meeting is complete, and whatever they were up to, we can only guess." Shakespeare is

clever in his construction here, prompting our curiosity about what role the witches will take in the play. The

structural decision to start with the witches suggests that their role will be significant. But the fact that we've

missed the focus of their meeting leaves the audience unsure of what to think of them. The witches introduced the theme

of the supernatural, which in Jacabian times would have been a big draw for audiences because there was a huge

amount of interest and belief in witchcraft. Practicing witchcraft was a crime punishable by death in

Shakespeare's time. And during the Jacabian era, King James is estimated to have been responsible for the burning of

4,000 alleged witches in Scotland alone. King James actually wrote a book on the subject, demonology. So, beginning the

play with this scene is therefore not only a good way to grab the interest of the audience, but also of the king, an

important source of revenue. Something interesting to note here is that ideas about witchcraft changed quite rapidly

in England. McBth was first performed in6006. Writing in 1745 about the play, Samuel

Johnson explained that in order to make a true estimate of the abilities and merit of a writer, it is always

necessary to examine the genius of his age and the opinions of his contemporaries. A poet who should now

make the whole action of his tragedy depend upon enchantment and produce the chief events by the assistance of

supernatural agents would be censured as transgressing the bounds of probability. he would be banished from the theater to

the nursery and condemned to write fairy tales instead of tragedies. In other words, just under 140 years after the

play was first produced, audiences found the idea of witches and spells laughable, much like we do today, and

the 1735 Witchcraft Act reduced the penalty for practicing witchcraft from death to a maximum of one year in

prison. This law change reflected a shift from actual belief in witchcraft to punishing those who made a pretense

of having special powers. And that's the genius of Shakespeare. He taps into contemporary obsessions and ideas to

make his work relevant to his audience. But make no mistake, when it was first produced, the witches and their

incantations would have been shocking to an audience. Shakespeare also uses form to set the witches apart from other

characters. Whilst all of the nobles in McBth speak in amic pentameter with unstressed syllables followed by

stressed syllables, the form used by the witches is troic meter with stressed syllables followed by unstressed

syllables. For example, fair is foul and fowl is fair. I've put the stressed syllables in bold here. Now, this use of

troic meter heightens a sense of the witch's otherworldliness and makes them stand out from the rest of the

characters, emphasizing their wickedness. Perhaps the biggest topic open for debate when it comes to the

witches is just how much power they possess. For example, do they make McBth kill King Duncan or was he going to do

it anyway? This was a topic explored in a 2010 Oxford University lecture by Dr. Emma Smith. Smith points out that whilst

in act one, scene one, the witches seem to know what is happening, when the battle's lost and won, and also where to

meet McBth upon the heath, the question raised is, does that mean they're able to draw him to them, or simply that they

know where he will be? Do they have the power of direction to make things happen or the power of prophecy to predict the

future? For Smith, Shakespeare's use of dramatic irony is key in suggesting that the witches aren't as powerful as they

might first appear to be. When the witches prophesy to McBTH in act one, scene three that he will become Fain of

Corridor, it's the first he's heard of it. And so when he's told of the promotion shortly after by Ross, it

could very well appear to McBTH that the witches made it happen. However, the audience is in a different position. We

already know from act one, scene two, that Duncan was going to promote McBth to Thain of Cordor. As Smith puts it, to

the audience, it seems much more likely that the witches interpose in a chain of human actions rather than direct actions

themselves. McBth might see his promotion to Thain of Cordor as being linked to the witches, but Smith argues

an astute audience would judge that McBth's promotion is a result of a rational political reason. He has been a

brave and loyal warrior, whereas Cordor has been a traitor. This dramatic irony then allows the audience to view the

witches as not as powerful as they appear to McBth. As if to assist us in drawing this conclusion, just before

this happens, also in act one, scene three, we see the witches in discussion with each other. A discussion which

reveals the limitations of their power and influence. For example, the audience finds out that one of the witches has

been offended by a woman who wouldn't give her chestnuts and has decided to take it out on the woman's husband who

is a sailor. We learn that the witch has control over the winds and uses them to disrupt the ship's journey. It's

important to note, however, that the witch does not have the power to take the sailor's life. Though his bark

cannot be lost, yet it shall be tempest tossed. Shakespeare's use of structure is key here. He deliberately shows the

audience the limits of the witch's power, so that when McBth arrives and is captivated by them, we can see that his

infatuation tells us more about him than it does about the witches. The witches appear next in act 3, scene 5, but many

scholars and editors believe this scene was not actually written by Shakespeare at all, but inserted by actors, either

to give themselves more lines or to excite the audience. Much of the evidence for this comes from the fact

that Hecy has so many lines despite not being introduced at any point previously. It's also said that the

witches appear different to when we first met them, even though they don't say much at all. Whatever the truth, we

learn in this scene that the witches are subordinate to Hecat, who is angry that they did not consult her first before

speaking to McBth. Hec describes herself as the mistress of your charms, meaning the source of all your powers. Again,

the idea of the witches as powerful is undermined here as they are essentially reprimanded by their superior. In act

four, scene one, McBth has come looking for reassurance and comfort that what he's done will keep him on the throne.

The witches duly show him three apparitions which McBth interprets in his own way. These apparitions, while

seeming to comfort him, are actually entirely deceptive and symptomatic of how the witches speak in riddles and

halftruths. The audience is shown a series of apparitions that are supposed to confirm one thing, but in fact can be

interpreted as the complete opposite. Shakespeare is flagging something that becomes crucial to the final outcome of

the play. He is in a way signposting important details for his audience. The first of the apparitions is the armed

head which literally foretells McBth's eventual decapitation at the hands of McDuff. McBth, however, appears to

believe that the head is representative of McDuff and seems thankful for having seen it, obviously misunderstanding its

true meaning. The second vision is of the bloody child, which is in reality McDuff. The advice given to McBth is

that he should feel completely safe and secure because no one who's been born of woman can hurt him. The equivocation

here is that the apparition is McDuff and so clearly he is alive despite not being born of woman. McBth fails to see

the deception here and reads into the prophecy that he has nothing to fear. The third vision is of a child crowned

with a tree in his hand. This is Malcolm Duncan's son coming to McBth's castle carrying a branch from a tree. The

advice here is that McBth can't be harmed until burn and wood moves to Dunen. Obviously believing that it's

impossible for a forest to move, McBth feels even more secure following this prophecy. Essentially, he's come to the

witches for reassurance. They've shown him a vision of the future, and he's read into it what he wants to see.

Before he leaves, however, the witches on McBth's orders show him a final vision. Here he sees a line of eight

kings who are all descendants of Banquo. And this leaves him in an awful state considering that it means none of his

descendants will inherit the throne. It's very curious here that McBth sees this and yet still doesn't doubt the

earlier visions. It's clear the witches are playing with him. Yet in this state, he either doesn't seem to care or

notice. And that's the last time we see the witches in the play, which is in itself worthy of analysis. If the

witches are so powerful, why do they not appear at all after act four, scene one? Their impact on stage is unquestionable

when they do appear there. But the reality is that once the battle starts, they're nowhere to be seen. Today, it's

hard to see the witches as anything more than laughable. But in Shakespeare's time, belief in witchcraft would have

meant that they had a much greater impact on the audience from their appearance in the play's opening scene.

As the play progresses, however, their supposed power becomes questionable, and by the last third of the play, their

absence perhaps suggests that they weren't as significant as they at first appeared. If you found this video

useful, please do subscribe to the channel. And for more on the witches, pick up Mr. Bruff's guide item at Beth,

which is linked in the description.