I’m curious as to why witches play such a key role in the
beginning of Macbeth. What is the
relationship between their prophecy and Macbeth’s own ambition? And Lady
Macbeth’s influence?
I would guess that the witches’ role in the story is to sort of
unlock Macbeth’s inner ambition. While Lady Macbeth does not interact directly
with the witches, she knows from Macbeth’s letter of their prophecy, and I
would guess that the witches unlock ambition in her too.
Shakespeare is playing with
human and inhuman sources of ambition. Every person goes through life with some
amount of ambition, and some people do truly awful things to reach their
ambitions. I’m not convinced that the witches in the play are real witches (I
know they are supposed to vanish into thin air, but who knows, right?), so I’m
wondering if the witches are kind of a sad “joke” or commentary on human
ambition. Some people have to feel like a power greater than themselves has
sealed their fate and led them to do terrible things. In other words, it’s apparently
really easy to justify something by a made-up twisted logic if the supernatural
is involved.
It’s really important to note that the witches never tell
Macbeth how he will become King. It’s never implied that he is supposed to do
so actively. How old is King Duncan? Old enough to die of old age soon? And
Malcolm? He could be killed in another battle. Macbeth and Lady Macbeth decide that Duncan must be killed.
I also interpret
the witches as being a collective physical manifestation of ambition. That is
to say, witches are traditionally thought of as ugly, and ambition can be very ugly too. I also think their paradoxes are a
linguistic manifestation of ambition. Paradoxes can be confusing, just like ambition
confuses your reasoning. They also have double meanings, of course, while
ambition has a sort of double meaning—the chasing after whatever is desired and
the consequences of getting it.
King Duncan says to Banquo after promoting him, “I have begun to
plant thee and will labor to make thee full of growing” (1.4.29-30). I think
this is a great allusion to the witches and to Lady Macbeth. They’ve all
planted a sort of “seed” in Macbeth’s head (that he should kill the king). If
this is the way to think about the witches and Lady Macbeth, then there’s also
a sort of reverse fertilization/pregnancy metaphor going on here (maybe?),
which is pretty fascinating.
