Page 69 - DENG403_BRITISH_DRAMA

Unit 4: Shakespeare: Macbeth—Introduction to the Author and the Text

• In the 400 or so years since Shakespeare died on his 52nd birthday in 1616, there have been Notes
plenty of rumors about the Bard and the personal experiences that may have inspired his works.
• Shakespeare changed the English language, inventing dozens of new words we still use today.
His plays have been translated into more than 80 other tongues and performed in dozens of
countries, where diverse audiences all still recognize the timeless elements of the human
experience as depicted by a young Englishman 400 years ago.
• Shakespeare lived during a time when the middle class was expanding in both size and wealth,
allowing its members more freedoms and luxuries as well as a louder voice in local government.
• William Shakespeare was born in Stratford-upon-Avon to John and Mary Arden Shakespeare.
The fourth of the Shakespeares’ eight children shares a birthday with St. George, the patron
saint of England.
• Town records indicate that William Shakespeare was John and Mary’s third child.
• In 1569, Shakespeare enters King’s New School, an excellent grammar school in Stratford
attended by the sons of civil servants like his father.
• In 1582, at the age of eighteen, William Shakespeare married the twenty-six-year-old Anne
Hathaway.
• William Shakespeare lived until 1616. His wife Anna died in 1623 at the age of 67.
• Legend says that Macbeth was written in 1605 or 1606 and performed at Hampton Court in
1606 for King James I and his brother-in-law, King Christian of Denmark.
• The material for Macbeth was drawn from Raphael Holinshed’s Chronicles of England,
Scotland, and Ireland (1587).
• Despite the play’s historical source, however, the play is generally classified as tragedy rather
than a history. This derives perhaps from the fact that the story contains many historical
fabrications—including the entire character of Banquo, who was invented by a 16th-century
Scottish historian in order to validate the Stuart family line.
• Macbeth is certainly not the only play with historical themes that is full of fabrications. Indeed,
there are other reasons why the play is considered a tragedy rather than a history. One reason
lies in the play’s universality.
• Given that Macbeth is one of Shakespeare’s shortest plays, some scholars have suggested that
scenes were excised from the Folio version and subsequently lost. There are some loose ends
and non-sequiturs in the text of the play that would seem to support such a claim.
• Macbeth is also unique among Shakespeare's plays for dealing so explicitly with material that
was relevant to England's contemporary political situation.

4.4 Keywords

Chamberlains : An official charged with the management of the living quarters of a sovereign
or member of the nobility.
Alderman : A member of a municipal legislative body, especially of a municipal council.
Bailiff : The highest elected office in Stratford and the equivalent of a modern day
mayor.
Banquo : A character, the legendary root of the stuart family tree in the play Macbeth
and is a historical fabrication.

Baptism : A ceremonial immersion in water, or application of water, as an initiatory
rite or sacrament of the Christian church.
Roguish young man : Legend characterizes Shakespeare as a roguish young man who was once
forced to flee London under suspect circumstances.

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