A sense of chaos and disorder runs through the play. In the first scene the witches chant that ‘Fair is Foul and Foul is Fair’ and this paradox sets the tone. Macbeth cannot tell whether the witches are on his side or not and his murder of the King plunges the country into turmoil.
Chaos and disorder are suggested in many ways. Birds of prey, toads and snakes suggest a threatening atmosphere. Nature is turned upside down after king Duncan’s murder, when hawks are killed by their prey and Duncan’s horses eat each other. Blood often seems to run through the story. Thunder, lightning, storms and shipwrecks are connected to the witches and the influence of evil in the world. Howling and shrieking seem to follow Macbeth. He is forever in a hurry, spurred on by his ambition. He cannot stand uncertainty, waiting or inaction, and has little patience. The theme of chaos is related in this way to that of time.
By starting the play with the witches and with thunder and lightning, Shakespeare leaves you with no doubt that the play is going to be about the struggle of good and evil; light and the darkness.
It is also clear who is to be the target for the forces of evil; the witches make an appointment to meet again tom lure Macbeth to destruction. Shakespeare instantly creates a mood of terror and unearthly evil: the first stage direction, ‘Thunder and Lightning. Enter three Witches’.
When the witches chant ‘Fair is Foul and Foul is Fair:/Hover through the fog and filthy air’ you can guess that it is going to be hard in the play to tell the difference between good and evil. The way things appear may not be the way they really are. Things that look good may turn out to be evil, evil things may seem to be good; just like some characters in the play. Grey-Malkin and Padock are the witches’ familiars, demon-companions in animal form. It is usually thought that a Grey-Malkin is a cat and a Padock is a toad.
The witches’ words have great affect on Macbeth. Banquo notices that this and asks him if he fears their words. Banquo cannot see why this great warrior should be afraid, when he is promised the only good things. What the witches say seems to strike a chord in Macbeth’s mind, especially the prediction that he will be king.
Banquo introduces clothing as one of the major images in the play. The pun is on “rapt” meaning “totally involved in” and “wrapped” meaning “covered” or “enveloped in”. Banquo also calls on the witches to tell his future and they say he will be the father of kings.
The witches vanish and Macbeth wonders if they have disappeared into the air: what he thought was solid has melted away. Other things around Macbeth that he thinks are solid, like his friends, loyalty, a good king on the throne and law and order the state, will also melt away under the evil influence of the witches.
Banquo seems suspicious of the witches. Unlike Macbeth, he has no hidden ambitions. Macbeth seems worried about the prediction that Banquo’s children will become kings, as though this is some kind of threat to his future. If Banquo’s children will be kings, Macbeth’s rise to power will be pointless if his line stops when he dies.
One of the witches describes how she will punish a sailor (the Pilot) because his wife would not give her some of the chestnuts she was eating. This shows how spiteful the witches are and how they can do a lot of harm. The witch is not powerful enough to sink the ship but she can make sure it is tossed about the stormy seas, and will torment the Pilot so that he cannot sleep. The ship is a metaphor for the state of Scotland, which is going to suffer a ‘storm’ when Macbeth is its pilot. The witches can only create the climate evil: man alone cause chaos in the world by destroying order.
Disgusting objects are thrown into a steaming pot as the witches concoct a charm. The dismembered bits of animals and humans are symbols of the witches’ destructive behaviour in the play. The witches talk all the time in rhymes, which makes everything they say sound like a magic spell being chanted.
The witches’ “gruel” is also an image of formless confusion, the primeval chaos into which the powers of evil are constantly striving to plunge creation. This reflects the Elizabethan’s belief about the nature of the world and the relationship between good and evil. Order and disorder.
The witches say Macbeth is like themselves-”something wicked this way comes”. Are the witches right? Notice how Macbeth talks to them. He does not seem afraid as he was at first. Macbeth doesn’t care how much damage or chaos he cause, he just wants to know the future. Remember Banquo’s warning which Macbeth seems to have forgotten. The witches will use Macbeth’s readiness to believe their predictions as a way of destroying him.
The nature and effects of evil dominate the action of the play. The potential for evil is present in nature, in man and in animals and the plays imagery evokes this.
Evil is a supernatural force, manifested in the shape of the three witches whose successful temptation of Macbeth threatens to plunge the world back into chaos from which Elizabethans supposed, God released it, when he created order and morality.
