How does shakespeare create a sense of evil and disorder in act 1 of macbeth

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    How does Shakespeare create a sense of evil and disorder in Act 1 of Macbeth?

Ellice Caldwell-Dunn.

Shakespeare uses a wide variety of methods as a dramatist to build on Macbeth’s theme, good versus evil. He uses many language and character techniques to create a sense of unnaturalness, and an overturning of moral and social order during Act 1 to engage the audience and create the atmosphere for the tragic fall of a great hero.

To begin with, Shakespeare specifically chooses to open the play with a topic that would be alarming for a Jacobean audience; witches, and treachery. In the Jacobean period, treachery was seen as horrific, as they believed in the divine right of kings; God chose the king, and therefore if you were against the king, you were also against God. Macbeth opens on a battlefield, where the audience later learns a traitor has betrayed the king, who has brought him to battle. “Assisted by that most disloyal traitor, the Thane of Cawdor.” The king wins, however, and gives the title of the Thane of Cawdor, the traitor’s former title, to Macbeth. This not only opens the play with something typically horrific for a Jacobean audience, but also gives a sense of dramatic irony right at the beginning of the play, as, although the audience have little idea, Macbeth, having received the title of the traitor, is soon to become a traitor himself.

The structure of Act 1 contributes significantly to a sense of evil and disorder, as Shakespeare uses alternating scenes to display the contrast between the forces of good and evil. He starts Macbeth with the witches, a clear stereotypical sign of evil, and then opens Scene 2 with the king, a stereotypical sign of good. The rest of Act 1 then unfolds in the same pattern, using odd numbers (1,3,5 and 7) for the forces of evil, and even numbers (2,4 and 6) for the forces of good. The audience would soon become aware of the switch from witches to king to witches, however Shakespeare opens Scene 5, a scene that, based on this alternating pattern, should represent evil, with Macbeth and Lady Macbeth. Both characters were included in the “even” numbered scenes at the beginning of Act 1, showing they were originally forces of good, however Shakespeare deliberately chooses to then use them to open Scene 5, an odd numbered scene. The interruption of the pattern begins to show the audience that other characters, besides the witches, have the capability of turning to the forces of evil during the play.

Witches, in Jacobean times, were seen as agents of the devil, and as the purest sign of evil, besides the devil himself. It was common for witches, or women people thought to be witches, to be drowned or burnt in the Jacobean period. Shakespeare uses the witches to begin to create an atmosphere of evil at the beginning of the play, by displaying the power they have, and the damage they can do.

In the opening scene of Act 1, Shakespeare uses disturbed weather in his stage directions, setting the witches to meet on a battlefield, with thunder and lightning. Not only does he include the tempestuous weather in stage directions but the witches also plot to meet again in the thunderstorm, showing that they clearly take pleasure in the bad weather. “When shall we meet again? In thunder, lightning or in rain?” The disrupted forces of nature show that even as early on in the play as the opening scene, there are ideas of disturbance in the play.

The witches refer to Macbeth in the first few lines, quickly associating him with evil, though the nature of the association is left unsaid. This adds a sense of mystery to the play. Is Macbeth a hero or a villain? Shakespeare begins the play with spell casting upon the “legendary” Macbeth, and immediately captivates the audience, as they do not know as yet who Macbeth is. “Where the place? Upon the heath. There to meet with Macbeth.” The witches also speak in riddles, adding to the mystery of the first scene, and the line lacks iambic pentameter, showing that the witches are imperfect and mysterious. The fact that they are casting spells suggests that the witches display signs of corrupting, and tempting Macbeth to evil, and, as witches are seen as agents of the devil in the Jacobean period, to tempt a heroic figure to evil would shock the audience, and immediately bring a sense of unease in the first lines of the play.

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The witches are portrayed as outcasts of society, and a danger to ordinary people. Shakespeare displays this in a range of ways. The witches are shown speaking simultaneously or finishing each other’s sentences which makes them seem powerful, and spiritually connected to one another. “Thrice to thine, and thrice to mine, and thrice again to make up nine.” Another language device Shakespeare employs to show this is so is that the witches do not speak in iambic pentameter. They have shorter lines, which emphasise the riddles and curses. Shakespeare uses iambic pentameter to create “the perfect line”, therefore the ...

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