The most influential writer among all the dramatists and poets of English literature, William Shakespeare politicised Macbeth by using the monarch of his time, King James I, to write his play. His fame grew; he became a wealthy renowned actor and playwright and his popularity grew massively even amongst both monarchs, Elizabeth I (ruled 1558-1603) and James I (1603-1625), becoming a favourite of both. James granted Shakespeare’s company the greatest possible compliment by bestowing upon its members the title of King’s Men. Not only Shakespeare but also the King spared no effort to politicise Shakespeare! So, Shakespeare, the greatest playwright of the millennium, can be challenged and criticised for satiating the King’s interest and vice versa. Surprising indeed!
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Macbeth is Shakespeare’s shortest and bloodiest tragedy, which tells the story of a brave Scottish general (Macbeth) who receives a prophecy from a trio of evil witches that one day he will become King of Scotland. Consumed with impatience and ambitious thoughts that are spurred into action by his wife, Macbeth murders King Duncan and seizes the throne for himself. He starts his reign filled with guilt and fear, and soon becomes a tyrannical ruler, as he is forced to commit more murders to protect his reign and himself from enmity and suspicion. The murders and evil doings swiftly make Macbeth and Lady Macbeth to arrogance, madness, and consequently to death. Macbeth is a response to its surrounding of the contemporary time. So, the context, even the witches’ utterance ‘Fair is foul, foul is fair’ has enriched Macbeth universally and taken it to the peak point of study and criticism.
Macbeth was most likely written in 1606, early in the reign of James I, who had been James VI of Scotland previously before he succeeded to the English throne in 1603 by the orders of Queen Elizabeth I. Macbeth was a contemporary political situation reflecting the time of King James’s reigns, who was a patron of Shakespeare’s acting company, and all the plays Shakespeare wrote under James’s reign. The witches represent the devil and Shakespeare makes this clear as King James was very concerned about witches and considered himself an expert on witchcraft. Macbeth clearly reflects the playwright’s close relationship with the ruler. In Macbeth, Shakespeare paid respect towards the King’s Scottish lineage by setting the play in Scotland. The theme of bad versus good kingship, embodied by Macbeth and Duncan, would have been produced at the royal court, where James was busy growing his English version of the theory of divine right.
Politicisation is often accused of being partiality as it goes against justice in any fiction because the playwright or the author must maintain the interest of a particular side. To satisfy the monarch or people in power, the dramatist must glorify the character even if the character is cruel, autocrat and evil in the real world. Sometimes it happens the other way and in every situation the writer must compromise to balance the scales.
In the case of Macbeth, there are conspicuous examples to be alluded. For example, Macbeth, in his soliloquy, clearly swings back and forth at the persistence in his wife to kill King Duncan. He criticises his own evil doings; he could not stop himself from being snared by his wife but still a sense of guilt and remorse is palpable. Interestingly, we never find him being a slight upset or worried or critical about the witches and their activities. In the face of the witches, his surrender seems to be unconditional, unchallenged, unquestionable, and voluntary. But he is totally opposite in the face of his wife appearing critical of any thoughts and ideas given by her.
Shakespeare did not make Macbeth criticise the witches or put them in any test because he intended to present them fully evil to satisfy the king’s interests in witchcraft. Anybody reading Macbeth from first to last will have the impression that witches were mostly responsible for the fall of Macbeth, and Shakespeare demonised them by presenting as fit controllers of Macbeth, which creates a deep and influential impression in the mind of Jacobean audience. It established the justice of punishing the witches severely to stop them controlling the fate of the people, whether this was right or wrong, this is a clear politicisation to make the king happy as he was in favour of burning the witches alive.
Shakespeare can be questioned for not doing any poetic justice in this play. Macbeth and lady Macbeth are severely punished for their flaws but the witches are left unpunished. We cannot deny that the play will lose a strong appeal without the successful plot or conspiracy of the witches working for the tragic deaths of a lot of heroic and innocent lives. The Aristotelian catharsis is very active with the tragic deaths of Macbeth and Lady Macbeth but the witches, not being punished for their misleading and deception, remain mysterious evil beings and thus punishable to us. Though Shakespeare might have thought the whole presentation some other way but it is important that in any tragedy good should be rewarded and bad be punished in the end of the day. However, by doing this, Shakespeare had successfully pleased the king with his play that goes against the witches in a blood-filled murder play. Macbeth is certainly not Shakespeare’s most complex play; however, it is one of his most powerful and emotionally intense one. Whereas Shakespeare’s other major tragedies, such as Hamlet, fastidiously explore the intellectual difficulty faced by their subjects, Macbeth tumbles insanely from the beginning to end. It is a sharp, rough sketch of theme and character and has shocked and fascinated audiences for over 400 years.
