The document provides a comprehensive summary of Shakespeare's 'Macbeth,' detailing its setting in 11th century Scotland, the plot involving Macbeth's ambition, regicide, and descent into tyranny, and character descriptions, including Macbeth and Lady Macbeth's moral deterioration. It also examines major themes such as the corrupting nature of ambition, internal and external conflicts, and the presence of supernatural elements. Ultimately, the play illustrates how unchecked ambition leads to destruction and chaos, culminating in Macbeth's downfall and Malcolm's ascension to the throne.

1. Alex Pavlakis, Caryl Brunner, Joan
Burger, Jaimee Crossan, Ariana
Incao, Emily Lemen

2. Setting
• ‘Macbeth’ is set mainly around Scotland.
The story starts off with the fighting near
Duncan’s castle, and then shifts to
Macbeth’s castle on Dunsinane Hill. Fife is
where Macduff lives and where his family
is killed. Macbeth meets the witches in a
desert place. There is one scene in
England as well when Macduff meets
Malcolm. The time period is in the 11th
century.

3. Macbeth Plot Summary
•Play opens with the three witches scrounging the battlefield
•Kind Duncan receives news of the victories of Macbeth and Banquo against the armies of Ireland and
Norway
•Macbeth and Banquo encounter the witches, who prophesize Macbeth will be made Thane of Cawdor
and eventually King of Scotland
•The Witches also prophesize that Banquo’s sons will be kings, however he will never receive the title
•Macbeth and Banquo are skeptical but soon after Ross arrives bringing Macbeth news of the traitor
thane of Cawdor, Macbeth’s new title
• At this point, Macbeth begins to wonder if he could ever become King and he writes to his wife
•Lady Macbeth wants her husband to obtain the throne and convinces him to commit regicide or the
murder of a King
•Macbeth and Lady Macbeth devise a plan to kill King Duncan in his sleep which includes;
–Lady Macbeth drugging the guards (they will think they’re responsible for the murder)
–Macbeth must stab Kind Duncan (also must overcome fear of regicide, guilt, and hallucinations)
–Lady Macbeth plants the bloody daggers with the unconscious guards
–Macbeth kills the guards the following morning out of “an act of rage”
–Finally, Macbeth and Lady Macbeth must convincingly pretend to be shocked and grieving
•Malcolm flees to England and Donalbain to Ireland, fearing they would be killed next

4. Plot Summary Continued…
•As King, Macbeth is not content for he is constantly fearful his power will come to an end
•Macbeth organizes the murder of his friend Banquo, and Banquo’s son Fleance
•Banquo is killed however Fleance escapes further preventing Macbeth from resting
•At the banquet, Macbeth envisions the blood bolstered ghost of Banquo, causing a dramatic scene and
essentially making everyone question Macbeth’s sanity as King
•Macbeth visits the witches who show him four apparitions;
•First, an armed head- warns Macbeth of Macduff (this Macbeth already knew)
•Second, a bloody child- No mortal will ever harm Macbeth
•Third, a child with a crown and tree- Macbeth will never be defeated until Birnam wood walk to
Dunsinane Hill
•Fourth, 8 Kings all resembling Banquo and his bloody ghost (Macbeth becomes outraged at this
sight)
•Macbeth is slightly relieved but he learns that Macduff has fled to England to join Malcolm
•Macbeth orders Macduff’s castle seized and his family murdered
•Lady Macbeth grows sick with guilt and eventually commits suicide
•At this news Macbeth becomes very pessimistic yet continues to fight
•Eventually, the English forces arrive, disguised in the branches of Birnam wood, and Macduff, who
was not born of woman, beheads Macbeth
•Malcolm becomes the new, and rightful, King of Scotland

5. Main Character Descriptions
• Macbeth- Thane of Cawdor and Glamis, eventually King,
easily tempted into murder to fulfill his vaulting ambition,
violent, ambitious, lacks ruling skills.
• Lady Macbeth- strong and ruthless, ambitious, has a
lust for power, conscious to the point she commits
suicide, manipulative.
• Banquo- brave, noble, his children will inherit the throne
(according to witch’s prophecies), murdered by Macbeth
• Three Witches- prophecies prompt Macbeth to murder
Duncan, comical, supernatural, could be independent
agents toying with human lives or agents of fate
• King Duncan- King of Scotland, murdered by Macbeth

6. Major Conflict
• Protagonist: Macbeth
• Antagonist: Macbeth
• The internal conflict with Macbeth was his
vaulting ambition to become and remain king,
which was his tragic flaw. His internal conflicts
led to the external conflicts, which was war.
Macduff and the witches were outside conflicting
forces, resulting in the decisions that Macbeth
had made. Lady Macbeth helped her husband
realize his goal by pushing him into committing
the murder of King Duncan.

7. Conflict Resolution
After Macbeth gains power, he becomes paranoid
with the thought that somebody will attempt to conquer
the throne. In order to protect his Kingship, Macbeth
organizes the murders of numerous people he views as
threats. In doing so, Macbeth wades further and further
into a murderous despotism that he cannot escape. In
the end, Macbeth is killed in battle by his enemy,
Macduff. Macbeth is beheaded, thus ending his reign of
tyranny. As a result, Malcolm is crowned King and
Scotland returns to normal.

8. The Corrupting Power and
Vaulting Ambition
• The main theme of Macbeth is the destruction that results when
ambition goes unrestrained by moral restrictions. This is most
evident in the play’s two main characters. Macbeth is a courageous
Scottish general who is not naturally inclined to commit evil deeds,
yet he deeply desires power and advancement. He kills King Duncan
against his better judgment and afterward is beside himself with guilt
and paranoia. Toward the end of the play he descends into a kind of
frantic, arrogant madness. Lady Macbeth pursues her goals with
greater determination, yet she is less capable of enduring the
repercussions of her immoral acts. She convinces her husband to kill
King Duncan and urges him to be strong in the events following the
regicide, but she is eventually driven to suicide by the effect of
Macbeth’s repeated bloodshed on her conscience. In each case,
ambition is what drives the couple to ever more terrible atrocities.
The problem that the play suggests is that once one decides to use
violence to further one’s quest for power, it is difficult to stop. There
are always potential threats to the throne, Banquo, Fleance, Macduff
—and it is always tempting to use violent means to dispose of them.

9. The Absurdity & Irony
• The witches’ chorus: Act I, Scene I, line 10:
"Fair is foul, and foul is fair."
This is a paradox. It is also a prophecy, where one thing seems like
another, or about how things will change through the story like the
characters. It is easier to grasp the meaning of this line as you
progress through this book.
This theme is a subtle theme, but with significant meaning. This
theme is referenced many times throughout the play.
The first thing that Macbeth says when he enters scene three (line
38) is, "So foul and fair a day I have not seen.” When the witches
said "Fair is foul, and foul is fair," during scene one, they were
referring to the condition of the day when they meet Macbeth,
though

10. Characterization
• One of Shakespeare's greatest skills as a dramatic playwright was his ability
to create a strong interest in major characters very quickly and to set those
major characters in relation to the play's minor characters, events, and
themes. Shakespeare's skill in characterization is distinctly shown through
his presentation of both, the minor and major characters.
• Lady Macbeth is one of Shakespeare’s most famous and frightening female
characters. When she is first introduced in the play she is already plotting
the regicide of King Duncan. Lady Macbeth is stronger, more ruthless, and
more ambitious than her husband. She seems fully aware of this and knows
that she will have to convince Macbeth into committing regicide. At one
point, she wishes that she were “unsexed of all her womanly qualities” (Act
I, scene v, lines 36–52), and that she were not a woman so that she could
commit the murder herself. Shakespeare, however, seems to use her, and
the witches, to emasculate Macbeth’s idea that “undaunted mettle should
compose / Nothing but males” (Act 1. vii.73–74). These women use female
methods of achieving power, which is, manipulation to further their
supposedly “male ambitions.” Women in the play can be as ambitious and
cruel as men, yet social constrictions deny them the means to pursue these
ambitions by themselves.

11. Quotation 1
“Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day
To the last syllable of recorded time.
And all of our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief
candle.
Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the
stage,
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.”
~Act V, Scene V
• In this quote, Macbeth has just
found out about the death of his
wife and the attackers approaching
his house. This quote really shows
the growth of Macbeth as a
character and demonstrates how
his life was ruined by his vaulting
ambition. This quote can be
summed up to meaning that life has
no meaning at all and that everyone
is insignificant in the big picture.
This statement by Macbeth can be
seen as a way to justify his horrible
actions because since life itself is
truly meaningless, he can not feel
guilty about the awful things he has
done.

12. Quotation 2
“Out, damned spot; out, I
say. One, two— why,
then ‘tis time to do’t. Hell
is murky. Fie, my lord, fie,
a soldier and afeard?
What need we fear who
knows it when none can
call our power to
account? Yet who would
have thought the old man
to have had so much
blood in him?”
~Act V, Scene I
• In this quote, Lady Macbeth is
sleep walking and is trying to rub off
the imaginary blood that has stained
her from the murdering of the King.
This quote shows Lady Macbeth’s
conscience about the murders even
though she had called her husband
a coward earlier in the work because
of these same thoughts. For the first
time in the play we see remorse
from Lady Macbeth. This quote is
significant because we see that Lady
Macbeth has gone crazy just as
Macbeth has because of the
paranoia of being convicted. The
reader learns a lot about Lady
Macbeth through this scene and
specifically the quote mentioned.

13. DRAMATIC IRONY
• William Shakespeare uses irony in Macbeth to add to the ambiguous
nature of the play, to keep the audience interested and to add to
suspense and anticipation.
• Right before he enters Macbeth’s castle, where he is brutally
murdered, King Duncan remarks on the good natured, welcoming
feeling he gets as he approaches the castle.
• “This castle hath a pleasant seat; the air nimbly and sweetly
recommends itself unto out gentle senses.”
• Near the end of the play, as tensions rise, Macbeth bases all of his
decisions on the apparitions of the witches, and clings to them as his
only source of reason; this is ironic as his trust in them is based only
on faith – the polar opposite of reason. At the very end of the play, the
apparitions end up hurting him rather than helping him. Ironically,
what he relied on to save him ended up contributing to his collapse.

14. The presence of supernatural
forces
• Macbeth provides for much of the play’s dramatic
tension and suspense. Several supernatural apparitions
throughout the play profoundly affect Macbeth and the
evil forces eventually claim Macbeth and destroy his
morals. Macbeth’s ambition was driven by the
prophecies of the three witches and he was willing to do
anything to assure that they actually transpire. Macbeth
is horrified at the notion of committing regicide, but he
eventually succumbs to the evil forces and this leads to
his downfall. Macbeth further compromises his honor by
arranging the murder of his best friend, Banquo. Banquo
places Macbeth in a precarious situation; he is deeply
entrenched in suspicion and there is no way out.
Macbeth’s vision of Banquo’s ghost at a royal banquet
only drives him closer to insanity.