Macbeth

• Scotland. Three witches prophesy that Macbeth (a general) will become Thane of Cawdor and then King. Banquo's descendants will be kings • The first prophecy comes true immediately. Macbeth's ambition ignites: "If chance will have me king, why, chance may crown me" • Lady Macbeth receives his letter. She's the one who commits fully: "Unsex me here, and fill me from the crown to the toe top-full of direst cruelty" • Duncan (the king) visits Macbeth's castle. Lady Macbeth convinces her wavering husband to murder him that night • Macbeth kills Duncan. Immediately, guilt overwhelms him: "Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood clean from my hand?" • He frames Duncan's guards. Malcolm and Donalbain (Duncan's sons) flee. Macbeth takes the throne • Paranoia sets in. Macbeth has Banquo murdered (to prevent the prophecy about Banquo's descendants). Banquo's ghost appears at the feast • Lady Macbeth cracks: sleepwalking, washing imaginary blood. "Out, damned spot! Out, I say!" • Macbeth visits the witches again. New prophecies: beware Macduff; no man born of woman can harm him; he's safe until Birnam Wood comes to Dunsinane • He has Macduff's entire family murdered. Macduff, in England, swears revenge • Malcolm's army uses tree branches from Birnam Wood as camouflage — the wood "moves" to Dunsinane • Macduff reveals he was "from his mother's womb untimely ripped" (caesarean birth — not "born" of woman) • Macbeth fights anyway: "Lay on, Macduff, and damned be him that first cries 'Hold, enough!'" He's killed. Malcolm becomes king • Shakespeare's shortest, most compressed tragedy — pure velocity from ambition to destruction