below my expectation
not thhe book i expected to receive, took too long to get. within allotted time but not the service i've come to expect from amazon. i order several books a month, not impressed with this seller.
Playwright vs. Poet: the Playwright wins.
Shakespeare was not very kind to the linchpin of his story. The tragedy of Macbeth the king became a personal tragedy of Macbeth the character of the play. He is sad, doubtful, fearful and altogether pathetic. In words, he is rebellious against his fate, but in the end he is powerless to do anything to alter it. He is not given an opportunity to shine his wit or spirit. He is not endowed with a single pun. Even Banquo is granted a piece of wisdom: "To win us to our harm, the instruments of darkness tell us truths, win us with honest trifles, to betray's in deepest consequence". Even Polonius is allowed to be witty ("Neither a borrower nor a lender be") and gives us "Though this be madness, yet there is method in't". Richard III is a veritable fountain of spirit, eloquence and wit. Macbeth is just evil and pathetic.
Evil and pathetic is Lady Macbeth.
The colorful relief from the lackluster main characters comes in the form of the porter and fantastical infernal creatures (Weird Sisters, Hecate and the apparitions) - the sole possessors of the playful and witty spirit. Maybe Shakespeare could not allow Macbeth to shine because the play was intended to please James I, the patron of Shakespeare's company and the descendent of murdered by Macbeth Banquo. Perhaps Macbeth indeed was a singularly uninspired man. Or the play may have been cut. Whatever the reason, in this macabre play about a tortured soul, Shakespeare uses spirits and the porter as a valve that relieves the pressure of pent up spark.
The many murders and the eerie creatures make for quite a dramatic staging. However, the general lack of spark makes one miss other Shakespearean plays where the main characters, however evil, are not spared the playwright's poetry...
I generally like Shakespeare, but...
I generally like Shakespeare. In fact, I can't think of one play that I did not like before I read this one. Macbeth I found to be tacky with very few memorable quotes.
Mac-Good for Mac-Shakespeare
I'll admit, it's hard for me to get into Shakespeare (so go stone me in the streets, you drama geeks). Yet, this play is a killer.....literally. I mean, they need to make this into a movie nowadays-all the battle scenes, all the drama, all the Scottish accents. This play is the epitome of action-packed. You get the real beauty of this play sitting in your AP Literature class, reading it out loud as a class, and getting the class clown to tackle the part of Lady MacBeth. It's Mac-Awesome.
Folger is a good series
It would be ridiculous for someone to come on here and give Bill a bad review. When a person writes a review on a Shakespeare play, Shakespeare is not on trial, the reviewer is. So, I have no comments on the play, just the series. This is the second Shakespeare work I have read out of the Folger Library series. The running commentary and essay at the end of the play are well done and beneficial. If you enjoy reading Shakespeare, but find the archaic language hard to grasp at times, this is a good series for you.
