Double, Double, Toil and Trouble? (CeCe Lasley)

This video is a quick overview of my research comps, ‘“Double, Double, toil and trouble?’ The Multiplicitous Nature of the Weird Sisters and its Effects on Culpability in Shakespeare’s Macbeth.” This project came out of my interests in Macbeth (it’s my favorite Shakespearean tragedy) and in Early Modern British History. The project seeks to explore questions surrounding the characterization of the Weird Sisters and how their depiction affects the question of culpability and responsibility in the play. The project aims to explore these questions through examining the history of Early Modern English views on witchcraft and other source material, as well as the role of the Weird Sisters themselves. The video covers the basics of the argument of the paper and an overview of its implications. Please enjoy!

Transcript

Hi! My name is Cece Lasley. Thank you for coming to my virtual comps presentation! In my comps I explored questions surrounding the characterization of the Weird Sisters and how their depiction affects the question of culpability and responsibility in Shakespeare’s Macbeth. 

This comps is situated within a scholarly debate between Stephen Greenblatt and Inge Leimberg on the characterization of the Weird Sisters, the supernatural characters who feature prominently in the play. Greenblatt believes them to be witches and responsible for the action of the play. Leimberg believes them to be representations of the Fates or Furies from Classical Mythology, and does not address the issue of culpability in her argument.

In my comps I argue that while it may be tempting to scapegoat the Sisters as either witches or Fates, the inability to place them into one category of supernatural creature relieves them of some responsibility for the action of the play. In fact, the Sisters do not take any direct action in the play, but merely speak with Macbeth and Banquo, and conjure apparitions that speak to Macbeth at his command. Instead, Macbeth interprets the Sisters’ words and makes his own decisions to act, exercising what he believes to be his own free will, with tragic results.

Macbeth was written for King James I of England and VI of Scotland, who was very interested in witches. In addition to James’ interests, Shakespeare drew heavily from historian Raphael Holinshed’s Chronicles of England, Scotlande, and Irelande. In the Chronicles, Holinshed recounts the story of an 11th century Scottish king named Makbeth who becomes king by murdering King Duncane and maintains his power through violence and falls in battle at the hand of Makduffe. Sound familiar? It should because Holinshed’s story is nearly identical to Shakespeare’s.  

Now I know that I’ve been talking a lot about the ambiguity of the Weird Sisters, but let’s walk through how that plays out in terms of their characterization as witches, fates, or something in between. 

The Weird Sisters are often called “the Witches” colloquially. While they do exhibit some of the characteristics of witches, they are not what can be called “active” witches. That is, they aren’t turning Macbeth into a newt. Instead, they merely state what will happen, and later conjure the apparitions that speak in riddles to Macbeth at his command. Their prophesizing nature may pull the Sisters towards Leimberg’s conception of them as representations of the Fates. As in the case of witches, the Sisters also exhibit qualities similar to the Fates. 

I argue that the Sisters are an amalgamation of supernatural figures. In addition to the blending of the characteristics of witches and Fates, Shakespeare’s Weird Sisters are literally a combination of the 3 distinct groups of supernatural characters present in Holinshed’s narrative – the Weird Sisters, a witch, and a wizard. As a result of Shakespeare combining the actions and speech of these distinct supernatural creatures, the resulting blended characters present a mix of the attributes of the originals.  

You’ll recall that I said that the Sisters were not what I call “active witches” earlier, which contributes to the complication of their characterization. This is important because in addition to never doing anything to Macbeth, they never explain or elaborate upon their or the apparitions’ statements. Therefore, Macbeth must interpret for himself what they mean and what he is going to do with the information from that interpretation. Macbeth chooses to understand the Sisters’ broad statements in a way that supports his ambitions. He decides not to take the opportunity of letting Fate decide his rise in power, but rather to listen to his own hubristic desires for power. These choices are made by Macbeth believing that he is operating under his own free will, rather than the will of Fate, and thus he is responsible for his own actions and their devastating consequences. 

Shakespeare provides scant evidence in the play that points to the Sisters’ being responsible for the events of the play, and by presenting them as passive figures, he challenges a popular contemporary idea that a supernatural figure, such as a witch, was responsible for all of the community’s woes. In addition, by having Macbeth actively pursue his ambitions, Shakespeare pushes against the idea of Fate as a passive concept. By giving his human characters some responsibility for their own actions, Shakespeare is opening up a larger discussion about human free will and how it was considered in Jacobean England.

Thank you so much for listening to my presentation, please reach out to me if you have any questions. Thank you also to everyone who helped me through this process – I could not have done this without your support!