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Summary: Big-Don's Review of a Shakespeare Classic
Review: Shakespeare was at his best when writing this one. This classic, will continue to live on for years to come, and I can see why. It has Scotland, swords, and ghosts; what's a better combination! A sure fire winner!
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Summary: If you can't understand a book, don't try and review it
Review: I too had to cover Macbeth for the first time at school, and I thought it was not easy or particularly grabbing at first, but to study this work you'll know it's brilliant. The language is complex and meaningful, I thought it was great. You don't have to be an English graduate to enjoy the play. A classic piece of work.
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Summary: Do You Think You Live A Charmed Life?
Review: If you think you live a charmed life, and no mortal born of woman can harm you, you're heading toward an end like MacBeth. Banquo will haunt you, your spouse/significant other won't be able to wash the blood off his/her hands, and you'll see whole forests moving toward you. Read the play, even if you're an "what, you egg!"
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Summary: A great introduction to Shakespeare!
Review: This is a wonderful opportunity to introduce pre-high school readers to Shakespeare. The dialogue is all Shakespeare's--giving the flavor without overwhelming. Coville so capably captures the essence of the play that he makes it accessible to middle grade students and whets their appetite to turn--once they're ready--to the original. The dark and moody pictures enhance the text, but it is the story that will stick with the readers--a story they would otherwise be unable to approach without hours of study and explanation. Coville does a masterful job.
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Summary: it was okay....
Review: I had to read the book 'MacBeth' for my english 20 class. At first i had no idea what the book was talking about and i didnt understand the language. I think that there should be a copy of the book that is like Romeo and Juliet with the plain english on the other side of the page, because i just didnt get it.
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Summary: That 'Ol High School Fave Pulls a Banquo on Me
Review: I could see a modern-day version of Macbeth with a young, clean-cut upstart businessman as Macbeth, his beautiful wife as Lady Macbeth, the President of the Corporation as King Duncan, and the media as the Witches (printing headlines about that upstart businessman).
Anyway, if you were one of those kids who fell asleep from class, you probably didn't know until the day after the Big Test that "Macbeth" is the play about a general who is named-three guesses- Macbeth. The king's favourite, the guy with good PR, he is strutting on his horse fresh from victory in battle (you don't wanna know what he did to that poor guy!) when he runs into the three witches. These chicks, for some reason, decide to pick on Macbeth by telling him that he'll be king. He does, of course, with the help of his wife that nasty li'l dagger. The only problem is, he now has to stay on that throne by killing more people who are suspicious of how he got to be king, which includes throwing someone close to him down under six feet. This is a lot of blood on his hands, so he starts to strain under the burden, and seeing things ("That's not Banquo sitting on my chair, is it???"). And his wife loves that blood so much that soon it's all she can see on her hands. Even if no one else can see the blood.
This play is best read aloud in a group, even those groups that tend to read their lines in flat uninflected monotones that would make Cindy Crawford look like an Oscar-contender. Hey, that would beat reading it by yourself. The best part of the book is the soliloquy Macbeth mutters about life's meaning when he found out what happened to his wife. And keep in mind that Macbeth isn't the dastardly villain who ,with a twirl of his mustache, would kill a nameless person in a minute. He is one of the first anti-heroes: a tragic character who was victim in his own victimizing.
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Summary: Thoughts on Macbeth
Review: Macbeth is the story of a general in the army of King Duncan of Scotland, who is approached by three witches, who plant the seeds of ruthless ambition in his mind, by predicting that he will be made King of Scotland.
He invites King Duncan to his castle, where encouraged by his, wife, he murders him.
He manipulates events to become King, and embarks on a reign of bloody tyranny, having all killed who stand in his way, or who he suspects may do so. Macbeth is the story of tyranny and ambition. It is also the story of inner struggles and of Macbeth's own diseased imagination. The primary villains of the play are the three witches. They do not simply predict, but indeed their soul aim is to sow evil and destruction wherever they can: " Fair is foul and foul is fair. Hover through the fog and filthy air."
Their motto seems to be an apt encapsulation of the dominant 21st century worldview. Indeed Orwell and Kafka where to predict a similar world where truth would be lies and lies would be truth, good would be evil and evil would be good, war would be peace and peace would be war. This twisted view of the witches is the worldview of Bolshevism and leftism today, where terrorists and dictators are lauded as 'revolutionary heroes' and those who defend against the former are vilified and reviled. The three witches of today are academia, the media and the United Nations. Lady Macbeth is but a pale shadow of the witches. She encourages her husband in his evil, but is destroyed by her own guilt.
She needs to call on the evil spirits to 'unsex' her and fill her with the direst cruelty, but at the end 'all the perfumes of Arabia' cannot wash away the guilt of her deeds.
The plea to be unsexed is relevant to the sexlesness of the cruel Bolshevik women of the last century and of women terrorists and women leftwing academics. These are generally sexless and totally cruel in pursuing revolution and the destruction of Judeo-Christian civilization. Lady Macbeth was outwardly beautiful but most of these unsexed women of the revolution have not. Unlike Lady Macbeth they have achieved the being of the three witches for whom they resemble. The play is indeed full of rich irony- how Macbeth persuades the three murderers that Banquo is responsible for their misfortunes, twisting the truth to suit his unholy ends as the media so often does today. Macbeth is brought to justice for his deeds. His arrogance is his downfall. The benevolent influence though, in this story is the doctor of physic - the voice of compassion and religion who says while attempting to heal Lady Macbeth- "More she needs the divine than the physician-G-D, G-D forgive us all"
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Summary: A very useful edition of a great play
Review: Macbeth has always been one of Shakespeare's most popular plays. It is vivid, has blood & murder, magic, visions, treachery, and just deserts. I mean, what is not to love? The play moves along quickly and isn't one of the longer plays. For all these reasons and more, audiences love it. But there is a lot more to the play than the plot outline might suggest. Shakespeare brilliantly works out the subtleties of character through the action, interactions, and self-discussions in the play. It isn't a simple "action" play, it is also a masterwork of revealing the character of the characters even when they are themselves unaware of the trap they are leaping into. I am partial to the Arden editions because I trust the text, love the extensive notes, and the introductory and additional material that helps give the play context and talks about sources Shakespeare almost certainly used. In this case Holinshed's "Chronicles of Scotland". Throughout this edition there are also discussions of the textural problems of this play: where some things seem to be missing, what might be interpolations, and so forth. This is a very useful edition of a great play.
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Summary: Bad story, but......
Review: 'Macbeth' is a bad story, but is has one of the greatest passages in English literature history. The speech Macbeth gives at the end is simply mindblowing. It is the only reason why the play deserves 3 stars.
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Summary: A gripping exploration of "black and deep desires"
Review: "Macbeth," the play by William Shakespeare, is definitely one literary classic that still holds its own as a vital and engaging piece of art. Despite being a stage play, it also works superbly as a reader's text apart from a theatrical setting. The plot begins thus: Scottish warrior Macbeth is told by three witches that he is destined to ascend the throne. This fateful prophecy sets in motion a plot full of murder, deceit, warfare, and psychological drama. Despite being a lean play, "Macbeth" is densely layered and offers the careful reader rewards on many levels. Woven into the violent and suspenseful story are a host of compelling issues: gender identity, the paranormal, leadership, guilt, etc. In one sense, the play is all about reading and misreading (i.e. with regard to Macbeth's "reading" of the witches' prophecies), so at this level the play has a rich metatextual aspect. Macbeth is one of Shakespeare's most unforgettable tragic characters. His story is told using some of English literature's richest and most stunning language.
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