Macbeth
In the world of theater, many superstitions are associated with “Macbeth”, the shortest of the tragedies written by William Shakespeare. In fact, theater performers do not say the name of this play aloud. Instead, they refer to it as “the Scottish play”, “MacBee” or “The Scottish King.” According to superstitions, the play was cursed because Shakespeare used real witches’ spells in the text. Interestingly, actors who uttered “Macbeth” inside a theatre allegedly figured into accidents, misfortunes, and even deaths. The spread of the idea that it is an “unlucky” play may have also stemmed from the fact that in the past, it was usually the last play staged before a theatre shuts down. Nonetheless, critics consider this play an anomaly due to its brevity. Compared to Shakespeare’s other tragedies like Othello and King Lear, “Macbeth” is more than a thousand lines shorter.The plot of this Shakespearean tragedy was loosely based on the life of King Macbeth of Scotland as accounted by Raphael Holinshed and Hector Boece, a Scottish philosopher. The scene highlights the start of the play where three witches, called the Weird Sisters, revealed to Macbeth, an army general of King Duncan of Scotland, the prophecy that he would soon become king. This prophecy cultivated the title character’s lust for power which led him to commit deception and murders.
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