History

After having seen Macbeth for the first time, at age 12, I immediately became obsessed with the question of how close to the true story Shakespeare had made his play. This was, though, pre-internet, and a local public library which could fit in, well, my current library. Needless to say it was decades, and several other productions of Shakespeare later before I actually was able to find out what really happened back in 11th Century Scotland, and how much Shakespeare 'literated' in order for this to be a Tragedie and not a Historie. Well, the first thing that's not obvious is that there was a King Macbeth of Scotland in the first place. He ruled with his wife, Lady Macbeth, and they succeeded King Duncan. Lady Macbeth's son from a previous marriage (Lulach) reigned briefly after his step-father's death, and was then followed by Malcolm, and then Donalbain. Malcolm, at the time of Duncan's death, was still a child, and not capable of the title, the Scots not using figureheads at this time. A history of Macbeth would also have shown various plotpoints almost Shakespearean in thier own right:

  • Gruoch (Lady Macbeth) had her son (Lulach) by her first husband (Gil Colmeign)
  • Gruoch married Macbeth, after he had killed Gil Colmeign.
  • Macbeth killed Gil Colmeign, in part, due to the fact that Gil Colmeign had already killed Macbeth's father. (Sinel).
  • Both Macbeth and Gruoch were in direct bloodline to the throne, thus Lulach had two legitimate claims on the crown..
  • Duncan looked like Lady Macbeths' father, likley because the two were second cousins. .
  • Duncan also looked like Macbeth's mother, as they were first cousins. Consequently:.
  • Macbeth and Lady Macbeth were cousins.
Outside the familial, other facts are altered or completely made up for the drama.
  • Macduff's family actually was slaughtered by Macbeth after Macduff had fled to England. The motive for his flight, though, was not one of intruige, but simply wanting to avoid a tax which Macbeth had levied to improve his palace.
  • Banquo, therefore Fleance and their whole royal line, didn't actually exist.
The witches were an oft-mentioned part of Macbeth's journey, but more in the way that Nancy Reagan used Tarot cards. This does however play into a part of four historical facts regarding the writing of the play itself.
  • The play was written after the coronation of James I of England, previously, James VI of Scotland.
  • James was a descendant of Duncan.
  • James had written a tretise on witchcraft.
  • Sheakspeare's troupe,"The Lord Chaimberlain's Men", were quickly promoted to being "The King's Men."
Macbeth is always listed as one of Shakespeare's most important, most loved, and most socially relevant plays. This is likely because it had a lot of 'academic' bits that literary-types love to sink their teeth into. It had a lot of blood, death, a love story, and more blood. And as for social relevance, this is the tragedie where we don't actually see a glimps of evil. Sure, greed, ambition, madness, even, but unlike Hamlet's Claudius, or Lear's Daughters, or Romeo and Juliet's uncaring families, Macbeth, himself, is not evil. He just does some things that are very bad, but not for his own sake. He's trying to please his wife. His wife isn't evil, just ambitious, and she pushes her devoted and blindly following husband into whatever she believes will be a means to their end. So, it's not about evil. It's about misplaced and poorly used feelings, and how blood begets blood. The wtiches, by the way, aren't evil. This is just what they do. Like people working at the DMV. They're not evil. It's just what they do for a living.

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