Be bloody bold and resolute!
Join us for Let's Make a Scene: The Scottish Play!
We will round-robin read Macbeth: The 30-Minute Shakespeare, which means you can be a ghost, a witch, or someone "from his mother's womb untimely ripped!" Good clean fun in late October.
Here is the script as a text document:
Here it is as a Word doc: (click the little blue docx link at the bottom of the block of text)
Here it is as a PDF: (Click the little blue PDF link at the bottom of the block of text)
Here is the Zoom Link:
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/85839762850?pwd=L3JtdTlCR0VUdEg0Qiszc29Gek1udz09
Here is the Facebook invitation link:
And here is the script pasted:
See you Monday October 23rd, 7:30 EST, the witching hour!
Characters in the play
The following is a list of characters that appear in this cutting
of Macbeth.
First Witch
Second Witch
Third Witch
Macbeth A Scottish general, Thane of Glamis
Banquo A general, prophesied by witches to inherit throne ross: A Scottish nobleman
Duncan: King of Scotland
Malcolm: son of King Duncan
Lady Macbeth: Macbeth’s ambitious wife
Murderer
Lennox A Scottish nobleman
Gentlewoman Doctor
Macduff A Scottish nobleman, hostile to Macbeth’s kingship
Narrators
scene 1. (act I, scenes 1 and 2)
A desert place.
First Witch
When shall we three meet again In thunder, lightning, or in rain?
Second Witch
When the hurlyburly’s done,
When the battle’s lost and won.
Third Witch
That will be ere the set of sun.
all
Fair is foul, and foul is fair:
Hover through the fog and filthy air.
Third Witch
A drum, a drum!
Macbeth doth come.
all
The weird sisters, hand in hand,
Posters of the sea and land, Thus do go about, about:
Peace! the charm’s wound up.
Macbeth
So foul and fair a day I have not seen.
Banquo
What are these
So wither’d and so wild in their attire, That look not like the inhabitants o’ the earth, And yet are on’t?
Macbeth
Speak, if you can: what are you?
First Witch
All hail, Macbeth! hail to thee, thane of Glamis!
Second Witch
All hail, Macbeth, hail to thee, thane of Cawdor!
Third Witch
All hail, Macbeth, thou shalt be king hereafter! [to BANQUO] Thou shalt get kings, though thou be none:
So all hail, Macbeth and Banquo!
First Witch
Banquo and Macbeth, all hail!
Macbeth
Stay, you imperfect speakers, tell me more:
I know I am thane of Glamis;
But how of Cawdor? the thane of Cawdor lives,
and to be king
Stands not within the prospect of belief, Speak, I charge you.
[Exit Witches, vanishing in all directions]
Banquo Whither are they vanish’d?
Macbeth
Into the air; As breath into the wind.
[to Banquo] Your children shall be kings.
Banquo
You shall be king.
Macbeth
And thane of Cawdor too: went it not so?
Banquo
Who’s here?
Ross The king hath happily received, Macbeth,
The news of thy success; He bade me, from him, call thee thane of Cawdor:
Banquo
What, can the devil speak true?
Macbeth
[aside] I am thane of Cawdor:
If chance will have me king, why, chance may crown me, Without my stir.
[to all] Let us toward the king.
Think upon what hath chanced, and, at more time, The interim having weigh’d it, let us speak Our free hearts each to other.
Banquo
Very gladly.
Macbeth
Till then, enough. Come, friends.
Scene 2. (act i, Scene iV)
The palace. Narrator
King Duncan thanks Macbeth and Banquo for their heroics, and announces his intention to have his son Malcolm succeed him as King. Macbeth is convinced that he can only become King by killing King Duncan.
Duncan
O worthiest cousin!
More is thy due than more than all can pay.
Macbeth
The service and the loyalty I owe,
In doing it, pays itself. Your highness’ part
Is to receive our duties; and our duties Are to your throne and children by doing every thing
Safe toward your love and honour.
Duncan
Welcome hither:
I have begun to plant thee, and will labour
To make thee full of growing. Noble Banquo, That hast no less deserved, let me enfold thee And hold thee to my heart.
Banquo
There if I grow,
The harvest is your own.
Duncan
We will establish our estate upon
Our eldest, Malcolm, whom we name hereafter
The Prince of Cumberland;
Macbeth
[aside] The Prince of Cumberland! that is a step On which I must fall down, or else o’erleap, For in my way it lies. Stars, hide your fires;
Let not light see my black and deep desires: The eye wink at the hand; yet let that be,
Which the eye fears, when it is done, to see.
.
Duncan [to Banquo]
True, worthy Banquo; he is full so valiant, Let’s after him.
Scene 3. act i, Scene V, act ii, Scenes 1 and 2
Inverness, Macbeth’s castle.
Narrator
Lady Macbeth reads her husband’s letter about his meeting with the Witches. Macbeth arrives, and she tells him that she will take charge of the preparations for King Duncan’s murder.
Lady Macbeth [reading]
“Came missives from the king, who all-hailed me ‘Thane of Cawdor’; by which title, before, these weird sisters saluted me, and referred me to the coming on of time, with ‘Hail, king that shalt be!’ This have I thought good to deliver thee, my dearest partner of greatness.”
(speaking now, and standing) Glamis thou art, and Cawdor; and shalt be
What thou art promised: yet do I fear thy nature;
It is too full o’ the milk of human kindness
Hie thee hither,
That I may pour my spirits in thine ear;
And chastise with the valour of my tongue
All that impedes thee from the golden round, ) Which fate and metaphysical aid doth seem To have thee crown’d withal.
The king comes here to-night.
He brings great news.
The raven himself is hoarse
That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan Under my battlements.
Come, you spirits
That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,
And fill me from the crown to the toe top-full
Of direst cruelty! make thick my blood;
Stop up the access and passage to remorse, Come, thick night,
And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell,
That my keen knife see not the wound it makes,
Nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark, To cry “Hold, hold!”
[To Macbeth]
Great Glamis! worthy Cawdor!
Thy letters have transported me beyond This ignorant present, and I feel now The future in the instant.
Macbeth
My dearest love,
Duncan comes here to-night.
Lady Macbeth
And when goes hence?
Macbeth
To-morrow, as he purposes.
Lady Macbeth
O, never
Shall sun that morrow see!
Your face, my thane, is as a book where men May read strange matters.
Look like the
innocent flower,
But be the serpent under’t. He that’s coming
Must be provided for: and you shall put
This night’s great business into my dispatch;
Which shall to all our nights and days to come Give solely sovereign sway and masterdom.
Macbeth
We will speak further.
Lady Macbeth
Only look up clear;
To alter favour ever is to fear:
Leave all the rest to me.
Macbeth
Is this a dagger which I see before me,
The handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch thee. (tries to clutch dagger, but it has no substance) I have thee not, and yet I see thee still.
Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible
To feeling as to sight? or art thou but
A dagger of the mind, a false creation,
Proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain?
I see thee yet, in form as palpable
As this which now I draw.
Thou marshall’st me the way that I was going; And such an instrument I was to use.
Thou sure and firm-set earth,
Hear not my steps, which way they walk, for fear Thy very stones prate of my whereabout.
I go, and it is done; the bell invites me. Hear it not, Duncan; for it is a knell
That summons thee to heaven or to hell.
Lady Macbeth
That which hath made them drunk hath made me bold; What hath quench’d them hath given me fire.
I have drugg’d their possets,
That death and nature do contend about them, Whether they live or die.
Hark! Peace!
It was the owl that shriek’d,
[Enter Macbeth His hands are bloody and he holds two bloody daggers.]
My husband!
Macbeth
I have done the deed. Didst thou not hear a noise?
Lady MacbethI heard the owl scream and the crickets cry.
Macbeth This is a sorry sight.
Lady Macbeth A foolish thought, to say a sorry sight.
Macbeth
Methought I heard a voice cry “Sleep no more!
Macbeth does murder sleep”—the innocent sleep,
Sleep that knits up the ravell’d sleeve of care, “Macbeth shall sleep no more.”
Lady Macbeth
Who was it that thus cried? Why, worthy thane,
You do unbend your noble strength, to think
So brainsickly of things.
Why did you bring these daggers from the place?
They must lie there: go carry them; and smear
The sleepy grooms with blood.
Macbeth I’ll go no more:
I am afraid to think what I have done; Look on’t again I dare not.
Lady Macbeth
Infirm of purpose!
Give me the daggers: the sleeping and the dead
Are but as pictures: ’tis the eye of childhood
That fears a painted devil. If he do bleed, I’ll gild the faces of the grooms withal; For it must seem their guilt.
Macbeth
Whence is that knocking?
How is’t with me, when every noise appals me?
What hands are here? ha! they pluck out mine eyes. Will all great Neptune’s ocean wash this blood Clean from my hand?
Lady Macbeth
My hands are of your colour; but I shame To wear a heart so white.
Macbeth
To know my deed, ’twere best not know myself.
Wake Duncan with thy knocking! I would thou couldst!
Scene 4. (act iii, Scene iV)
Hall in the palace.
Narrator
Having ordered Banquo murdered, Macbeth discovers an unexpected guest at his feast: Banquo’s ghost!
Macbeth
Sit down and hearty welcome.
Ross
Thanks to your majesty.
Macbeth ( to Murderer) There’s blood on thy face.
Murderer
’Tis Banquo’s then.
Macbeth
’Tis better thee without than he within.
Is he dispatch’d?
Murderer
My lord, his throat is cut.
MacbethAnd Fleance?
Murderer
Most royal sir,
Fleance is ’scaped.
Macbeth
Now I am, confined, in saucy doubts and fears. But Banquo’s safe?
Murderer
Ay, my good lord: safe in a ditch he bides, With twenty trenched gashes on his head.
Macbeth
Thanks for that: Get thee gone:
Lady Macbeth
My royal lord,
You do not give the cheer;
Macbeth
Now, good digestion And health! All at table toast and give a cheer. lennox
May’t please your highness sit.
[Enter the Ghost of Banquo]
Macbeth
The table’s full.
Lennoz
Here is a place reserved, sir.
Macbeth
Where?
Lennox
Here, my good lord. What is’t that moves your highness?
Macbeth
Which of you have done this?
Ross
What, my good lord?
Macbeth
Thou canst not say I did it: Never shake Thy gory locks at me. ross
Gentlemen, rise: his highness is not well.
Lady Macbeth
Sit, worthy friends: my lord is often thus, And hath been from his youth: pray you, keep seat; [to Macbeth, aside] Are you a man?
Macbeth
Ay, and a bold one, that dare look on that Which might appal the devil.
Lady Macbeth
O proper stuff!
This is the very painting of your fear: This is the air-drawn dagger which, you said, Led you to Duncan.
Why do you make such faces? When all’s done, You look but on a stool.
Macbeth
Behold! look! lo!
Lady Macbeth
My worthy lord,
Your noble friends do lack you.
Macbeth
Do not muse at me, my most worthy friends,
I have a strange infirmity, which is nothing
To those that know me. Come, love and health to all;
Then I’ll sit down. I drink to our dear friend
Banquo, whom we miss;
Macbeth
Quit my sight! let the earth hide thee!
Thy bones are marrowless, thy blood is cold;
Thou hast no speculation in those eyes
Which thou dost glare with! Hence, horrible shadow!
Unreal mockery, hence!
Why, so: being gone, I am a man again.
Pray you, sit still.
Lady Macbeth
You have displaced the mirth With most admired disorder. ross
What sights, my lord?
Lady Macbeth
I pray you, speak not; he grows worse and worse; Go at once.
Lennox
Good night; and better health Attend his majesty!
Lady Macbeth
A kind good night to all!
Macbeth
It will have blood; they say, blood will have blood: Stones have been known to move and trees to speak; I will, to the weird sisters:
More shall they speak; for now I am bent to know, By the worst means, the worst. For mine own good, I am in blood.
Strange things I have in head, that will to hand; Which must be acted ere they may be scann’d.
Lady Macbeth
You lack the season of all natures, sleep.
Macbeth
Come, we’ll to sleep.
We are yet but young in deed.
Scene 5. (act iV, Scene i)
A cavern.
Narrator
The Three Witches conjure around the cauldron, making predictions that embolden Macbeth, who decides to kill Macduff’s family.
First Witch
Thrice the brinded cat hath mew’d.
Second Withc
Thrice and once the hedge-pig whined.
Third Witch
Harpier cries ’Tis time, ’tis time.
First Witch
Round about the cauldron go; In the poison’d entrails throw. Swelter’d venom sleeping got,
Boil thou first i’ the charmed pot.
All
Double, double toil and trouble; Fire burn, and cauldron bubble.
Second Witch
Fillet of a fenny snake,
In the cauldron boil and bake;
Eye of newt and toe of frog,
Wool of bat and tongue of dog, For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.
All
Double, double toil and trouble; Fire burn and cauldron bubble.
Third Witch
Liver of blaspheming Jew,
Gall of goat, and slips of yew
Finger of birth-strangled babe Ditch-deliver’d by a drab, Make the gruel thick and slab:
Add thereto a tiger’s chaudron,
For the ingredients of our cauldron.
All
Double, double toil and trouble; Fire burn and cauldron bubble.
Second Witch
Cool it with a baboon’s blood,
Then the charm is firm and good. By the pricking of my thumbs,
Something wicked this way comes. Open, locks,
Whoever knocks!
Macbeth
How now, you secret, black, and midnight hags!
What is’t you do?
All
A deed without a name.
Macbeth
I conjure you, by that which you profess,
Howe’er you come to know it, answer me:
First Witch
Macbeth! Macbeth! Macbeth! beware Macduff; Beware the thane of Fife.
Second Witch
Macbeth! Macbeth! Macbeth!
Macbeth
Had I three ears, I’ld hear thee.
Second Witch
Be bloody, bold, and resolute; laugh to scorn
The power of man, for none of woman born Shall harm Macbeth.
Macbeth
Then live, Macduff: what need I fear of thee? But yet I’ll make assurance double sure, thou shalt not live.
Third Witch
Macbeth shall never vanquish’d be until Great Birnam wood to high Dunsinane hill Shall come against him.
Macbeth
That will never be
Who can impress the forest, bid the tree Unfix his earth-bound root? Sweet bodements! Good!
Macbeth
Where are they? Gone?
[Enter Lennox]
What’s your grace’s will?
MacBeTH
Saw you the weird sisters?
Lennox
No, my lord.
My lord, Macduff is fled to England.
Macbeth
The castle of Macduff I will surprise;
Seize upon Fife; give to the edge o’ the sword His wife, his babes, and all unfortunate souls That trace him in his line.
Scene 6. (act V, Scene i)
Dunsinane. Anteroom in the castle.
Narrator
A gentlewoman who waits on Lady Macbeth calls on a doctor to witness Lady Macbeth’s compulsive sleepwalking behavior.
Gentlewoman
Lo you, here she comes! This is her very guise; and, upon my life, fast asleep.
Doctor
How came she by that light?
Gentlewoman
She has light by her continually; ’tis her command.
Doctor
You see, her eyes are open.
Gentlewoman
Ay, but their sense is shut.
Doctor
What is it she does now? Look, how she rubs her hands.
Gentlewoman
It is an accustomed action with her, to seem thus washing her hands:
Lady Macbeth
Yet here’s a spot.
Out, damned spot! out, I say!—One: two: Who would have thought the old man to have had so much blood in him. The thane of Fife had a wife: where is she now?— What, will these hands ne’er be clean?
Doctor [to Gentlewoman]
You have known what you should not.
Gentlewoman
She has spoke what she should not, I am sure of that:
heaven knows what she has known.
Lady Macbeth
Here’s the smell of the blood still: all the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand. Oh, oh, oh!
Doctor
What a sigh is there! The heart is sorely charged.
Gentlewoman
I would not have such a heart in my bosom for the dignity of the whole body.
Lady Macbeth
Wash your hands,
Banquo’s buried;
He cannot come out on’s grave.
To bed, to bed! there’s knocking at the gate:
come, come, come, come, give me your hand. What’s done cannot be undone.—To bed, to bed, to bed!
Doctor
Foul whisperings are abroad: unnatural deeds Do breed unnatural troubles: infected minds
To their deaf pillows will discharge their secrets: God, God forgive us all! Look after her; I think, but dare not speak.
Gentlewoman
Good night, good doctor.
Scene 7. (act V, Scene Viii)
Another part of the field.
Narrator
Macbeth and Macduff fight fiercely, as the Witches’ prophecies unfold.
Macbeth
Why should I play the Roman fool, and die On mine own sword?
[Enter Macduff]
Macduff
Turn, hell-hound, turn!
They fight.
Macbeth
Thou losest labour:
I bear a charmed life, which must not yield, To one of woman born.
Macduff
Despair thy charm;
And let the angel whom thou still hast served
Tell thee, Macduff was from his mother’s womb Untimely ripp’d.
Macbeth
Accursed be that tongue that tells me so, For it hath cow’d my better part of man!
I’ll not fight with thee.
Macduff
Then yield thee, coward,
We’ll have thee, as our rarer monsters are,
Painted on a pole, and underwrit, “Here may you see the tyrant.”
Macbeth
I will not yield,
To kiss the ground before young Malcolm’s feet,
Though Birnam wood be come to Dunsinane,
And thou opposed, being of no woman born,
Yet I will try the last. Lay on, Macduff,
And damn’d be him that first cries, “Hold, enough!”
Malcolm
I would the friends we miss were safe arrived. Macduff is missing,
Here comes newer comfort.
[Re-enter MacduffF, holding Macbeth’s head in a bag.]
MacDUFF (to Malcolm)
Hail, king! for so thou art: behold, where stands
The usurper’s cursed head: the time is free: Hail, King of Scotland!
All
Hail, King of Scotland!
Malcolm
What’s more to do,
Producing forth the cruel ministers
Of this dead butcher and his fiend-like queen,
Who, as ’tis thought, by self and violent hands
Took off her life;
This, we will perform in measure, time and place: So, thanks to all at once and to each one,
Whom we invite to see us crown’d at Scone.
ALL
Out, out, brief candle!
Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more: it is a tale Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing.
All hold hands and take a bow!