Macbeth Act 1
Essay Preview: Macbeth Act 1
Report this essay
The play opened with thunder crackling above a Scottish moor, where three witches talk eerie about when to meet again to confront Macbeth. This scene sets the mood for the play. When Macbeth and Banquo are on their way to the king’s court they come upon the witches and are in horror. The witches tell Macbeth he is the Thane of Glamis, the Thane of Cawdor, and that he will be king hereafter. Macbeth says, “I know I am the Thane of Glamis. But how of Cawdor? The Thane of Cawdor lives a prosperous gentleman, and to be king stands not within the prospect of belief, no more than to be Cawdor.” (Act I scene 3 lines 74-78). When Macbeth and Banquo arrive at the castle they learn that Cawdor has been executed nobly and that Malcolm, king Duncan’s son, will be the heir to the throne. Macbeth shows his joy but realizes that Malcolm now stands between him and the crown. Lady Macbeth and Macbeth plan a dinner where king Duncan and Malcolm will dine at Macbeth’s manor. At the dinner they plan to have both Duncan and Malcolm poisoned and killed. Macbeth is honored by Duncan and decides not to go through with the killing; this makes Lady Macbeth angry with him.
The theme for Act I was “Things are not what they seem.” The basic understanding to this theme is that things were very ironic in Act I. A statement by the witches, “Fair is foul and foul is fair” is very ironic because this statement translates to what is good is bad and what is bad is good. That shows that nothing good is really good and also no matter what you do it’s bad. Another event that was not expected to happen was when Lady Macbeth found out about the prophecy the witches told Macbeth, a evil side began to come out of her when she started to plan the killing of king Duncan and Malcolm. This is ironic because Lady Macbeth has a first impression of a nice, kind, and friendly person, not a person that has an evil side. When Macbeth and Banquo were met by the witches in the woods and were given the prophecy of Macbeth to be king, this was also ironic. This was ironic because Macbeth was not expecting to run into the witches and was especially not expecting the prophecy to be king. What was also ironic about that was that Macbeth took a little bit to realize whether or not he should believe the witches.
There are ironic stories all around us in the news and on the streets. One example of a real life ironic story is how people eat McDonald’s and fast food all the time and sue the fast food industries because