Summary:
Three Witches meet in a barren, open place filled with thunderstorms to discuss the future and their next meeting.
Analysis:
The play Macbeth begins in a heath, that is to say, an open area covered in rough grass and inhabited only by a few small wild animals. A heath is usually a desolate, lonely area, as it is unable to be cultivated. William Shakespeare could have chosen this place specifically for its symbolic meaning. Empty lands used for meetings normally hint at secrecy. Characters tend to meet in these areas when they plan to discuss something not meant for other ears or frowned upon in society.
Shakespeare adds more to the atmosphere by adding in thunder and lightning, setting the scene of the play. Like bleak lands, thunder and lightning are often used as symbolic features in literacy works. They usually represent dark times, which could be a clue to the nature of the three Witches. Thunder and lightning are often used to predict a great change in the near future as well. Shakespeare uses this tool to foreshadow future events in the play.
The stage directions for Act 1, Scene 1, of Macbeth are used until wrung dry. “A heath. Thunder and lightning.” These two simple
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However, in later scenes, we see the Witches refer to themselves as the “weird sisters”. The Old English spelling of the word is “wyrd”, which has a double meaning as “Fate”. This could be a hint as to where Shakespeare found information to develop these characters. The three Fates of mythology represent three figures who spun the thread of a person’s life. When the time of that person is up, their thread would be cut by the very same figures who spun their thread in the first place. The Fates also had the ability to look into the future, which could be where the origins of the three Witches’ ability comes