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Your eyes were glacial and your promises all rang true
And this is why I am not a director, because while I realize that there is much psychological and supernatural ambiguity to be mined from the banquet scene in Macbeth—whether there is truly a spectre at the feast or whether Macbeth's reason is starting to give way, his guilt painting up murdered Banquo before him as previously his ambition drew a dagger on the air; or whether this question matters at all—I also think there's no argument: of course the ghost is really there. He promised Macbeth he would be.
MACBETH
Here's our chief guest.
LADY MACBETH
If he had been forgotten,
It had been as a gap in our great feast,
And all-thing unbecoming.
MACBETH
To-night we hold a solemn supper, sir,
And I'll request your presence.
BANQUO
Let your highness
Command upon me; to the which my duties
Are with a most indissoluble tie
For ever knit.
MACBETH
Ride you this afternoon?
BANQUO
Ay, my good lord.
MACBETH
We should have else desired your good advice,
Which still hath been both grave and prosperous,
In this day's council; but we'll take to-morrow.
Is't far you ride?
BANQUO
As far, my lord, as will fill up the time
'Twixt this and supper: go not my horse the better,
I must become a borrower of the night
For a dark hour or twain.
MACBETH
Fail not our feast.
BANQUO
My lord, I will not.
The world of Macbeth is one of witches and worse things waiting, curses and prophesies and adynata that come, however slantwise—none of woman born, till Birnam wood remove to Dunsinane—true. (I'm with Tolkien, however, in being disappointed that the actual wood does not go anywhere. I really expected it to, the first time I read Macbeth. It's like an entire forest of Chekhov's gun.) It's not the most supernatural play in the canon, but it's got to be up there. Ghosts and apparitions are not suspensions of disbelief, but factual as branches or blades. And words are spells. Our chief guest, all-thing unbecoming, a most indissoluble tie, this is performative speech. So don't command someone to dinner and then kill him, for the love of little green apples. Especially in a Scotland of völur, you're a fool if you think a man's death is a stronger bond than his word.
(I am quite sure every critic back to the seventeenth century has already figured this out, but I just thought of it in the shower. It saves me posting about the fact that what I have is probably a viral sore throat and may not go away for weeks, which is a lot more annoying.)
MACBETH
Here's our chief guest.
LADY MACBETH
If he had been forgotten,
It had been as a gap in our great feast,
And all-thing unbecoming.
MACBETH
To-night we hold a solemn supper, sir,
And I'll request your presence.
BANQUO
Let your highness
Command upon me; to the which my duties
Are with a most indissoluble tie
For ever knit.
MACBETH
Ride you this afternoon?
BANQUO
Ay, my good lord.
MACBETH
We should have else desired your good advice,
Which still hath been both grave and prosperous,
In this day's council; but we'll take to-morrow.
Is't far you ride?
BANQUO
As far, my lord, as will fill up the time
'Twixt this and supper: go not my horse the better,
I must become a borrower of the night
For a dark hour or twain.
MACBETH
Fail not our feast.
BANQUO
My lord, I will not.
The world of Macbeth is one of witches and worse things waiting, curses and prophesies and adynata that come, however slantwise—none of woman born, till Birnam wood remove to Dunsinane—true. (I'm with Tolkien, however, in being disappointed that the actual wood does not go anywhere. I really expected it to, the first time I read Macbeth. It's like an entire forest of Chekhov's gun.) It's not the most supernatural play in the canon, but it's got to be up there. Ghosts and apparitions are not suspensions of disbelief, but factual as branches or blades. And words are spells. Our chief guest, all-thing unbecoming, a most indissoluble tie, this is performative speech. So don't command someone to dinner and then kill him, for the love of little green apples. Especially in a Scotland of völur, you're a fool if you think a man's death is a stronger bond than his word.
(I am quite sure every critic back to the seventeenth century has already figured this out, but I just thought of it in the shower. It saves me posting about the fact that what I have is probably a viral sore throat and may not go away for weeks, which is a lot more annoying.)