Macbeth

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When shall we three meet again?

In thunder, lightning, or in rain?

When the hurly-burly's done.

When the battle's lost and won.

Where the place?

Upon the battlefield,

there to meet with Macbeth.

Fair is foul, and foul is fair.

Hover through the fog and filthy air.

(All roar)

(Sound muted)

(Roaring)

(Sound muted)

(Grunting and groaning)

(Lennox) Doubtful it stood,

as two spent swimmers

that do cling together

and choke their art.

'The merciless Macdonwald

from the Western Isles

'of kerns and gallowglasses

is supplied.'

And fortune,

on his damned quarrel smiling,

showed like a rebel's whore.

But all's too weak,

for brave Macbeth -

well he deserves that name -

disdaining fortune,

with his brandished steel

which smoked with bloody execution,

like valour's minion

carved out his passage

till he faced the slave

which ne'er shook hands

nor bade farewell to him

till he unseamed him

from the nave to the chops

and fixed his head

upon our battlements.

And, to conclude,

victory fell on us.

Valiant Macbeth.

Worthy gentleman.

Great happiness.

Whence cam'st thou, noble Prince?

From Fife, great King,

where Norwegian banners flout the sky

and fan our people cold,

assisted by that most disloyal traitor,

the Thane of Cawdor.

God save the King!

No more that Thane of Cawdor

shall deceive our bosom interest.

Go pronounce his present death

and with his former title

greet Macbeth.

I'll see it done.

What he hath lost,

noble Macbeth hath won.

So foul and fair a day

I have not seen.

(Banquo) What are these?

Live you or are you aught

that man may question?

Speak, if you can.

What are you?

Macbeth.

Hail to thee, Thane of Glamis.

Macbeth.

Hail to thee, Thane of Cawdor.

All hail, Macbeth,

that shalt be king hereafter.

Good sir,

why do you start and seem to fear

things that do sound so fair?

My noble partner

you greet with present grace

and great prediction

of noble having and of royal hope

that he seems rapt withal.

To me you speak not.

Hail, lesser than Macbeth

and greater.

Not so happy yet much happier.

Thou shalt get kings

though thou be none.

So all hail, Macbeth and Banquo.

(Young witch) 'Banquo and Macbeth,

'all hail.'

Stay, you imperfect speakers.

Tell me more.

Say from whence you owe

this strange intelligence

and why, upon this blasted heath,

you stop our way

with such prophetic greeting.

Speak, I charge you.

The earth hath bubbles as the water has,

and these are of them.

Whither are they vanished?

Into the air,

and what seemed corporal

melted as breath into the wind.

Would they had stayed.

Were such things here

as we do speak about?

Or have we eaten on the insane root

that takes the reason prisoner?

Your children shall be kings.

You shall be king.

And Thane of Cawdor too.

Went it not so?

To the selfsame tune and words.

The King hath happily received,

Macbeth,

the news of thy success.

As thick as hail

came post from post

and every one did bear thy praises,

in his kingdom's great defence,

and poured them down before him.

And we are sent to give thee

from our royal master thanks.

And, for an earnest of a greater honour,

he bade me from him

call thee Thane of Cawdor.

The Thane of Cawdor lives.

Why do you dress me

in borrowed robes?

Treasons capital, confessed and proved,

have overthrown him.

(Macbeth) Do you not hope

your children shall be kings

when those that gave

the Thane of Cawdor to me

promised no less to them?

That trusted home might yet

enkindle you unto the crown

besides the Thane of Cawdor.

But 'tis strange,

and oftentimes,

to win us to our harm,

the instruments of darkness

tell us truths,

win us with honest trifles

to betray's in deepest consequence.

(Macbeth) This supernatural soliciting

cannot be ill,

cannot be good.

If ill, why hath it given me

earnest of success,

commencing in a truth?

I am Thane of Cawdor.

If good, why do I yield

to that suggestion

whose horrid image doth unfix my hair

and make my seated heart

knock at my ribs

against the use of nature?

Present fears are less

than horrible imaginings.

If chance will have me king,

why, chance may crown me

without my stir.

Hail, Macbeth.

O worthiest cousin.

More is thy due

than more than all can pay.

The service and the loyalty I owe

in doing it pays itself.

From hence to Inverness,

and bind us further to you.

I'll be myself the harbinger

and make joyful the hearing of my wife

with your approach,

so humbly take my leave.

My worthy Cawdor.

(Chanting in Gaelic)

"They met me in the day of success

"and I have learned

by the perfect'st report

"they have more in them

than mortal knowledge.

"When I burned in desire

to question them further,

"they made themselves air

into which they vanished.

"Whiles I stood rapt in the wonder of it

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."'

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.

Come to my woman's breasts

and take my milk for gall,

you murthering ministers,

wherever, in your sightless substances,

you wait on nature's mischief.

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!"

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.

Thy letters have transported me

beyond this ignorant present

and I feel now

the future in the instant.

My dearest love,

Duncan comes here tonight.

And when goes hence?

Tomorrow, as he purposes.

O never shall sun that morrow see!

Glamis thou art, and Cawdor,

and shalt be what thou art promised.

Yet I do fear thy nature.

It is too full o' the milk

of human kindness

to catch the nearest way.

Thou wouldst be great.

Art not without ambition

but without the illness should attend it.

To beguile the time,

look like the time.

Bear welcome in your eye,

your hand, your tongue.

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.

We will speak further.

All our service, in every point

twice done and then done double.

Give me your hand.

Conduct me to mine host.

We love him highly and shall continue

our graces towards him.

By your leave, hostess.

(Children singing in Gaelic)

(Duncan) My plenteous...

(Chatter and laughter)

Up!

Up!

(Chatter dies down)

My plenteous joys,

wanton in fulness,

seek to hide themselves

in drops of sorrow.

Sons,

kinsmen,

thanes,

and you whose places

are the nearest,

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