TEXT:
MACBETH
Where are they? Gone? Let this pernicious hour
Stand aye accursed in the calendar!
Come in, without there!
Enter LENNOX
LENNOX
What's your grace's will?
MACBETH
Saw you the weird sisters?
LENNOX
No, my lord.
MACBETH
Came they not by you?
LENNOX
No, indeed, my lord.
MACBETH
Infected be the air whereon they ride;
And damned all those that trust them! I did hear
The galloping of horse: who was't came by?
LENNOX
'Tis two or three, my lord, that bring you word
Macduff is fled to England.
MACBETH
Fled to England!
LENNOX
Ay, my good lord.
MACBETH
Time, thou anticipatest my dread exploits:
The flighty purpose never is o'ertook
Unless the deed go with it; from this moment
The very firstlings of my heart shall be
The firstlings of my hand. And even now,
To crown my thoughts with acts, be it thought and done:
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. No boasting like a fool;
This deed I'll do before this purpose cool.
But no more sights! Where are these gentlemen?
Come, bring me where they are.
Exeunt
NOTES:
Pernicious
Pernicious comes from a Latin root meaning ruin or harm - something pernicious is therefore harmful, dangerous or ruinous. Macbeth considers this a momentous moment, a time that should be marked in the calendar as perpetually dangerous.
Calendars
Calendars, or as they were better known, almanacs, were books filled with days and were relied on to mark out days that were auspicious or - as Macbeth would have it - pernicious. They were popular enough for Bernard Stuart Capp to write a whole book about them, entitled Astrology and the Popular Press: English Almanacs 1500-1800. More to our purposes, my former professor David Wiles wrote a charming study called Shakespeare’s Almanac: A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Marriage and the Elizabethan Calendar that gives a sparkling insight into the connections between that play and this kind of popular book. A must-have companion for any bardolatrous bookshelf is Gregory Doran’s Shakespeare Almanac, which is filled with timely trivia for every day of the year.
Flying
We may never know if or how Shakespeare’s company presented the witches and their movement on stage. Did they fly? Could they have flown? There’s enough mention of their airborne travels to suggest that perhaps they could. Broadway productions like Wicked and The Wizard of Oz have made great work of having their witches fly, but Macbeth’s trio often seem considerably more stuck on the ground. Have you ever seen the Scottish witches fly?