The universal reaction to MacBeth is that we identify with him, or at least with his imagination.  Shakespeare, rather dreadfully sees to it that we are MacBeth; our identity with him is involuntary but inescapable.  All of us possess, to one degree or another, a proleptic imagination; in MacBeth, it is absolute.  He scarcely is conscious of an ambition, desire, or wish before he sees himself on the other side of the shore, already having performed the crime that equivocally fulfills ambition.  MacBeth terrifies us partly because that aspect of our own imagination is so frightening: it seems to make us murders, thieves, usurpers, and rapists.  Why are we unable to resist identifying with MacBeth?

In this unit we will explore our connections to the tragic king, examine the role the supernatural plays a roll in his downfall, define and identify paradoxes and equivocations, characterize and map the minds of the major players strutting and fretting their hour upon the stage, closely analyze important soliloquies, and, of course, engage in a final assessment of your understanding, using both a 40-min. essay and a project.