The Role of Doubles and Duplicity in Shakespeare's Macbeth

Running head: ENGLISH ESSAY
English Essay
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Author Note

1ENGLISH ESSAY
Introduction
The main aim of this essay is to discover the big role that doubles and duplicity play in
the plot of the Shakespearean classic tragedy Macbeth. The entire drama evolves around the
theme of duplicity in both the characters thane of Glamis, Macbeth and his wife Lady Macbeth
(Shakespeare: 34).
Theme of doubles and duplicity
In the very first scene of the play, the witches appear in the heath and they bear the
equivocal messages in the ears of both Macbeth and Banquo. The equivocal saying of the
witches ‘fair is foul, and foul is fair’ always sends the message that something uncanny would
surely happen in the near future to both of them (Shakespeare: 34). If the beginning of the play is
something of that kind it surely suggests that the ending will never be as the audience would
think it to be. All the things that are in front of the eyes are not like that in reality.
The three witches would begin the proceedings of the play in the duplicitous ways. This
act of duplicitous ways is then carried forward by the two protagonists of the play Macbeth and
Lady Macbeth (Shakespeare: 239). The prophecies that the three witches had made in the first
scene to Macbeth and Banquo eventually led Macbeth to commit the horrific deed of killing the
King of Scotland, the meek Duncan. The series of misdeeds opened its account by this tragic
deed only.
Lady Macbeth could be held responsible mostly for making Macbeth feel that this deed
was so important by spurring it in the ears (Shakespeare: 236). The prophecies of the witches and
later the spirits also proved to be duplicitous (Shakespeare: 367). It is because the sayings of the
three spirits eventually got true but not in the way Macbeth expected it to be. The climbing of the