Macbeth — Act 1 The Witches' Prophecy & Macbeth's Temptation — AQA GCSE English Literature

SPEC 3.1.1 • MACBETH

Act 1 — Prophecy & Temptation

Shakespeare gives us the witches before the protagonist, the prophecy before the choice, and a soliloquy in which Macbeth names the trap he is about to walk into. The whole tragedy is loaded in Act 1.

Why Act 1 Is Analytically Rich

Act 1 sets up everything the rest of the play will spend four acts paying off. Shakespeare's ordering is itself the argument:

Witches before Macbeth. We meet the supernatural before we meet the protagonist — so when Macbeth enters, the moral atmosphere is already inverted.

Prophecy before choice. Macbeth hears what he will be before he decides what he will do. The witches give him a script; the rest is whether he accepts the role.

Soliloquy before murder. By Act 1 Scene 7, Macbeth has named the trap — "vaulting ambition" — in his own voice, before he commits the deed.

The Tragic Move

Shakespeare's structural argument is that articulate self-knowledge does not save Macbeth. He sees the trap and walks in anyway. That is what makes him a tragic figure rather than merely a wicked one.

Key Terms For This Lesson

Definitions

Soliloquy — a speech in which a character, alone on stage, reveals interior thoughts directly to the audience. The defining method of Shakespearean tragedy.

Aside — a brief speech other on-stage characters cannot hear. Different from a soliloquy: shorter, others may be present.

Iambic pentameter — the standard line: ten syllables, five stresses, in a soft-LOUD (da-DUM) pattern. Spoken by noble characters in unbroken moral order.

Trochaic tetrameter — the witches' line: eight syllables, four stresses, in a LOUD-soft (DUM-da) pattern. The reversed metre marks their inversion of natural order.

Chiasmus — a rhetorical pattern where two terms reverse around a central pivot. "Fair is foul, and foul is fair" — A-B-B-A.

Enjambment — when a line of verse runs on into the next without a punctuation pause. Used by Shakespeare to make rhythm perform meaning.

Foil — a character whose qualities contrast with another's, illuminating that character. Banquo is Macbeth's foil throughout Act 1.

1.1 — The Witches' Compressed Thesis

Three witches appear on a heath in thunder. The scene is barely a dozen lines long — but Shakespeare uses every one. The line that closes the scene is the play's compressed thesis:

"Fair is foul, and foul is fair, / Hover through the fog and filthy air." Witches · Act 1 Scene 1

Chiasmus

"Fair is foul / foul is fair" inverts moral categories before the play has properly begun. The A–B–B–A structure makes the inversion formal — appearance and reality are about to switch places, and Shakespeare puts that switch into the very shape of the sentence.

AO2 Move

Don't just identify chiasmus. Explain what it does: the rhetorical pattern enacts the inversion the line describes. The form performs the meaning. That's a Level 5/6 method-and-effect analysis in one sentence.

Metre — The Witches Break The Rhythm

The witches don't only say something unusual. They sound unusual. Shakespeare gives them a different metre from everyone else in the play.

AO2 Insight

The witches' metre is itself an act of inversion. Iambic pentameter goes soft-LOUD; trochaic tetrameter goes LOUD-soft — the rhythm is literally reversed. The metre mirrors the meaning. When you hear the witches, ordinary order has already been disrupted at the level of sound.

1.2 — Macbeth Before We Meet Him

Before Macbeth enters the stage, the wounded Captain reports his battlefield heroism to Duncan:

"For brave Macbeth — well he deserves that name…" Captain · Act 1 Scene 2

The praise is real. But look at how Shakespeare describes the violence:

"He unseam'd him from the nave to th' chops, / And fix'd his head upon our battlements." Captain · Act 1 Scene 2

The Pre-emptive Irony

Macbeth's violence is celebrated when sanctioned by the king — but the physical vocabulary ("unseaming", a severed head on battlements) is the same vocabulary the play will use for the regicide to come. Shakespeare's argument: Macbeth's capacity for violence is given. The tragedy is what he turns it to.

AO3 Move

This scene works directly against the bolt-on context error. A weak AO3 says "Jacobean society was violent." A strong AO3 says: "Shakespeare establishes that the violence the king's wars sanction will become indistinguishable from the violence those same wars produce — Macbeth's 'unseaming' of Macdonwald foreshadows the unseaming of cosmic order in Act 2."

1.3 — The Three-Tier Prophecy

On the heath, the witches greet Macbeth with three titles. The structure is the trap:

"Thane of Glamis!"

He already is — true, verifiable

"Thane of Cawdor!"

About to be confirmed — soon verifiable

"King hereafter!"

The temptation — would require action

The Rhetorical Structure

Two truths plus one possibility. The witches make the dangerous claim sound credible by anchoring it to two confirmable ones. This is equivocation at its purest — they do not lie. Macbeth will become Thane of Cawdor; he will become king. What the witches do not say is what those things will cost.

And to Banquo, a quite different prophecy:

"Thou shalt get kings, though thou be none." Third Witch · Act 1 Scene 3

"Two Truths Are Told" — Macbeth Casts Himself

After the second prophecy proves true — he has become Thane of Cawdor — Macbeth speaks aside:

"Two truths are told, / As happy prologues to the swelling act / Of the imperial theme." Macbeth · Act 1 Scene 3

The Theatrical Metaphor

Macbeth describes the prophecies as the "prologues" and the "swelling act" of a play that will end with him as king. The metaphor is dramatic — he treats his own life as a script unfolding.

Why The Metaphor Condemns Him

He has cast himself in a role before he has chosen the action. From this moment on he is, in his own metaphor, playing the part of regicide — the murder is staged in his imagination before it is committed in fact. Shakespeare's argument: the deed begins in the language a man uses about himself.

1.4 — Duncan Names Malcolm Heir

Duncan announces Malcolm as Prince of Cumberland — the official heir to the throne. Macbeth registers this in another aside:

"Stars, hide your fires; / Let not light see my black and deep desires." Macbeth · Act 1 Scene 4

The Light/Dark Motif Begins

The imperative verbs ("hide", "let not") show Macbeth requesting darkness — moral concealment, not just literal night. The adjectives "black" and "deep" describe his desires, and crucially, he names them himself. He knows what he wants is morally dark. He asks the cosmos to look away.

Why This Matters

The light/dark imagery established here will run the entire play — through "dark night strangles the travelling lamp" (2.4) after the murder, through Lady Macbeth's "come, thick night" invocation (1.5), through the sleepwalking scene where she requires "light by her continually" (5.1). Shakespeare's argument: moral darkness, once invited, refuses to leave.

1.6 — Dramatic Irony at the Castle Gate

Duncan arrives at Macbeth's castle to spend the night. He praises what he sees:

"This castle hath a pleasant seat; the air / Nimbly and sweetly recommends itself." Duncan · Act 1 Scene 6

Banquo adds:

"This guest of summer, / The temple-haunting martlet, does approve / By his loved mansionry that the heaven's breath / Smells wooingly here." Banquo · Act 1 Scene 6

Dramatic Irony

The castle appears blessed — the "temple-haunting martlet" (a bird associated with church towers) suggests sacred space, divine approval. The audience knows what awaits Duncan inside. Shakespeare layers irony at every level: the bird is sacred, the air is sweet, the host plans murder.

The deception Lady Macbeth will demand — "look like the innocent flower, but be the serpent under't" — is already operating at the architectural level. The castle itself is equivocating.

1.7 — The "If It Were Done" Soliloquy

Alone, on the eve of the murder, Macbeth delivers the play's first major soliloquy. He reasons against the deed:

"If it were done when 'tis done, then 'twere well / It were done quickly… we still have judgment here… I have no spur / To prick the sides of my intent, but only / Vaulting ambition, which o'erleaps itself / And falls on the other." Macbeth · Act 1 Scene 7

The Self-Knowledge Move

Shakespeare gives Macbeth full, articulate awareness of what is about to happen. He names his only motivation: "vaulting ambition". He knows there is no good reason for the murder. He knows the only force pulling him forward is ambition that will destroy him.

The Tragic Paradox

This is Shakespeare's most striking tragic move: Macbeth's intellect sees the trap. His articulacy diagnoses his own fate. And it does not save him. The play's tragedy is that articulation is not the same as escape — and self-knowledge alone is not virtue.

"Vaulting Ambition" — When Form Performs Meaning

The metaphor is horse-and-rider. Ambition is a horse the rider cannot control. The crucial AO2 detail is where Shakespeare places the line break:

The Level 6 Sentence

"Shakespeare places the leap on one line — 'Vaulting ambition, which o'erleaps itself' — and withholds the fall until the next: 'And falls on the other'. The enjambment makes the verse itself fall across the line break, the form enacting the very over-extension the metaphor names."

Examiner Alert — Work Against Memorisation

Examiner Report · Paper 1 · June 2024

"The very best students seemed to actively work against pre-learned material."

The "vaulting ambition" line is famous. Every student has it memorised. The discriminator is whether you can do something with it — analyse the enjambment, place the metaphor in the play's whole moral structure — rather than just quote it as evidence that Macbeth is ambitious.

The Test

Ask: is my analysis specific to this quotation, or could I have written the same sentences about any quotation? If the analysis would survive a quotation swap, it isn't really analysing the quotation. It's quoting the quotation.

Weak vs Strong — Same Quotation, Different Marks

Weak · Level 2/3

"Macbeth says he has 'vaulting ambition.' This shows he is ambitious."

Problem: circular — the quotation contains the word "ambition" and is used to "prove" he is ambitious. No method named, no effect explored. Could be written about any character with any quotation.

Strong · Level 5/6

"Shakespeare places the leap on one line — 'which o'erleaps itself' — and withholds the fall until the next: 'And falls on the other'. The enjambment makes the verse itself fall across the line break, the form enacting the very over-extension the metaphor names. Macbeth is articulate enough to see the trap; the play's tragedy is that articulation is not the same as escape."

Scores because: specific method (enjambment) located on the precise line position; the form-performs-meaning insight is anchored in what Shakespeare actually does on the page; the closing claim places the moment in the play's whole tragic argument.

WHW+C — The "Vaulting Ambition" Soliloquy

Question: Starting with this soliloquy from Act 1 Scene 7, explore how Shakespeare presents Macbeth's awareness of his own ambition. 30 + 4 marks

Constructed example in AQA's question format — not from a real past paper. The 1.7 soliloquy itself (Macbeth-alone, before Lady Macbeth re-enters) has not been a named focus in the 2020–2024 archive.

Thesis

Shakespeare presents Macbeth's awareness of his ambition not as a moral safeguard but as a tragic intensifier: articulate self-knowledge becomes the very thing that prosecutes him, because he names the trap and walks into it anyway.

W

What the writer does: Shakespeare gives Macbeth a horse-and-rider metaphor — "vaulting ambition, which o'erleaps itself / And falls on the other" — placing the leap on one line and withholding the fall until the next, with the line break between "itself" and "And falls".

H

How it works: The metaphor casts ambition as a horse the rider cannot control. The enjambment delays the fall across the line break — the verse itself falls onto the next line just as the horse falls "on the other" side. The form performs the meaning: the line break is the moment of over-extension the imagery describes.

W

Why it matters: Shakespeare positions Macbeth as articulate enough to see the trap. He diagnoses his own fate in his own mouth. The play's tragedy is not that Macbeth cannot foresee the consequences — it is that he can, and proceeds anyway. Self-knowledge does not produce virtue.

+C

Context: A Jacobean audience anxious after the 1605 Gunpowder Plot about regicidal ambition disordering cosmic order would have heard this soliloquy as a warning — and as a confirmation that the man whose ambition threatens the Divine Right of Kings can name his own crime in advance without being saved by the naming.

Banquo — Macbeth's Foil Throughout Act 1

Shakespeare uses Banquo as a constant contrast against which Macbeth's choices register. They hear the same prophecies in the same scene — and react completely differently.

Banquo · Open

Banquo speaks to the witches: "Speak, then, to me, who neither beg nor fear / Your favours nor your hate."

He questions them ("What, can the devil speak true?") and refuses to act on prophecy.

Macbeth · Internal

Macbeth falls into asides: "Two truths are told… my thought, whose murder yet is but fantastical, / Shakes so my single state of man."

He goes silent in company, then private. He has begun translating prophecy into intention.

Why The Asymmetry Matters

Shakespeare gives Macbeth and Banquo the same supernatural information and shows two completely different responses. The contrast tells us that the witches do not determine Macbeth's choice — they name a possibility he chooses to act on. Banquo proves the choice was Macbeth's, because Banquo hears the same prophecy and refuses it.

Practice — Close Analysis Drill

Macbeth's aside in Act 1 Scene 3:

"This supernatural soliciting / Cannot be ill, cannot be good: if ill, / Why hath it given me earnest of success, / Commencing in a truth?"

Write one sentence that names a method, explains its effect, and links the moment to the play's wider tragic argument about supernatural agency.

Model

"The antithetical pairing 'cannot be ill, cannot be good' uses parallel repetition with antonyms to invert moral categories within a single line — Macbeth's syntax has already absorbed the inversion the witches established in 1.1 with their chiastic 'fair is foul, foul is fair', and Shakespeare's argument is that the supernatural's effect is not seduction but contamination at the level of language itself."

Why

One precisely named method (antithesis via parallel repetition with antonyms). Specific to this quotation (the repetition of "cannot be"). Linked back to the witches' actual chiasmus in 1.1. Places the moment in the play's wider argument about supernatural agency. That is the Level 5/6 move in a single sentence.

Checkpoint

You should now be able to do three things:

1

Identify trochaic tetrameter as the witches' metrical signature — and explain that the reversed rhythm (LOUD-soft, 4 feet) mirrors the moral inversion of "Fair is foul, and foul is fair".

2

Explain equivocation — speech technically true but deliberately misleading — and link it to the three-tier prophecy structure (two truths plus one temptation) and the 1605 Gunpowder Plot context.

3

Analyse the "vaulting ambition" soliloquy using WHW+C — naming the horse-and-rider metaphor, the enjambment between "itself" and "And falls" that makes the verse perform the fall, and Shakespeare's argument that articulate self-knowledge does not save the tragic hero.

Next Lesson

Lesson 1.03 — Acts 1–2: Lady Macbeth and the Murder of Duncan. We meet the play's other architect of regicide and watch Act 1 Scene 7 from her side of the conversation.