Macbeth, Story Book Grade 4: Steck-Vaughn Short Classics, Student Reader

Virtually all editions of Macbeth will have at least some annotations. Rummaging through five different editions, I preferred the Yale University Press version, edited by Burton Raffel, as having the most comprehensive and comprehensible notes, as well as an excellent introduction to Shakespeare's play. Raffel not only explains the meanings of obscure words, but also gives brief notes pertaining to relevant history, geography, stage directions, etc, that are rarely addressed as fully by other editors. In addition, Raffel frequently gives the proper way to stress the syllables in a line when reading it aloud, which can be extremely helpful. (However, in most places these stresses need to be very subtle, so that you don't sound like "taDUM taDUM taDUM".) And Yale's page layout is among the clearest that I've seen. (To find this edition: at Avanced Search, enter ISBN 0300106548; or, enter Macbeth as title, and either Raffel as author or Yale as publisher.) As a bonus, this edition includes at the back a long essay on the play by Harold Bloom. This is not an uninteresting commentary, but Bloom desperately needs a good editor. His essay is not only at least three times longer than it should be, but is startlingly repetitious. Yale would have been wise to have asked Bloom for a rewrite.

As a teacher of 11th grade English, I ordered this text because I was curious about its supplementary material. Now I am committed to the Norton Critical Editions for EVERY Shakespeare play I teach in the future! My students were amazed and sometimes enthralled with the incredibly rich background material which supplemented their study of Macbeth. They especially loved comparing Lady Macbeth's invocation of evil forces, and her declaration of imagined infanticide, with Seneca's Medea, in which Medea declares she will sacrifice her children to punish her cheating husband. They were incredulous that Macbeth's witches were actually mentioned several times in Holinshed's history. The factual background for Macbeth's rise and fall, set within the context of the eleventh century, gave them a deeper understanding of his inherent brutality. They also were better able to appreciate the modern aspects of his personality as interpreted by Shakespeare by contrasting the Bard's Macbeth with Holinshed's details of the actual historical Macbeth. And they really enjoyed learning that Lady Macbeth's real name was Gruoch. (Several said they're going to name their dog or their first daughter after her! Ha, ha!) WHAT A SUPERIOR SOURCE for any teacher! Please buy this if you are reading, studying, or teaching Macbeth! Added note: Now it's years later, and I have used the Norton Critical Editions for teaching EVERY time one is available for the work I'm teaching. They are simply the best in providing depth and analysis via the historical documentation, critical reviews (both historical and contemporary), and other source material. I am such a fan of these, and have shared them with so many students, that my AP students have begun to buy them also for the work we are studying. I can't praise these editions highly enough!

A handy little paperback pocket edition of the great play you've read and seen many times. The 1994 Penguin Popular Classic edition is interesting because it includes twenty-two pages of introductory material about Shakespeare, his times, and the play itself, all written by an unnamed editor who uses the first-person and discusses editorial choices made in this version. The editor emphasizes the fact that there are weaknesses and holes in the text, caused by Shakespeare's writing on a short deadline in 1606 and by the fact that later editors and actors and compilers probably cut-and-pasted large sections. The result, counsels the editor, is that some scenes (including Hecat's speech in III-v, and the witches' appearance in IV-i) is "probably not by Shakespeare".This is rather a large leap. It may be true, but we have no way to know for sure. Other credible scholars (Levi, Bloom) note that these sections are unique, but do not aver that they are not by Shakespeare. In any event, it is rather interesting that this editor devotes so much space to this notion, and misses the opportunity to discuss other --more important-- elements of the play, such as the subtle poetry of Macbeth's speeches, the "post-Christian" religious significance, the blood-darkness-water themes, the parallels to Lear, or the political connections between Scottish Thanes and British Earls. Another quibble is with the notes: all the text notes and vocabulary are at the end of the book, so an interested reader is constantly riffling back and forth. Penguin should have followed Folger's admirable lead and put the text notes on the same pages as the text itself.

I read this book in class, with my Language Arts teacher and the rest of my class. We didn't do the exact play, just read through it, but it was fun. You may think, why are 7th graders reading Shakespeare? Well, the answer is, we have a great teacher with enthusiasm, that is willing to teach us with his characterists before we read it in high school with the most boring teacher in the world. Anyway, reading this was a blast. With the help of the New Folger Library explanations, and my teacher, I understood this play. It teaches that greed doesn't pay, no matter how hard you try, and how many people help you. Also, you will regret what you do, and realize it wasn't worth it when your head has been removed from your shoulders. It has these great messages, as well as no matter how "perfect" your plans are, they aren't and will backfire eventually. The characters are excellent, although some are very greedy, which makes this play interesting. This was the first Shakesspearean play I have ever read, although I have seen Romeo and Juliet at the opera. This got me interested in Shakespeare, and I plan to read his comedies, and possibly Hamlet.

There are four recordings of this play available and I feel this Harper Audio version is by far the best. If for no other reason, it preserves the poetry of Shakespeare's lines far more than do any of the others, thanks mostly to Anthony Quayle's reading. The rest of the cast are all veteran classical actors who know what they are about. And thankfully the director decided to forget about annoying Scottish accents! Grab this one and give some as gifts.