Macbett

{{short description|1972 satirical play by Eugène Ionesco}}

{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}}

{{Infobox play

| name = Macbett

| image =

| image_size =

| caption =

| writer = Eugène Ionesco

| characters =

| setting =

| premiere = 1972

| place = Théâtre de l'Alliance française

| orig_lang = French

| subject =

| genre = satire

}}

Macbett is Eugène Ionesco's satire on Shakespeare's Macbeth first staged in 1972.{{sfn|Billington|2007}}{{sfn|Curtiss|1972}}

Plot

Two generals, Macbett and Banco, put down a rebellion. In payment for their heroic service, Archduke Duncan promises to bestow on them land, titles and cash, but he reneges on the deal. Encouraged by the seductive Lady Duncan, Macbett plots to assassinate the Archduke and crown himself King. He tries to maintain his tenuous grip on the throne through a vicious cycle of murder and bloodshed. Meanwhile, he is haunted by the ghosts of his victims and discovers that his new wife is not all that she seems.

Themes

Written during the Cold War, Ionesco's Macbett remoulds Shakespeare's Macbeth into a comic tale of ambition, corruption, cowardice and excess, creating a tragic farce which takes human folly to its wildest extremes. Innovations include a long conversation between the thanes of Glamiss and Candor, the characters of a lemonade seller and butterfly hunter, and the revelation that the rightful heir to the throne is a worse tyrant than Macbett ever was.{{sfn|Smith|2003|pp=77–78}}

See also

References

{{reflist|20em}}

Sources

{{refbegin|30em}}

  • {{cite web

|title = Macbett

|last = Billington

|first = Michael

|author-link = Michael Billington (critic)

|website = The Guardian

|date = 18 June 2007

|access-date = 6 January 2018

|url = https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2007/jun/18/theatre

}}

  • {{cite news

|title = Ionesco Upends Macbeth Story

|last = Curtiss

|first = Thomas Quinn

|newspaper = The New York Times

|date = 9 February 1972

|page = 45

|access-date = 6 January 2018

|url = https://www.nytimes.com/1972/02/09/archives/ionesco-upends-macbeth-story-shakespeares-play-detours-into.html

}}

  • {{cite book

|title = Macbeth: Language and Writing

|last = Smith

|first = Emma

|series = Arden Student Guides

|publisher = A&C Black

|year = 2003

|isbn = 9781408156032

}}

{{refend}}

{{Ionesco Plays}}

{{Macbeth}}

Category:Plays by Eugène Ionesco

Category:Theatre of the Absurd

Category:1972 plays

Category:Plays and musicals based on Macbeth

Category:Plays set in Scotland

Category:Satirical plays

{{1970s-play-stub}}