The Witches

• The Witches


  Symbol of external evil, representatives of the Devil on earth
• The Witches


  • Grotesque (described as having bearded faces, heightening the sense that they are supernatural or unnatural)
  • Duplicitous (their prophecies are deliberately misleading, leading to characters misunderstanding them)
  • Malevolent (seen plotting evil acts of torture against ordinary people before delivering their first three prophecies)
  • Disruptive (constantly seen to disrupt nature with storms and spells, and seek to disrupt the Great Chain of Being and God's authority over the world)
• The Witches


  Can be seen as agents of fate, only predicting the inevitable consequences of characters' actions
• Shakespeare may also be suggesting that the witches are only manifestations of the characters' psychological realities: they only encourage characters to be true to their own – evil – selves