A Spatial Interpretation Of Macbeth

In 1564, British literary world gives birth to a great man—William Shakespeare—who creates quantity of popular works by using rich vocabulary and unique techniques. Shakespeare and his works play an important and special role in World literature. William Shakespeare’s four great tragedies Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, and Macbeth are his most important and famous creations in his literary career. The shortest length of the text, the swiftest movement of the plot and the strongest emotion of characters are Macbeth’s distinguishing features. It depicts a story that the hero Macbeth turns into a brutal tyrant under the effect of various factors. For many years, various critical approaches have been applied to analyze Shakespeare’s Macbeth, among which mainly are: Psychoanalytic approach, Feminist criticism, Existentialism, Images & Symbols and Tragic theme analysis, etc. In recent years, “spatial turn” appeared, spatial issues have invited more and more scholars’ and critics’ attention and interest. Spatial narrative was applied in literature field more frequently. However, few articles have approached dramatic texts from the perspective of spatial narrative, especially for Shakespeare’s Macbeth, no article has systemically studied this work from the perspective of spatial narrative.This dissertation “A Spatial Interpretation of Macbeth” sheds light on the notion of “Spatial Narrative” and explores the types of space, techniques of spatial narrative in Macbeth. To begin with, it introduces the research background and makes a brief knowledge of the spatial narrative. Next, it is the main part of this dissertation which employs Henri Lefebvre’s, Gabriel Zoran’s and other scholars’ spatial narrative theories to interpret Macbeth. From the perspective of topographical space, it discusses three specific topographical spatial scenes in Macbeth, that is, desert place, city castle and battle field. Each geographical space has a different environment, diverse atmosphere, disparate meanings, various events, so produces different social space and psychological space. This different space’s interpretation provides a better understanding of this tragedy. From the perspective of social space, it analyzes England’s turbulent social background at that time and the culture background influenced by Greek and Hebrew. Psychological space part focuses on the protagonist Macbeth’s conflict between “id”, “ego” and “superego” and Lady Macbeth’s “self-lost”. Textual space part discusses two techniques applied in this great work, that is, narrative trap and polyphony narrative. Finally, the part of conclusion gives a summary to the whole thesis. Macbeth is a great work which need different angle to interpret and need new element to further appreciate. Space in literature becomes more and more attractive. A spatial interpretation of dramatic text Macbeth is a new and a bold try, also a difficult try.