CRITICISM

Baldo, Jonathan. “The Politics of Aloofness in Macbeth.” English Literary Renaissance 26, No. 3 (Autumn 1996): 531-60.

Discusses Macbeth in the context of Jacobean politics.

Berryman, John. “On Macbeth.” In Berryman's Shakespeare, edited by John Haffenden, pp. 319-34. New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 1999.

Analyzes Macbeth in the context of Elizabethan and Jacobean cultures, including an overview of the play's major themes and action.

Callaghan, Dympna. “Wicked Women in Macbeth: A Study of Power, Ideology, and the Production of Motherhood.” In Reconsidering the Renaissance: Papers from the Twenty-First Annual Conference, edited by Mario A. Di Cesare, pp. 355-69. Binghamton, NY: Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies, 1992.

Explores the cultural conflict between patriarchy and the rule of mothers, as well as skepticism surrounding witchcraft as it is portrayed in Macbeth.

Fox, Alice. “Obstetrics and Gynecology in Macbeth.” Shakespeare Studies 12 (1979): 127-42.

Focuses on the frequent use of the vocabulary of obstetrics and gynecology in the language used by Macbeth and Lady Macbeth.

Guj, Luisa. “Macbeth and the Seeds of Time.” Shakespeare Studies 18 (1986): 175-88.

Explores Shakespeare's treatment of the theme of time in Macbeth, tracing its origins in Renaissance myths, icons, and emblems.

Helms, Lorraine. “The Weyward Sisters: Towards a Feminist Staging of Macbeth.” New Theatre Quarterly 8, No. 30 (May 1992): 167-77.

Studies the role of the witches in Macbeth, exploring the difficulty in staging the play in the absence of theater conventions that were prevalent in Shakespeare's day.

Janton, Pierre. “Sonship and Fatherhood in Macbeth.” Cahiers Elisabethains 35 (April 1989): pp. 47-58.

Explores the theory that fear of assuming manhood is Macbeth's tragic flaw, leading him to annihilate all the potential and virtual father figures in the play.

Love, H. W. “Seeing the Difference: Good and Evil in the World of Macbeth.” Australasian Universities Language and Literature Association Journal (AUMLA) 72 (1989): 203-28.

Examines Macbeth as a morality play, with special focus on the use of supernatural elements and vice figures.

Lynch, Kathryn L. “‘What Hands Are Here?’: The Hand as Generative Symbol in Macbeth.” Review of English Studies 39, No. 153 (February 1988): 29-38.

Explores the significance of the hand motif in Macbeth.

Richardson, Brian. “‘Hours Dreadful and Things Strange’: Inversions of Chronology and Causality in Macbeth.” Philological Quarterly 68, No. 3 (Summer 1989): 283-94.

Suggests that the inversions of chronology in Macbeth are designed to mirror the central concerns of the play and that Shakespeare uses time as an integral part of his narrative technique.

Waters, D. Douglas. “Catharsis as Clarification.” In Christian Settings in Shakespeare's Tragedies, pp. 79-118. Cranbury, NJ: Associated University Press, 1994.

Discusses Shakespeare's tragic plays, and proposes that catharsis as clarification is the reader's main response to Shakespearean tragedies in Christian settings.

Willbern, David. “Phantasmagoric Macbeth.” English Literary Renaissance 16, No. 3 (Autumn 1986): 520-49.

Sketches a three-dimensional map of Macbeth in a visceral, psychoanalytic, and phantasmagoric context.

Wintle, Sarah and René Weis. “Macbeth and the Barren Sceptre.” Essays in Criticism 41, No. 2 (April 1991): 128-46.

Explores the topical nature of the action recreated in Macbeth, including references to such contemporary incidents as the Gunpowder Plot and other Jacobean political concerns.