Why do you think Shakespeare made the opening scene of Macbeth feature the three witches?

Answer 1

Shakespeare shows the three witches in the first scene of Macbeth to demonstrate that the play is a tragedy. Since witches are commonly associated with evil, this creates a dark and dangerous atmosphere and foreshadows death. The witches are also extremely important to the play because it is their prophecies that drive Macbeth and Lady Macbeth to commit terrible acts.

Answer 2

The first scenes of all plays and particularly Shakespeare's are intended to get the audience's attention and set the scene. The audience would take a while to settle down so the initial dialogue (which might be drowned out by audience noise) is frequently of little importance and takes place often between unimportant characters. Thus the first dialogue in Romeo and Juliet is between Sampson and Gregory, who we never see again, the first dialogue in Hamlet is between Bernardo and Francisco, in Julius Caesar between the tribunes and the people celebrating Caesar's triumph. Where the characters are more important (as Kent and Gloucester in King Lear) they do not talk about anything of particular importance. The same is the case here. The witches are intended to grab the audience's attention, but not say anything of much interest until the line "there to meet with Macbeth."

The witches also set the scene so the audience knows that this play is going to have the supernatural in it and that things will not be what they seem in this play "Fair is foul and foul is fair"

Answer 3

In the rambunctious theatre of Shakespeare's day, it was sometimes hard to settle down the crowd and catch their attention. Shakespeare often had attention-grabbing scenes to start plays off: swordfights, ghosts, riots and so on. He also often had minor characters in the first scenes so if people were slow to catch on they wouldn't miss a lot.

The witches proved to be a great attention-getter, even though they have nothing important to say in scene 1 (their important stuff comes in scene 3). At the same time, their first appearance is not essential to the plot, so if people are finishing their conversation in scene 1 they can pay attention to scene 2, where the setup of the play is going to be explained by the bloody sergeant.

Answer 4

Shakespeare liked his first scenes to do the following things: get the audience's attention but don't cover any important plot points. The audience would probably be distracted and it would take something to make them pay attention to what was going on onstage. For those who might not finish their purchase of snacks or conversation with their neighbour until the first few minutes of the play was done, it helped if nothing really significant happened in the first scene. Hence the witches, who are attention-getters, come on but don't say anything of significance.

Of course, Shakespeare broke this rule himself in Richard III which opens with a speech by the title character.

Answer 5

The three witches are a part of the Macbeth story as told in Holinshed's Chronicles. The opening scene introduces them, but does not say anything important about them. The main purpose of the scene is to catch the audience's attention, so they will pay attention to what is happening on stage. A great many Shakespeare plays start in this way, with scenes which do not involve the main character and often have some arresting aspect such as a brawl (Romeo and Juliet), a riot (Coriolanus) or a ghost (Hamlet). If you are paying attention to what the witches say, you will get a hint as to how this play will go with the words "fair is foul and foul is fair" which introduces the idea of things really being the opposite of what they seem. But if you missed that line because you were buying Oranges or a beer, you can pick up the action with the second scene.

Answer 6

It is an introduction to a character in Macbeth. The three witches.