Macbeth “Fair is foul and foul is fair, hover through the fog and filthy air.” It almost sounds like the three witches at the opening of William Shakespeare’s tragedy Macbeth (1605-6) are describing aspects of the global situation in the 21st century. Urged by his wife, Macbeth kills King Duncan in Act V to become the new king of Scotland. Lady Macbeth falls into a kind of madness. Her sleepwalking and attempts to wash the bloodstains – “Out damned spot!” – from her hands exemplify what later might be designated as obsessive-compulsive behavior. Lady Macbeth suicides from overweening guilt. Macbeth himself leads an apparently ‘charmed’ existence. He cannot be killed by one born of a woman. But he is finally beheaded by Macduff who was “untimely ripped” from his mother’s womb. Just before his death, Macbeth’s name is described as “a hotter name than any is in hell.” » Atlantis, Glamour, Madness, Obsession, Undoing
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