Macbeth: Act 1, Scene ii: Homework

We’ve launched into the reading of Macbeth with visceral vigour. Tonight’s homework is to translate the following (spoken by the bleeding and bloody Sargeant about the events in a recent battle) into contemporary English

We’ve launched into the reading of Macbeth with visceral vigour. Tonight’s homework is to translate the following (spoken by the bleeding and bloody Sargeant about the events in a recent battle) into contemporary English. Feel free to come up with your own metaphors!

 

Sergeant
Doubtful it stood;
As two spent swimmers, that do cling together
And choke their art. The merciless Macdonwald–
Worthy to be a rebel, for to that
The multiplying villanies of nature
Do swarm upon him–from the western isles
Of kerns and gallowglasses is supplied;
And fortune, on his damned quarrel smiling,
Show’d like a rebel’s whore: but all’s too weak:
For brave Macbeth–well he deserves that name–
Disdaining fortune, with his brandish’d steel,
Which smoked with bloody execution,
Like valour’s minion carved out his passage
Till he faced the slave;
Which ne’er shook hands, nor bade farewell to him,
Till he unseam’d him from the nave to the chaps,
And fix’d his head upon our battlements.

Posted by Christopher Waugh

“Risk! Risk anything! Care no more for the opinions of others, for those voices. Do the hardest thing on earth for you. Act for yourself. Face the truth.” (Katherine Mansfield)

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