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What else can be said about Macbeth. An infinite amount of movies and theatre productions have been made of this most tragic of tragedies, most horrific of horror stories - complete with witches and murder. Lady Macbeth is one of literature's ultimate evil women and she can never manage to wash the blood off her hands - such a fantastic psychological illustration of guilt has never been surpassed until perhaps Raskolnikov's dialogs with Sonya in Crime and Punishment. A must-read and one of the greatest Shakespeare plays among so many titanic, staggering works.

The book begins with the three "weird sisters" who anticipate Macbeth's arrival. We then switch to Macbeth with his companions after a bloody, successful battle and see the ill-fated Banquo before, in the next scene, the two of them fall upon the weird sisters on the "blasted heath" and their fatal predictions are made as to the rise of Macbeth. Banquo is barely affected other than the strangeness of the scene, but Macbeth is truly inspired. Critics have for centuries asked whether, without the weird sisters, Macbeth would have been capable of all the murders that will soon begin. I feel that he already a smoldering piece of evil inside him (like that in the toaster at the end of 'The Time Bandits') and that the weird sisters as well as Lady Macbeth gave him the final push towards action, without which it is possible that he would have remained a sort of evil reflection of Hamlet.

It never ceases to amaze me the power of the writing and the deep psychology of Macbeth and his deadly Lady. Blind and bloody ambition. Are they avenging the world for her barren womb? How close does Richard III come to Macbeth’s depravity? The two stories are quite similar, but Macbeth is a bigger, grander character. Stupendous literature.

Fino's Reviews of Shakespeare and Shakespearean Criticism
Comedies
The Comedy of Errors (1592-1593
The Taming of the Shrew (1593-1594)
The Two Gentlemen of Verona (1594-1595)
Love's Labour's Lost (1594-1595)
A Midsummer Night's Dream (1595-1596)
The Merchant of Venice (1596-1597)
Much Ado About Nothing (1598-1599)
As You Like It (1599-1600)
Twelfth Night (1599-1600)
The Merry Wives of Windsor (1600-1601)
All's Well That Ends Well (1602-1603)
Measure for Measure (1604-1605)
Cymbeline (1609-1610)
A Winter's Tale (1610-1611)
The Tempest (1611-1612)
Two Noble Kinsmen (1612-1613)

Histories
Henry VI Part I (1589-1590)
Henry VI Part II (1590-1591)
Henry VI Part III (1590-1591)
Richard III (1593-1594)
Richard II (1595-1596)
King John (1596-1597)
Edward III (1596-1597)
Henry IV Part I (1597-1598)
Henry IV Part II (1597-1598)
Henry V (1598-1599)
Henry VIII (1612-1612)

Tragedies
Titus Andronicus (1592-1593)
Romeo and Juliet (1594-1595)
Julius Caesar (1599-1600)
Hamlet (1600-1601)
Troilus and Cressida (1601-1602)
Othello (1604-1605)
King Lear (1605-1606)
Macbeth (1605-1606)
Anthony and Cleopatra (1606-1607)
Coriolanus (1607-1608)
Timon of Athens (1607-1608)
Pericles (1608-1609)

Shakespearean Criticism
The Wheel of Fire by Wilson Knight
A Natural Perspective by Northrop Frye
Shakespeare After All by Marjorie Garber
Shakespeare's Roman Plays and Their Background by M W MacCallum
Shakespearean Criticism 1919-1935 compiled by Anne Ridler
Shakespearean Tragedy by A.C. Bradley
Shakespeare's Sexual Comedy by Hugh M. Richmond
Shakespeare: The Comedies by R.P. Draper
Tyrant: Shakespeare on Politics by Stephen Greenblatt
1599: A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare by James Shapiro

Collections of Shakespeare
Venus and Adonis, the Rape of Lucrece and Other Poems
Shakespeare's Sonnets and a Lover's Complaint
The Complete Oxford Shakespeare