蘇格蘭軍中大將馬克白與班戈，在勝仗歸國途中遇見三個女巫，女巫們預言馬克白將成為國王，而班戈的子子孫孫，都會成為蘇格蘭的國王，這預言在馬克白心中留下深刻的印象，引起了馬克白夫婦謀刺國王的行動，也進而引起馬克白對班戈父子的謀殺，馬克白一心想改變命運，一方面展開血腥爭奪，一方面又深受良心的譴責，終使他產生幻覺而瘋狂，成為野心侵蝕下的悲劇者。《馬克白》是莎士比亞在憂鬱時期所寫下的四大悲劇作品之一，筆下的人物馬克白，則是一個不知滿足、被野心吞沒的悲劇人物。
This is the first edition of "Macbeth" to be developed by and for the RSC, the world's leading Shakespeare theatre company and it includes unique material to help the reader understand and enjoy Shakespeare on the stage as well as on the page. It is illustrated with photographs of classic and unusual performances. Outstanding on-page notes explain words and phrases unfamiliar to a modern audience, including the slang, political references and bawdy humour often ignored or censored in competing editions. The book includes scene-by-scene summary, offering an easily understandable way into the play; presents a completely new introduction by Jonathan Bate, exploring the text and critical debates around it; contains a summary of the play's performance history, at the RSC and elsewhere; and features interviews with important Shakespearean directors Rupert Goold, Gregory Doran and Trevor Nunn discussing key productions at the RSC.
作者簡介：
About the Author
JONATHAN BATE is Professor of Shakespeare and Renaissance Literature, University of Warwick, UK, and the editor of The RSC Shakespeare: The Complete Works. He has held visiting posts at Harvard, Yale and UCLA and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, a Fellow of the British Academy, an Honorary Fellow of St Catherine's College, Cambridge, and a Governor and Board member of the Royal Shakespeare Company. A prominent critic, award-winning biographer and broadcaster, he is the author of several books on Shakespeare, including The Genius of Shakespeare (Picador), which was praised by Sir Peter Hall, founder of the RSC, as "the best modern book on Shakespeare." In June 2006 he was awarded a CBE by HM The Queen 'for services to Higher Education'. ERIC RASMUSSEN is Professor of English at the University of Nevada, USA, and the Textual Editor of The RSC Shakespeare: The Complete Works. He is co-editor of the Norton Anthology of English Renaissance Drama and has edited volumes in both the Arden Shakespeare and Oxford World's Classics series. He is the General Textual Editor of the Internet Shakespeare Editions project - one of the most visited Shakespeare websites in the world. For over nine years he has written the annual review of editions and textual studies for the Shakespeare Survey.