THE WITCHES' SPELL
 
 

Double, double, toil and trouble; 

Fire burn, and cauldron bubble. 

Fillet of a fenny snake 

In the cauldron boil and bake; 

Eye of newt, and toe of frog, 

Wool of bat, and tongue of dog, 

Adder's fork, and blind-worm's sting, 

Lizard's leg and owlet's wing, 

For a charm of powerful trouble, 

Like a hell-broth, boil and bubble. 

Double, double, toil and trouble; 

Fire burn, and cauldron bubble. 
 
 

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

 
 

Projektbeschreibung
von H. Schlieger
Für die Oberstufe war es über eine längere Zeit schwierig, geeignete Partner zu finden. Erst als wir Zugang zu amerikanischen Schulnetzen bekommen konnten, die ein reichhaltiges Angebot an E-mail Projekten offerierten und uns zu eigenen Ideen anregten, entschlossen wir uns (mein Englischkollege Graham Wood und ich), selbst initiativ zu werden.
Die Schulnetze verfahren nach dem einfachen Prinzip "schickt uns Eure Ideen - wir vermitteln die Partner". Das Schulnetz IECC (Intercultural E-Mail Classroom Connections) verbreitete an Schulen aus über 60 Ländern unser Angebot über eine sogenannte "Mailing List". Jede angeschlossene Schule empfing auf diesem Weg die folgende Aufforderung zur Mitarbeit:


To: iecc-projects@stolaf.edu
Subject: 9-12PROJ>Macbeth Lit Proj (From Germany)
Cc: Helmut Schlieger TGA 
Date - Tue, 21 Feb 1995 22:57:11 +0000
To - IDEAS@acme.fred.org
Subject - Call for participation
Name of our project: MACBETH (Shakespeare) 
Date:  Starting and ending dates of the complete project: April 24th to May 12th 
Purpose: Cross-cultural exchange of ideas and opinions. 
Subjects: "MACBETH"- Practise in English 
Grade level: Advanced students at secondary schools 
Summary: To call into question and discuss some of the accepted wisdom about the characters in "MACBETH". 
Our first motion will be:
"- Macbeth is the best of a bad lot - "
Number of participants: 3 classrooms 
Project Coordinator: Graham Wood  eMail
Project Organization: Helmut Schlieger eMail
School Homepage: Trifels-Gymnasium Annweiler / Germany


Die Schulen, die sich bald darauf meldeten, waren aus den USA (Hawaii, Texas, Nebraska, Massachusetts), Kanada (British Columbia) und Australien (Canberra) Hier die Anmeldung der Partner aus Hawaii:


Dear Mr. Wood,
We would like to participate in your Macbeth project. We are a class of eight seniors in Advanced Placement English. We read Othello earlier this year, and have not read Macbeth. If we are selected for this project, we will read it and be ready to engage in conversation by April 24. Please let us know if we are selected so we may begin our reading.
Cynthia Matsuoka Kauai High and Intermediate School 3577 Lala Road Lihue, Hawaii 96766 Email: Cynth64001@aol.com


Sobald die Teilnehmer feststanden, verschickten wir an alle Diskussionsthemen, die die Schüler unseres Leistungskurses Englisch, Jahrgangsstufe 12, im Unterricht mit Herrn Wood entwickelt hatten. Ziel war es, themenbezogene Gruppendiskussionen durchzuführen mit Gruppenmitgliedern aus den jeweiligen Schulen, also "internationale Klassenzimmer" zu erzeugen, die themenspezifisch kooperierten. In unserem Fall diskutierten Schülergruppen aus 3 Kontinenten! Unsere Arbeitsthemen waren bewußt "provokatorischer Natur", da sie inhaltlich der traditionellen Interpretation des Stückes widersprachen und so die Diskussionsfreude steigern sollten. Folgende Mail ging an die Partner:


Dear participating schools, dear MACBETH students, 
Please give us your thoughts on ONE of the following unconventional but in our opinion reasonable statements: 
MACBETH
is a victim of a fate which exploits his most positive qualities.

LADY MACBETH
is a victim of her love for her husband, she feels it her duty to help him to realize his desire. 

DUNCAN 
is an incompetent ruler, directly responsible for the chaos that follows him. 

MALCOLM
is a coward who does not deserve the crown. 

BANQUO
is a hypocritical opportunist. 

THANES
are just time-servers.

Our students intend to make Thursday our MAILDAY. Thank you, Graham Wood 

Der Hinweis am Ende (MAILDAY) ist von besonderer Bedeutung. Alle Teilnehmer sollen wissen, wann mit Antworten zu rechnen ist. Dies erleichtert den Arbeitsrhythmus und stellt eine organisatorische Erleichterung für den Postverteiler ("postmaster") dar, der die vielen Mails den jeweiligen Gruppen weiterleitet und neue versendet. Kann der Termin aus unterschiedlichen Gründen (Feiertage, Schulveranstaltungen, Ferien, etc.) nicht eingehalten werden, so sind alle darüber zu informieren.

M A I L S 
Ein kurzer Auszug 
aus der Diskussion 
"Lady Macbeth"		 Date: Fri, 2 Jun 1995 09:14:35 -0500
To: atg@rhrk.uni-kl.de 
From: Ann Koppeis Bowles
Subject: re: Macbeth (2) 

Lady Macbeth

        I disagree with the statement that Lady Macbeth is a victim of her love for her husband, and that she feels it her duty to help him to realize his desire.  Lady Macbeth is a very sick and horrible woman who uses her influence over her husband to cause him to murder the king.  Lady Macbeth plays on Macbeth's ego by basically saying he is a weak loser if he does not murder the king to build up his and her power. 
Lady Macbeth does not even feel remorse when her husband kills the king.  When he comes in the room feeling very guilty she just simply belittles him, takes the knives he used to murder the king with, and returns them back to the sight of the murder.  Then she smears blood on the guardians faces, to make them look guilty, and returns back to her room. 
After the murder Macbeth cannot sleep because of the guilt he feels, but Lady Macbeth feels no guilt and sleeps fine.  This is ironic because later in the play Lady Macbeth can no longer sleep and sleepwalks, trying to scrub the blood off her hands. 
Lady Macbeth is also a very evil woman.  To help her fulfill her the murder she calls on the "dark powers" and hopes they can "unsex" her.  She is also the person that thinks of the devious plan to kill the king.  I do not feel that Lady Macbeth made her husband kill the king,  but I do feel that she was a big influence. 

Kate McDonough 
English Period 2 
May 8,1995
REPLY: Dear Kate, 

        How cruel you are to Lady Macbeth! Don't you realize that she FORCES herself to act in what she believes are her husband's best interests? 
She knows that he desperately wants the crown and, as a loyal wife, does  everything she can to secure his "content". Evil is not natural to her; she has to pray for it. You are making a big mistake in trying to see everything in terms of good and bad, black and white. ALL the characters in MACBETH are in some way evil; Lady Macbeth is the one who  suffers most for it. 
Praying to the devil after having received Macbeth's letter ("unsex me") is important because it shows us something extraordinary of the relationship between Macbeth and Lady Macbeth: He has no secrets from her and she is his "dearest partner of greatness". Lady Macbeth understands her husband well. She knows that he has great ambitions but she also knows that he is honourable and that his sense of honour will not allow him to "catch the nearest way". She knows that she will have to urge her husband on becoming king and THIS IS WHY she sacrifices herself and calls for evil spirits to help her. 
In addition we mustn't forget that Lady Macbeth and Macbeth actually live a usual married life. Consequently it is in fact her duty to help her husband to realize his desire; unfortunately she becomes a victim of her love. 
Yours, Regine Alebrand, Melanie Schramm 
Trifels-Gymnasium Annweiler
Ein kurzer Auszug 
aus der Diskussion 
"Macbeth":		 Date: Fri, 2 Jun 1995 09:14:10 -0500 
To: atg@rhrk.uni-kl.de 
From: Ann Koppeis Bowles 
Subject: re: Macbeth (1) 

"Macbeth is a victim of a fate which exploits his most positive qualities"

        I believe that this is a false statement.  All of the things that happened to Macbeth had nothing to do with fate. Macbeth's greed was tempted by the three witches.  What they told him would happen was only going to come about through his own doings.  If he had wanted to he could have prevented his downfall. 
When Macbeth was told that he was going to be king, his greed overtook him and he began plotting to kill the king and take the throne. 
This was not fate. It was a suggestion given by the witches to Macbeth, that he acted on. 
I do see that Macbeth was a good man with positive qualities and that he changes to an evil man.  This was the result of his greed eating him up and the guilt from an action of his own doing, taking over his life. 

Alexis Major (Dover-Sherborn High School in Dover, Massachusetts)
REPLY: Dear Alexis, 

        I disagree with your opinion that fate has no influence on Macbeth. 
You have to consider the fact that people at the time when Macbeth lived believed in supernatural powers. So the witches' prophecies do only strengthen his desire to become king but also lead him to believe that it is his fate to succeed to the throne. Although he tries to resist his thoughts of regicide, there is not much he can do to "prevent his downfall". 
First of all he has the perfect opportunity to kill Duncan who comes to visit him in his castle. 
Secondly, his wife who is obsessed by the idea to make him king persuades him to commit murder. 
Thirdly, the unnatural events that take place in the first few scenes of the play such as the dagger that Macbeth sees in front of him and the stars that don't come out at night make him feel like there is some great power on his side. So, whatelse could he do but believe that he must become king? 

Regine Alebrand (Trifels-Gymnasium Annweiler)
zum Anfang