Macbeth Dreams Visions and Hallucinations Rereading
The influence of Dreams, Visions and Hallucinations in Macbeth and other Literary Texts
“The realities of the world affected me as visions, and as visions only, while the wild ideas of the land of dreams became, in turn,—not the material of my every-day existence--but in very deed that existence utterly and solely in itself.” ---- Edgar Allan Poe Uncanny encounters with visions and hallucinations blur the presumed constraints of time and space. The ‘phantasms’ or sensory impressions incited by diurnal experiences which are unrealized in normal consciousness, gets holistically unveiled through conjuration of dreams. Referring to one of the foremost exponents of ‘weird’ literature Howard Phillips Lovecraft, definite emotions of pain and pleasure were associated to phenomena whose cause and effect could be discerned by men but those beyond his power of comprehension were marvellously interpreted as supernatural ploys thus, sowing the seeds of awe among a race possessing limited experience. The process of dreaming aided in constructing the notion of an unreal or spiritual world towards which man’s natural response was fear and hence, man’s hereditary essence became saturated with superstitions. Though the territory of the unknown has diminished in the present times, a physiological fixation in our nervous tissues makes the inherent associations, clinging around objects and processes once mysterious (but now explainable), become operative even when the conscious mind has been purged of all wonder. The appearance of the three Weird sisters at the inception of Shakespeare’s timeless play, Macbeth, excites a sense of awe coupled with a subtle dread due to contact with unknown spheres and forces and their re-appearance in the third scene after the King’s order establishes the influence of ‘supernatural soliciting’. The role of imagination is indispensible since, the deadly outcomes stemmed from imaginings of a sensitive mind and even the
“The realities of the world affected me as visions, and as visions only, while the wild ideas of the land of dreams became, in turn,—not the material of my every-day existence--but in very deed that existence utterly and solely in itself.” ---- Edgar Allan Poe Uncanny encounters with visions and hallucinations blur the presumed constraints of time and space. The ‘phantasms’ or sensory impressions incited by diurnal experiences which are unrealized in normal consciousness, gets holistically unveiled through conjuration of dreams. Referring to one of the foremost exponents of ‘weird’ literature Howard Phillips Lovecraft, definite emotions of pain and pleasure were associated to phenomena whose cause and effect could be discerned by men but those beyond his power of comprehension were marvellously interpreted as supernatural ploys thus, sowing the seeds of awe among a race possessing limited experience. The process of dreaming aided in constructing the notion of an unreal or spiritual world towards which man’s natural response was fear and hence, man’s hereditary essence became saturated with superstitions. Though the territory of the unknown has diminished in the present times, a physiological fixation in our nervous tissues makes the inherent associations, clinging around objects and processes once mysterious (but now explainable), become operative even when the conscious mind has been purged of all wonder. The appearance of the three Weird sisters at the inception of Shakespeare’s timeless play, Macbeth, excites a sense of awe coupled with a subtle dread due to contact with unknown spheres and forces and their re-appearance in the third scene after the King’s order establishes the influence of ‘supernatural soliciting’. The role of imagination is indispensible since, the deadly outcomes stemmed from imaginings of a sensitive mind and even the
Cited: Arnold, Aerol: “The Recapitulation Dream in Richard III and Macbeth.” Shakespeare Quarterly, Vol. 6, No. 1 (Winter, 1955), pp. 51-62, JSTOR Bella, Tenijoy La: “A Strange Infirmity”: Lady Macbeth’s Amenorrhea Crawford, A.W.: “The Apparitions in Macbeth.” Modern Language Notes, Vol. 39, No. 6 (Jun., 1924), pp. 345-350, JSTOR Fahey, Caitlin Jeanne: “Altogether governed by humours: The Four Temperaments in Shakespeare” Favila, Marina: “Mortal Thoughts and Magical Thinking in Macbeth.” Modern Philology, Vol. 99, No. 1 (Aug., 2001), pp. 1-25, JSTOR Foucault, Michael: Madness and Civilization Grossvogel, David I.: “When the Stain Won’t Wash: Polanski’s Macbeth.” Diacritics, Vol. 2, No. 2 (Summer, 1972), pp. 46-51 JSTOR Kramer, Heinrich and Sprenger, James: The Malleus Maleficarum Parker, Barbara L.: “The Great Illusion.” The Sewanee Review, Vol. 78, No. 3 (Summer, 1970), pp. 476-487, JSTOR Paul, Henry N: “Macbeth’s Imagination”- Bloom’s Macbeth through the Ages Welles, Orson dir., Macbeth, Republic Pictures, 1948.Film.