George V. Reilly

Review: Macbeth: A Novel

Macbeth: A Novel
Title: Macbeth: A Novel
Author: A.J. Hartley, David Hewson
Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★
Publisher: Thomas & Mercer
Copyright: 2012
Pages: 328
Keywords: historical fiction
Reading period: 5–6 April, 2015

Macbeth is an honorable Scottish lord who serves an ignoble king. When Malcolm finally goes too far, Macbeth and his wife convince themselves that Malcolm must die. (Encounters with a trio of strange women also swayed their minds.) Macbeth himself becomes king but guilt and paranoia start eating away at him and his wife.

Hartley and Hewson retell Shake­speare’s classic play as a novel, providing psy­cho­log­i­cal motivation for Macbeth’s usurpation and downfall. Their Lady Macbeth is more sym­pa­thet­ic and less nakedly ambitious than she is usually portrayed.

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