The Authenticity of Hecate in Macbeth

The Authenticity of Hecate in Macbeth

The authenticity issue of Macbeth's Hecate endures. Recent critics still argue about whether the scenes are Shakespearean, why they are or are not, and what the implications are one way or the other. Some critics cling to the authenticity of the Folio while others wave their copies of Middleton's "The Witch" in protest. The modern director and reader then will find no clear direction to read or not to read from textual scholarship. Instead, would-be travellers to the world of Macbeth had better consider their options and ask specifically: what does Hecate add with her appearance and how do these additions impact the play?

Some critics have made the mistake of trying to dismiss Hecate as a fetching song-and-dance girl. In his Introduction to Macbeth, editor Kenneth Muir remarks: "The Hecate passages were clearly invented to introduce the songs and Middleton is usually blamed for these insertions" (xxxiii). But more recent critics like Henri Suhamy take umbrage with both the form and the substance of this argument. Suhamy notes: "the direction printed in italics in the Folio, after line 33 (III,v)--"Musicke, and a Song"--does not mention any identifiable song, contrary to what is indicated by most editors" (274). Stallybrass seems also to believe that Hecate is there to dance, but at least he credits her with a particularly important number: "the dance of Hecate and the six Witches gives a concrete dramatization of the 'deed without a name' (IV.i.49) which reverses the whole order of 'Nature'" (200). What Hecate's interpolation really supplies, however, is order and much more: balance, authority, direction, and reason are all part of the substance she provides.

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