If you would like to use our texts and translations, please click here for more information.
Text
Lady Macbeth- A Scena
(1606)
English source:
William Shakespeare
He is about it:
Their doors are open; and the surfeited grooms
Do mock their charge with snores:
I have drugg'd their possets,
That death and nature do contend about them,
Whether they live or die...
I laid their daggers ready;
He could not miss 'em. Had he not resembled
My father as he slept, I had done't
Why did you bring these daggers from the place?
They must lie there: go carry them; and smear
The sleepy grooms with blood...
Infirm of purpose!
Give me the daggers: the sleeping and the dead
Are but as pictures: 'tis the eye of childhood
That fears a painted devil. If he do bleed,
I'll gild the faces of the grooms withal;
For it must seem their guilt.
Their doors are open; and the surfeited grooms
Do mock their charge with snores:
I have drugg'd their possets,
That death and nature do contend about them,
Whether they live or die...
I laid their daggers ready;
He could not miss 'em. Had he not resembled
My father as he slept, I had done't
Why did you bring these daggers from the place?
They must lie there: go carry them; and smear
The sleepy grooms with blood...
Infirm of purpose!
Give me the daggers: the sleeping and the dead
Are but as pictures: 'tis the eye of childhood
That fears a painted devil. If he do bleed,
I'll gild the faces of the grooms withal;
For it must seem their guilt.
Composer
Joseph Horovitz
Joseph Horovitz is a British composer and conductor.
Poet
William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare was an English poet, playwright, and actor, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet, and the "Bard of Avon". His extant…
Performances
Previously performed at:
- 40. Fairy Tales - Stanford to Sondheim: Kitty Whately & Simon Lepper 18 Oct 2019
- Kitty Whately / Sholto Kynoch 05 Mar 2016