Macbeth and Harry Potter - prophecy parallels

[Geoff Bannister]

No: HPFGUIDX 129132

Although much bandwidth has been expended in discussing the subject 
of the prophecy I have tended in the past to avoid these discussions 
because I do not consider myself to be any sort of expert in this 
area but my interest has been raised by comparisons with the 
prophecies in Shakespeare's Macbeth made by JKR.

I posted some thoughts along these lines a little while ago in 
message 128332. These had in part been triggered off by the fact that 
in the POA "medium which dare not speak its name" the Hogwarts choir 
sing a song which draws exclusively on the words used by the three 
witches. Also, in the advertising, the slogan "Something wicked this 
way comes" was used. 

JKR's comments on her website suggest that the Macbeth story may have 
been at the back of her mind on occasions; there are little clues in 
the books – the Weird Sisters pop group for example using 
Shakespeare's name for his coven. There are similarities between the 
way in which prophecy is handled by these two authors – and also 
dissimilarities - and I wanted to draw some parallels between them.

In both Macbeth and HP, the authors have constructed careful 
smokescreens to mislead the recipients of the prophecies so that the 
end products are not perhaps quite what they expect.

In Macbeth, the witches are setting out with the intent of bringing 
him down and engineering his destruction. At their first meeting, 
they present him with a truth and a prophecy. He is greeted as Thane 
of Cawdor and, soon after this, he has the news confirmed by 
messengers from King Duncan that the previous Thane has been stripped 
of his title. Now, Macbeth at this point could have thought "Well, 
maybe the prophecy will come true. Duncan might die or fall in battle 
and perhaps the crown might come to me." In which case the prophecy 
would have been fulfilled without any side effects.

However, he tells Lady Macbeth of his meeting and she decides that a 
little help is needed in getting the prophecy to take effect. In 
passing, I wonder whether I can see something of Bellatrix 
Lestrange's style in the way she sets out to achieve her aims. She 
cajoles, bullies and manipulates Macbeth into killing the king, 
taking the crown and actually bringing about the fulfilment of the 
prophecy by his own actions.

It is only because of this that Macbeth goes to see the witches to 
try to gain reassurance that all is well and receives their second 
message - a warning and two prophecies. Beware of Macduff as a 
warning and the prophecies that his position is safe unless Birnam 
Wood comes to Dunsinane Castle and also that he will not be 
vanquished by a man born of woman. The twist is in the way in which 
he interprets the two prophecies and the way in which they are 
implemented to bring about his downfall.

Two dissimilarities with the Harry Potter prophecies are that they 
are not given to the same person and they do not apparently refer to 
the same person. However, the first prophecy presents a truth and a 
prophecy. The truth is that a child will be born at the end of the 
seventh month. The prophecy, which Voldemort only hears in part is 
that this child will vanquish the Dark Lord. But, because of his own 
wish for power – echoing that, at least, of Lady Macbeth – he sets 
off to destroy the child without finding out the rest of the 
prediction, setting his sights on Harry and possibly also Neville and 
thus actually bringing about a partial fulfilment of the prophecy by 
his own actions. I say a partial fulfilment because for the time 
being Voldemort has been vanquished; after the events of Godric's 
Hollow, he was stripped of his body and his powers and - especially 
that of independent physical action - for fourteen years. The second 
prophecy seems not to be directed at Voldemort but those around him 
and may not present a parallel to the Macbeth predictions.

What is interesting is that Macbeth is warned to beware of Macduff; 
the final link in the chain of his downfall is that one of the two 
later prophecies given by the Weird Sisters does not apply to Macduff 
and thus Macbeth's imagined immunity is proved invalid. Now, although 
miles of ink and hours of thought have been given to the Hogsmeade 
prophecy by the hyper-intelligent pan-dimensional beings who inhabit 
HPFGU, is there something skilfully and fiendishly buried in the 
wording which can produce a "Macduff effect" on Voldemort?

I will make my own prophecy. Beware of innocent looking authors with 
long blond hair.......

I await the remaining books with increasing curiosity.