A Castle as “Hell” and “Heaven”: Spaces and Their ‘Equivocal’ Meanings in Shakespeare’s Macbeth

One of the most graphic ways in which the world-modelling function of literary texts comes to the fore is the use of spaces, owing to the various meanings which are attributed to them in the process of ‘semanticization’. Although Jurij Lotman’s theory concerning literary space, which is arguably one of most illuminating discussions in the field, was developed mainly with reference to fiction, drama and the theatre are no less important in this respect, including, of course, Shakespeare’s plays. In the past few years, Macbeth in particular has come under scrutiny in this context, albeit space in this tragedy has mostly been analysed in an unsystematic and partial way (with special emphasis on the castles). The present essay, while drawing on previous research, purports to complement it by systematizing the spaces and their forms of semanticization in Macbeth, extending the spaces under discussion so that imagery and ‘transcendental’ spaces (heaven and hell) are also included; above all, it highlights the remarkably ambiguous, ‘equivocal’ and unstable use of spaces in this play as indicative of a profoundly ambivalent worldview.