Editing Banquo (section)

===Ghost scenes===
When Macbeth returns to the witches later in the play, they show him an apparition of the murdered Banquo, along with eight of his descendants. The scene carries deep significance: King James, on the throne when ''Macbeth'' was written, was believed to be separated from Banquo by nine generations. What Shakespeare writes here thus amounts to a strong support of James' right to the throne by lineage, and for audiences of Shakespeare's day, a very real fulfilment of the witches' prophecy to Banquo that his sons would take the throne.<ref>{{cite journal |title="Macbeth": King James's Play |last=Williams |first=George Walton |journal=[[South Atlantic Review]] |date=May 1982 |volume=47 |issue=2 |pages=12–21 |doi=10.2307/3199207|jstor=3199207 }}</ref> This apparition is also deeply unsettling to Macbeth, who not only wants the throne for himself, but also desires to father a line of kings.<ref>{{cite journal |title=The Apparitions in Macbeth, Part II |last=Crawford |first=A. W. |journal=[[Modern Language Notes]]|publisher=[[The Johns Hopkins University Press]]|location=Baltimore, Maryland|date=November 1924 |volume=39 |issue=7 |pages=383–388  |doi=10.2307/2914760|jstor=2914760 }}</ref>

Banquo's other appearance as a ghost during the banquet scene serves as an indicator of Macbeth's conscience returning to plague his thoughts. Banquo's triumph over death appears symbolically, insofar as he literally takes Macbeth's seat during the feast. Shocked, Macbeth uses words appropriate to the metaphor of usurpation, describing Banquo as "crowned" with wounds. The spirit drains Macbeth's manhood along with the blood from his cheeks; as soon as Banquo's form vanishes, Macbeth announces: "Why, so; being gone, / I am a man again."<ref>[http://www.clicknotes.com/macbeth/T34.html#106 ''Macbeth'', Act 3, Scene 4, lines 106–107.]  {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100603033725/http://www.clicknotes.com/macbeth/T34.html |date=3 June 2010 }}</ref><ref name="Calder">{{cite book |last=Calderwood |first=James L. |title=If It Were Done: Macbeth and Tragic Action |url=https://archive.org/details/ifitweredonemacb0000cald |url-access=registration |location=Amherst, Massachusetts|publisher=[[University of Massachusetts Press]] |date=1986 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/ifitweredonemacb0000cald/page/126 126–129] |isbn=978-0-87023-534-4}}</ref>

Like the vision of Banquo's lineage, the banquet scene has also been the subject of criticism. Critics have questioned whether not one, but perhaps two ghosts appear in this scene: Banquo and Duncan. Scholars arguing that Duncan attends the banquet state that Macbeth's lines to the Ghost could apply equally well to the slain king. "Thou canst not say I did it", for example, can mean that Macbeth is not the man who actually killed Banquo, or it can mean that Duncan, who was asleep when Macbeth killed him, cannot claim to have seen his killer. To add to the confusion, some lines Macbeth directs to the ghost, such as "Thy bones are marrowless",<ref>[http://www.clicknotes.com/macbeth/T34.html#94 ''Macbeth'', Act 3, Scene 4, line 91.]  {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100603033725/http://www.clicknotes.com/macbeth/T34.html |date=3 June 2010 }}</ref> cannot rightly be said of Banquo, who has only recently died.<ref name="Furness">{{cite book |title=Macbeth |editor1-last=Furness |editor1-first=Horace Howard |editor1-link=Horace Howard Furness |publisher=Classic Books |date=2007 |isbn=978-0-7426-5283-5 |pages=167–169}}</ref>

Scholars debate whether Macbeth's vision of Banquo is real or a hallucination. Macbeth had already seen a hallucination before murdering Duncan: a knife hovering in the air. Several performances of the play have even ignored the stage direction to have the Ghost of Banquo enter at all, heightening the sense that Macbeth is growing mad, since the audience cannot see what he claims to see. Scholars opposing this view claim that while the dagger is unusual, ghosts of murdered victims are more believable, having a basis in the audience's superstitions. Spirits in other Shakespeare plays—notably ''[[Hamlet]]'' and ''[[Midsummer Night's Dream]]''—exist in ambiguous forms, occasionally even calling into question their own presence.<ref name="Calder"/><ref name="Furness"/><ref>{{cite book |last=Bradley |first=A. C. |author-link=A. C. Bradley |title=Shakespearean Tragedy |location=Boston, Massachusetts |publisher=Adamant Media |date=2003 |isbn=1-4212-0849-0 |pages=492–493}}</ref>

The concept of a character being confronted at a triumphant feast with a reminder of their downfall is not unique to Shakespeare and may originate from [[Belshazzar's feast]], as portrayed in the [[Bible]]. The term 'ghost at the feast' has entered popular culture, and is often used as a metaphor for a subject a person would rather avoid considering, or (considering the general plot of ''Macbeth'') a reminder of a person's unpleasant past or likely future.