The Witches of North Berwick

To the east of Edinburgh is the town of North Berwick, an old fishing town whose claim to fame was the nearby island of Fidra believed to be the inspiration for Robert Louis Stevenson's ‘Treasure Island'. This town has been named as the best place to live in Scotland  by the BBC but this contrasts with an ignominious past of murderous intent aimed at women.

King James V1 was travelling to Denmark to bring back his bride, Anne, in1589 and during the sea crossing severe storms broke out, so severe were they he had to turn back and a furious King became convinced this was the work of witches specifically from, you guessed it, North Berwick. These creatures were out to ruin him, there was a belief that one of them sailed into the Firth of Forth in a sieve in order to summon the storm. So this was a double crime of being a witch and a regicide.

James’s hatred was well known and during his reign 70 - 200 “ witches” were put on trial, tortured and/or executed from North Berwick alone. This number is approximate as the final number can’t be known. The number burned at the stake alive in Scotland was around 4,000.

There was a small kirk on the green in the town where the women met, danced and summoned the Devil, according to gossip, they were older women, midwives, healers who worked with herbs and curative plants. These people were prime targets.

Acts of torture here were particularly cruel. In order to obtain a confession a breast ripper was used ( I’d never heard of this before ) a Scold’s Bridle which is a metal device to fit around the head with metal prongs into the mouth making it impossible to speak. Some  men were said to use it on their wives!.

Shakespeare actually wrote the witches into Macbeth during James’s reign in the early 17th century using the tale of the sieve -

“But in a sieve, I’ll thither sail
And, like a rat without a tail,
I’ll so, I’ll do I’ll do.

My poem below was first published as runner-up in Second Light Poetry Competition.

Night walk with Phantoms

Women are out - not the moon,
pale and listening by hedges
to the zeppelin raid of hail.

They darken by chance
in a lull of wind, quicken
from tree shapes, crouch
forgetful in wasted grass.

Cloud lifts - huge, silver-bellied.
The crone plays at trickery;
squat on shrubby heels, she’s
whiskered with new growth.

She springs elbows to east and west,
becomes a stiff weather-vane
all set for change.

Thank you for reading,

Cynthia Kitchen.

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Accent

In 2013 I was back in Birmingham for an event and my friends came up from London to help. They had never been to the second city before. Their son, aged about 21, went for a wander and came back to inform us that the Brummie accent was the sexiest he had ever heard.

At first I thought that needed a paragraph of its own without further comment. But research has found (e.g. Thorne in 2003) that overseas visitors find it lilting and melodious. And really when I come to think about it and remember that Shakespeare would have been using this dialect in his rhymes and vocabulary is it so surprising?

I’ll prove this later on as I have just used the words ‘accent’ and ‘dialect’ as though they were interchangeable and I need to clarify this first.

The word dialect comes from the Ancient Greek dialektos “discourse, language, dialect,” A dialect generally involves more than just pronunciation—it differs from another form of the language in at least some grammatical structures and vocabulary.

Accent goes back to Latin, where the root referred to the stress patterns in vocal music. (It's related to the words "cant" and "chant".) It has been used in English to refer to spoken words since at least the 10th century. As the term is used by linguists, everybody has an accent. It's the sum of the way you form your vowels, stress your syllables, lengthen your sounds, etc. There has to be an accent in the same way that every sound has a length (thank you to Joshua Engel for that explanation).

For example if you get a Preston newsreader, a BBC newsreader and Scottish newsreader to each read the same written script. And let’s say they are all perfect readers. All the words and grammar will be the same. The difference in what you hear will be accent.

But if they meet up for a cup of tea these 3 people’s speech will differ in vocabulary and in grammar, as well as in pronunciation. The totality of these differences are called a dialect

I once worked at a major London Teaching Hospital and one day a Consultant and two medical students were heading to the same lift I was waiting for. The two students were doing the “Yah, absolutely Sir” to the Consultant but when they got on the lift with me and their boss had carried on down the corridor the conversation changed to “What yowm doin tomorrer?”.

Shakespeare memorial room at Birmingham central library

I said above that to overseas folk the Birmingham accent is lilting and melodious. What do British people think?

YouGov said that the West Country accent is considered the most attractive to over-60s compared to only 22% of 18-24 year-olds. The opposite perception had developed for Northern Irish too, with most 18-24 year-olds seeing it as attractive, compared to only 37% of over-60s, and then the Geordie accent also had a greater appeal to older British people too.

Here’s the list in full. The Most Attractive Accents in the British Isles are:
Southern Irish
Received Pronunciation
Welsh
Yorkshire
West Country
Geordie
Northern Irish
Glaswegian
Cockney
Mancunian
Scouse
Brummie

I also said above that I would now prove that Shakespeare wrote in a Birmingham dialect and/or accent. Unfortunately, I have run out of space.

People sometimes mix up the Birmingham accent with the Black Country one. They are different but for this I don’t care as it’s a great poem by Liz Berry and anyway she now lives in Birmingham.

Homing

For years you kept your accent
in a box beneath the bed,
the lock rusted shut by hours of elocution
how now brown cow
the teacher’s ruler across your legs.

We heard it escape sometimes,
a guttural uh on the phone to your sister,
saft or blart to a taxi driver
unpacking your bags from his boot.
I loved its thick drawl, g’s that rang.

Clearing your house, the only thing
I wanted was that box, jemmied open
to let years of lost words spill out –
bibble, fittle, tay, wum,
vowels ferrous as nails, consonants

you could lick the coal from.
I wanted to swallow them all: the pits,
railways, factories thunking and clanging
the night shift, the red brick
back-to-back you were born in.

I wanted to forge your voice
in my mouth, a blacksmith’s furnace;
shout it from the roofs,
send your words, like pigeons,
fluttering for home.

                                           Liz Berry

Thanks for reading, Terry Q.

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Midsummer Night's Dream

I was fortunate during my degree studies to take a couple of trips to Stratford to attend performances of Shakespeare plays by the RSC. The first year, my daughter came with me to see Taming of the Shrew and A Midsummer Night's Dream. It was a thrill to see Queen of the Fairies, Titania, flying around the scenery in acrobatic aerial work. 

Several years ago, there was a Midsummer's Eve music event held in the local village of Great Eccleston. We didn't know what to expect but there was a stage in the centre, with a band so we drank, danced and sang into the night. A garden had been decorated with fairies and lights. It was a lovely and surprising experience. 

A friend was visiting from Australia and I was keen share English heritage with him, so I booked tickets for an open air performance of Romeo and Juliet at Fell Foot Park in The Lakes. We packed the picnic basket, spent the day in Bowness and settled onto our blanket late afternoon. The performance was fantastic and completed as the sun dropped below the horizon. The day was made even more delightful by the hooting of a tawny owl as we left for home. Perfect. 

I still seek out open-air Shakespearean performances. I was particularly disappointed when one at  Williamson Park in Lancaster was abandoned due to a thunderstorm, but I did attend a really enjoyable play at Lytham Hall more recently.  There was one evening at Croston Hall that was unforgettable. 

Midsummer Madness

On midsummer afternoon
as the sun scorched the lawn
the derelict Jacobean Hall
stood as towering backdrop
to our picnic in the park.

The Scottish play performed
like chilled water
dancing pleasant fingers
of tingling excitement
down the curve of my back

A burst of cool strawberry
bathed in glutinous cream
melted on my tongue
washed by cold, dry fizz.
You tried to be cool. I was hot.

I watched the sword fight.
hot tempers
and felt your warming smile,
bright eyes piercing my chiffon dress.
It was hot.

My thoughts ran away
to seduction
to the shade of the trees
to the circle of your arms.

Suddenly the image was gone,
Vanished in the sultry mist,
as applause filled the air,
with the sound of others.

When we packed away the basket,
you lightly brushed my ankle.
A rush of hot blood. A fiery flush
A glistening bead coursed
the valley of my breasts.

We sat outside the pub
with long, cool drinks
with Latino music
with another audience.
The mercury rose.

Speeding home
your hand left the wheel
to seek my skin
and the warm breeze blew my mind.

We rolled out the rug
and rolled like bears
beneath the shade
of the mighty copper beech.

It was hot.
You were hot.
I was hot.
The ground was cool
Through the latticed leaves
we saw the stars
and promised them to me.

It was Midsummers Eve
and wow, it was hot!


Thanks for reading. Adele

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Tragedy

I think I first really got into tragedy when I was about nine or ten, perhaps even younger.  I used to stay at my nan’s flat some weekends and she’s take me down to the video shop and let me chose pretty much whatever I liked.  I watched Robocop again and again, and all the Swarzenegger films, but what I liked best was films about Vietnam.  There was a whole slew of them at one time  - Hamburger Hill, Full Metal Jacket, Born on the Fourth of July – and they were all really grim.  My nan was a wonderful person, but I still can’t believe she used to let me watch this stuff.

Platoon was my favourite.  The part where Elias is being pursued by the Viet Cong as his buddies look on from the deck of a departing helicopter, all to the tune of Samuel Barber’s Adagio for Strings , has always stuck with became me.  I wonder whether or how much it has shaped my outlook on life, since I’ve always been told to not take myself and life too seriously.

We all know that we can look at the world in a variety of ways; that we find in experience whatever it is we’re looking for.  As a matter of survival, most people I know tend to cultivate a more comic state of mind.  These days, the adage ‘look for the ridiculous in anything and you will find it’, is not difficult to apply.  Dwell on tragedy, common sense runs, and you risk cultivating a sense of victimhood and seriousness neither yourself nor the world deserves.

Opening the newspaper it often seems we have lost the ability to accept the fact that terrible things occur beyond our control.  If everything, and everyone, is accountable then nothing can be tragic.  We seek redress through the law, and this perhaps is where tragedy ends and the black comedy Kafka described begins.

However, perhaps one of the greatest tragedies ever written – King Lear – is still as relevant as ever.  It plays itself out again and again wherever an inheritance is at stake and estranged siblings begin squabbling over money.  When I first read King Lear it was the language that drew me in.  I still have the New Swan edition with all the footnotes at the bottom of each page.  It was the most intense reading experience of my life, and I have been reading Shakespeare ever since, but I thought the story in itself was pure fiction.  After all, how could Goneril and Regan behave like that?  And Edmund?

The older I get the more I realise that this murderousness and deceipt are a part of the human experience we have not evolved out of, nor are ever likely to, no matter how sophisticated we suppose ourselves to be.  In holding a mirror up to us in his his great tragedies, Shakespeare wasn’t embellishing for dramatic effect.

The opening scene in King Lear I find cringe-worthy.  Lear’s reign has descended into farce and inauthenticity.  He banishes Cordelia for having the temerity to speak truth to power but tolerates the Fool, who also understands the danger of the situation.  The machinery of the state is thrown out of kilter, and like Lady Macbeth, Lear’s two remaining daughters and Edmund make their grab for power.  I still find it genuinely discomfiting how strong these characters are in their moments of becoming, and how clearly they understand the self-deceipt of others: ‘this excellent foppery of the world’…. ‘An admirable evasion of whoremaster man, to lay his goatish disposition to the charge of a star!’ (ActI sceneII)

Both Lear and Kent make the mistake of growing complacent in their old age.  Perhaps the greatest tragedy a play like King Lear shows is that turmoil is cyclical.  It’s a play that contains dark truths, that we ignore at our cost.

Dan Holt 

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History

My bookshelves groan with the evidence of a full and varied education in History and English Literature coupled with a love of reading.  Much of my free time lately has been spent delving into my fat, well-used volume of The Complete Works of Shakespeare.  This has been for research purposes and to help find inspiration for my guest blog. I thumbed my way through Othello, trying to make sense of the notes I’d pencilled in the margins.  Neat, perfectly formed tiny writing from years, nay, decades ago, using a sharp, probably 3H pencil,  page after page.  And my underlining of some text, that must have been significant at the time.  It is lost on me now and the only thing I remember is sniggering inwardly at Shakespeare’s use of the words ‘tupping’ and ‘tupped’. These farmyard words and their meanings are the ones that stick in my childish mind.

I confess, with head bowed in shame that I haven’t always got on with the work of Mr Shakespeare.  I struggled with Hamlet, couldn’t get to grips with Henry V and I’ll never believe that Richard III was the tyrant that Shakespeare made him out to be. This might sound like blasphemy to fans of The Bard and I apologise, for what do I know? I tried my best, backed up with a fair amount of ‘fudging’ and help from caring classmates.  Many years later, something came into my possession which made a world of difference … a boxed set of DVDs with Laurence Olivier playing the lead character in six Shakespeare plays.  His ‘Heathcliff’ had taken my breath away when I was eleven and ever since, I’d had a soft spot for him.

“Now is the winter of our discontent, made glorious summer by this sun of York…” There was Olivier as Richard III, spitting out the words with venomous, clipped delivery. He looked menacing as he stooped and limped, dark eyes glaring from a twisted face. The make-up department had excelled. I was smitten.I wanted to know the truth about Richard III. I didn’t want to believe he was a cruel, vindictive king who ordered the murder of his young nephews and had an incestuous relationship with his niece. Apart from genealogy facts and succession to the throne, his life seems shrouded in a mystery of contradictions. Written accounts by others bearing truth or fiction. Perhaps Shakespeare had it right all along and, was he given information from Elizabeth I or is that another rumour?Laurence Olivier’s acting brought Richard III and other difficult characters to life and helped me to find an acceptable level of understanding in the history plays. It won’t improve my grades, but it’s never too late to learn or improve. I think a visit to Leicester Cathedral is in order, to pay respect to an English king who set me on a knowledge seeking journey that hasn’t ended.

A short poem:

Warwickshire gentleman known as Will

Looking thoughtful with parchment and quill.

Filling the hours of endless days

Composing sonnets and writing plays.

Clever and witty, word after word

But what was his spin on Richard III?

Thank you for reading, Pamela Winning.

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Deconstructing Dick

Now is the winter of our discontent

Protests continue on a number of fronts:

• Anti-fracking (MP, Caroline Lucas to be charged for helping stage a peaceful protest)
• Many groups, including the main unions, assembling in Manchester this Sunday against the privatisation of the NHS
• UK Uncut want an end to austerity measures that hurt the poorest and advocate a tax on financial transactions
• Several groups have formed to fight the 'bedroom tax' which was recently condemned by a UN special investigator
• Journalists continue to publish details of government spying on civilians despite threats and the detention of those who help them

Made glorious summer by this sun of York;

The first Conservatives were supporters of James Stuart, Duke of York, when he was excluded from the throne for being a Catholic.  The Tories were known for their love of the monarchy and hostility towards reform of the church.

And all the clouds that lour'd upon our house
In the deep bosom of the ocean buried.

Take your pick.  There's the Osama bin Laden threat which was used to keep us in a state of fear, before he was killed and buried at sea, so the story goes.  Alternatively, there are the concerns over climate change and pollution which are sunk beneath piles of Newspeak and propaganda which puts the finance of private business above the state of the planet's ecosystems.

Now are our brows bound with victorious wreaths;

London Olympics 2012

Our bruised arms hung up for monuments;

The right to protest is in a fragile state and protesters can be dispersed for 'distressing' the public.  Given the number of copies of The Daily Mail sold across the country, it is likely that there will always be a member of the public who is capable of becoming distressed at the sight of a protest.

Our stern alarums changed to merry meetings,
Our dreadful marches to delightful measures.

Protesters often mix political anger with more entertaining messages.

Grim-visaged war hath smooth'd his wrinkled front;
And now, instead of mounting barded steeds
To fright the souls of fearful adversaries,
He capers nimbly in a lady's chamber
To the lascivious pleasing of a lute.

Boris Johnson

But I, that am not shaped for sportive tricks,
Nor made to court an amorous looking-glass;
I, that am rudely stamp'd, and want love's majesty
To strut before a wanton ambling nymph;
I, that am curtail'd of this fair proportion,
Cheated of feature by dissembling nature,
Deformed, unfinish'd, sent before my time
Into this breathing world, scarce half made up,
And that so lamely and unfashionable
That dogs bark at me as I halt by them;

This is how the disempowered are made to feel.  Those at the bottom are portrayed as leeches, as something broken or cancerous which needs to be cut away from the population.  Those who protest against, for example, the use of drones, are portrayed as terrorist sympathisers and detained - in the UK.


Why, I, in this weak piping time of peace,
Have no delight to pass away the time,
Unless to spy my shadow in the sun
And descant on mine own deformity:

The unemployed (there are lots of these since trillions of pounds were lost by corporations who continue to reward their risk-takers while accepting handouts from our taxes) can't afford to ride on the train but they have plenty of time to become depressed over what they are told are their own failings.

And therefore, since I cannot prove a lover,
To entertain these fair well-spoken days,
I am determined to prove a villain
And hate the idle pleasures of these days.

Necessarily a villain, if your protest stands in the way of a company whose representatives are working within the government.

Plots have I laid, inductions dangerous,
By drunken prophecies, libels and dreams,
To set my brother Clarence and the king
In deadly hate the one against the other:
And if King Edward be as true and just
As I am subtle, false and treacherous,
This day should Clarence closely be mew'd up,
About a prophecy, which says that 'G'
Of Edward's heirs the murderer shall be.


At the Labour Party Conference, Miliband set himself up against the energy companies, threatening to freeze their prices if Labour win back power.  The energy companies feigned fury and in return threatened power cuts, this despite the extra £3billion in profits the 'impoverished' energy firms have made since the ConDem government took over.

But is this progress?  Current prices mean families are already suffering from fuel poverty.

Dive, thoughts, down to my soul: here
Clarence comes.

The Transparency of Lobbying, Non-Party Campaigning and Trade Union Administration Bill could come into play from January 2014.  It can significantly reduce the campaigning activities of charities and protest groups right up until the next general election.  Many vociferous opponents of the current government may find themselves effectively gagged during that time.

  Richard III - a villain or someone written as such by history's winners?  And who will write the story of this government, when the scholars are all owned by the same companies whose interests the government represents?  Will our descendents read about the brave, heroical decisions taken by Cameron, the hero of the 21st century?

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Shakespeare's Casting Couch

 by Ashley Lister

Now old Shaky Bill

Had a very long quill

And wrote plays filled with kings, queens and knights

But in those bygone days,

To play in his plays,

You first had to get in his tights.

Of course it helped no end

That Shakespeare liked men

He chose all those that liked his caresses.

(His roles for women

Are surprisingly thin

And were all played by blokes who wore dresses).

Now it might sound rude

And it’s possibly crude

To say this was how he cast his plays

But we’ve all watched TV

And it’s quite plain to see

That’s how most stuff’s still cast nowadays.

I’ve seen those folks

Who’re in Hollyoaks,

And I’ll try saying this with some tact

The show does well on balance

But the cast have no talents:

No one’s on there because they can act.

This same problem plagued Bill

Though he bore no ill will –

He’d hold auditions backstage and disrobe

And he’d say to each player

As he took off each layer:

“I’ve got a large part for you in the Globe.”

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Shakespeare

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Modern Language

Couple of weeks back at the last BDGPS meeting at the Cafe 5, I delivered a mini lecture about how to Shakespeare more interesting to the youth of today. I concluded the Iambic Pentameter was partially to blame. It makes the dialogue hard to master and turns the kids off, which is such a shame when the words themselves have so much meaning.

I also claimed that William was a 'punk', that he often did his own thing, wrote his own rules and famously, invented his own words. This last statement I used as evidence that it is academics who claim to be bastions of the English language that are stopping people from being interested in Shakespeare and that modern 'counter culture' which many refer to as 'chavs', 'goths' or 'emos' have more in common with the Bard than any of these professor types do.

The youth, with their slang terms and inarticulate grunts of communication are the ones tacking the language forward. By telling these social groups that they do not 'speak proper' Telling them to read Shakespeare so they can understand the English language is like telling them to stop listening to hip-hop and listen to Elvis Presley. Whatever your musical tastes, Elvis was at the start of the new movement that allowed Hip-Hip to be created, not a real reason for street beats not to exist.

William Shakespeare invented over 1700 new words in the English language. Some by changing the use from nouns into verbs and verb into adjectives. He put words together connecting them in ways never seen before. He added prefixes and suffixes, removed letters created completely new original words. And all because he wanted to make them fit, because he wanted to finish his work, because he, well, just wanted to.

So, our Will was a bit of rebel who just made things up to suit him and his art. Sounds like he should be a hero of the young and not as the graffiti once said about him, as a man who “wrote plays that were very boring”

Here are just a few of his creations:

academe, accused, addiction, advertising, amazement, arouse, assassination, backing, bandit, bedroom, beached, besmirch, birthplace, blanket, bloodstained, barefaced, blushing, bet, bump, buzzer, caked, cater, champion, circumstantial, cold, blooded, compromise, courtship, countless, critic, dauntless, dawn, deafening, discontent, dishearten, drugged, dwindle, epileptic, equivocal, elbow, excitement, exposure, eyeball, fashionable, fixture, flawed, frugal, generous, gloomy, gossip, green, eyed, gust, hint, hobnob, hurried, impede, impartial, invulnerable, jaded, label, lackluster, laughable, lonely, lower, luggage, lustrous, madcap, majestic, marketable, metamorphize, mimic, monumental, moonbeam, mountaineer, negotiate, noiseless, obscene, obsequiously, ode, olympian, outbreak, panders, pedant, premeditated, puking, radiance, rant, remorseless, savagery, scuffle, secure, skim milk, submerge, summit, swagger, torture, tranquil, undress, unreal, varied, vaulting, worthless, zany, gnarled, grovel

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MacScottish Play and the Zombies

 by Ashley Lister

This week's theme is jokes. I believe there are one or two jokes in the following play which was performed at the Dead Good Poets' open mic event yesterday evening.

MacSCottish Play and the Zombies

 EXT. A desolate moor near Sauciehall Street. Night.

SFX: thunderbolt & lightning. Three witches are centre stage. One of them holds a cat.

First Witch

When shall we three meet again?

Second Witch

What about next Tuesday, for the bingo? That would

be nice, wouldn’t it?

Third Witch

I have been visited by a prophecy of doom from my pussy.

First Witch

(to audience)

She means her cat.

Third Witch

My pussy has told me two things: First it has told me

the zombies are coming.

Second Witch

Ooh! That’ll be nice. Usually they just shamble

along seeking brains and eating people.

Third Witch

And, secondly, my pussy has told me that we will meet

with the nobleman, Lord MacScottish Play.

Second Witch

Ooh! A nobleman. How lovely. Will you be washing your

pussy before you meet him?

First Witch

(to audience)

She means her cat.

Third Witch

I don’t think there’ll be any need to wash my pussy.

He’s Scottish so he won’t be expecting that.

[beat]

Unless you’re talking about my cat.

Enter MacScottish Play and Banquo

MacScottish Play

Fandabidosi. Och aye the noo. Whit urr ye three ladies

daein' 'ere?

Banquo

[to audience/precise English]

Good evening. My name is Banquo and, for the remainder of

this play, until my untimely death at some point later in

this opening act, I shall be playing the role of the

translator for everything said by the noble Lord

MacScottish Play.

MacScottish Play

[angrily to audience]

Ye heckit Sassenach bastards.

Banquo

[to audience/translating]

Good evening English people. I admire and respect

your culture.

First Witch

All hail MacScottish Play, Thane of Cawdor.

Second Witch

All hail MacScottish Play, King of Scotland and slayer

of the Zombies.

Third Witch

(offering cat to MacScottish Play)

All hail MacScottish Play. Would you like to play with my

pussy?

MacScottish Play

Ah dinnae ken whit ye'r sayin’, yer dunderheided bitches.

Banquo

(translating)

The Lord MacScottish Play thanks you for your kind

greeting but he’s unsure why you’re calling him by these

grand titles.

MacScottish Play

(nodding)

Aye.

(points at Third Witch)

Pussy.

Third Witch

(offering cat to MacScottish Play)

Would you like to play with my pussy?

MacScottish Play

(stroking the cat)

Ah wid ower clap yer wee moggie. Aye.

MacScottish Play strokes the Third Witch’s cat.

Banquo

(to the remaining two witches)

What dark business is occurring here? These roads should

be safe for travellers like myself and my lovely Lord

MacScottish Play. He’s a Scotsman. He’s not used to being

accosted by wanton slatterns like yourselves. No offence.

Not unless one of you is trying to sell him smack or

something. No offence. Or unless one of you is his sister

propositioning him for sexual services. No offence. Or

offering him a munchy box. No offence. Or a deep friend

Mars Bar and neeps. No offence.

 

First Witch

We have been granted a prophecy. Zombies are going to

come.

Second Witch

I said: ‘that would be nice.’ Usually they only get to

shamble places and eat brains in these types of stories.

It must be very frustrating for them.

Banquo

(aghast – looking around)

Zombies here in Scotland? Brainless, empty shells of

soulless human beings, killing and consuming without any

thought or conscience? How will the zombies have a chance

against them?

Enter Zombie

First Witch

Here’s one. I told you the zombies were coming.

Second Witch

(disappointed)

He’s not coming. He’s just walking slowly.

Banquo

(to audience)

I’ve never understood why anyone would fear zombies.

They’re so slow moving and obvious it’s not like they’d

be able to sneak up behind someone and take them

unsuspecting and unawares.

Zombie attacks Banquo by sneaking up behind him – unsuspecting and unawares. Banquo dies.

Zombie

Brains. Must eat brains.

Zombie attacks Second Witch.

Zombie

Brains. Must eat brains.

Second Witch

Ooh! This getting eaten out isn’t as nice as I’d hoped

it might be.

Second Witch dies. Zombie attacks Third Witch.

Zombie

Brains. Must eat brains.

Third Witch dies. She takes the cat down with her when she falls. MacScottish Play produces a sword and stabs Zombie. Zombie dies.

MacScottish Play

(talking to the dead Zombie)

Ya bas. Ah wis plooter her moggie.

First Witch

Well done Lord MacScottish Play. You saved the world from

Zombies and stopped Scotland from becoming home to a race

of mindless, inarticulate violent types that are shunned

and feared by the rest of the free thinking world.

MacScottish Play

Thank f**k for that. We wuddnae huv wanted that tae

happen, wid we?

THE END

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