Enter Three Witches

Enter Three Witches is a 2007 work of young adult fiction by Caroline B. Cooney. An adaptation of the Shakespearean tragedy Macbeth, it takes its name from the trio of secondary characters in the original work who act as prophet figures and predict major plot arcs, including the ascent of Lord Macbeth. Written in accessible prose, it retells the play while extending some of Macbeth’s lesser-explored plot elements, and also introduces some novel ones that refer to tropes in contemporary tragedies.

The story is set in Scotland and follows Lady Mary, the teenage ward of Lord and Lady Macbeth and daughter to Lord Cawdor. Mary’s future is upended when her father is convicted of betraying Macbeth. Now stuck in the castle and surrounded by people hostile to her because of her lineage, Mary tries to survive and save the lives of other innocent people who are threatened by the ruthless royals.

The novel begins by introducing Mary and her position in the castle hierarchy. Still a young woman, she’s privileged to work closely with other royal officials, including Lord and Lady Macbeth, thanks to her father’s status. From her position as ward, she also knows about the latest happenings in the kingdom. Mary is ostracized by the other staff, who come from the lower class and have worked their way up. These staff include Swin, a cook with knowledge of arcane magic, and Ildred, a sad woman who yearns for a life of freedom outside the castle walls. Mary spends her days of labor also yearning for something else: reunion with her fiancé as well as with her father, Lord Cawdor, whose political business usually takes him far away.



The novel loosely follows Macbeth’s gradual, and then sudden, ascent to the Scottish throne. The sitting king of Scotland is murdered, and the culprit is unknown, while his sons flee the castle in the aftermath. Members of the kingdom blame them for the murder, though it is possible it was one of the king’s servants. Mary overhears the Witches deliver a warning that the murderer is still roaming free in the kingdom.

In the midst of this conflict, Mary’s father, who remained loyal to the previous king, attempts to block Macbeth’s move. He’s deemed a traitor to the king and hanged. Although no one in the kingdom actually approves of the shift in power, Macbeth along his trio of loyalists—Banquo, Fleance, and Seyton—are loudly celebrated as heroes for defeating the enemy. Suddenly, Mary’s right to work, to even exist, in the kingdom is in question. She fears that she will be the next to be hanged as a political enemy.

Meanwhile, the other characters reveal their own perspectives on the kingdom’s instability. Though few of the characters outside of the Macbeth family support the new king, the necessity of keeping their opinions private leads to most of the major mishaps extracted from the original play. Enter Three Witches gives extra attention to these characters’ inner lives, namely those of Macbeth, Banquo, and Lady Macbeth, in order to refigure them as rational actors in a complex game in which not all information is readily available.



The plot arc opposing Macbeth’s ascent follows Fleance, Banquo’s son. Departing from the events of the play, where he simply disappears, Fleance resolves to thwart Macbeth by finding his sons and forcing them to admit that they murdered the late King Duncan. While riding in the country with his father, Fleance and Banquo are ambushed by people posing as robbers who hold axes and seem to be sent to kill them. They defeat the assassins and continue on. In Scottish history, Fleance makes it to Wales, where he fathers a son who later becomes Scotland’s rightful king, fulfilling the Witches’ prophecy.

Meanwhile, using her cunning and political literacy, Mary manages to avoid a grim fate until the truth about Macbeth’s usurping of King Duncan emerges. At the end of the novel, Macduff, the original work’s figure of morality who suspects Macbeth from the beginning, beheads Macbeth, allowing the kingdom to stabilize and select a rightful leader. Malcolm, King Duncan’s son, assumes the throne. Mary looks forward to a king who will lead righteously and give Scotland’s citizens the dignity and peace they desire.

Because it is told in novelistic rather than dialogic form, Enter Three Witches is able to draw a morally relativistic account of the original play’s action, nodding to contemporary theatrical forms where characters’ conflict arises at least partially out of asymmetries in information or understanding. It more fully explores certain characters who are prominent in Scottish history but only briefly included in Shakespeare’s text. Together, these elements render Cooney’s novel both situated and accessible in the young adult literary canon, and a good introduction to Shakespeare’s writing.