Macbeth - Foul is fair and fair is foul

The “fair is foul and foul is fair” motif runs throughout Act 1 of Macbeth in a way that it can apply to every occurrence in the play. Its central meaning explores versions of reality and directly relates to how appearance may be deceptive. The play opens with the weird sisters chanting the line and thus, introducing to the audience that what is fair and foul, although opposite in meaning, can co-exist, ‘Fair is foul and foul is fair, Hover through the fog and filthy air’ (1.1.1). This stresses that difference between reality and illusion, good and evil, and other antonyms, is often as murky as ‘fog and filthy air’. Macbeth also draws on this idea in Scene 3 line 40, ‘So foul and fair a day I have not seen.’ This reiterates that things can be both foul and fair simultaneously. In this case, he may have been alluding to the bloodshed but also the victory, which come hand-in-hand. In Scene 4, the underlying message of the motif is captured by Macbeth’s intentions to kill the King and commit treason although he has just been praised for his bravery and patriotism. This emphasises that appearances are sometimes misleading and through suggesting that Duncan is fooled again, the motif underpins that it is impossible to know the truth by appearance and that there may always be two contrasting sides in people and situations.