Title: Macbeth
Author: Jo Nesbo
Publisher: Hogarth Shakespeare
Pages: 503
Price: 599
Jo Nesbo’s Macbeth opens with rain — not your romantic this-will-be-so-cleansing downpour, but an ominous precipitation. Not unlike the setting of the opening scene of Shakespeare’s tragedy of the same name: A desert where the three witches meet but with thunder and lightning in the background. Nesbo’s setting is a city/town with no name, inhabited by people with no personalities, this is to drive in the lifelessness of the whole area.
Hogarth Shakespeare, in 2015, commissioned modern-day authors to reinvent the bard’s classic tales. Nesbo is the latest amongst the likes of Jeannette Winterson, Howard Jacobson, Anne Tyler, and Margaret Atwood.
On the first glimpse, Nesbo seems brings in his Scandinavian noir panache to the play that is rife with the supernatural and ghostly visions. To paraphrase the witches in Macbeth, this novel is fair as well as foul, which will no doubt make Nesbo’s fans happy — after all the protagonist is a Harry Hole-type policeman and “a man of the people”. However, that is the only thing common between the fictional Norwegian police detective and Nesbo’s Macbeth. While Harry despite straddling the morality line never actually crosses it, Macbeth takes pride in doing so. The popular Norwegian writer doesn’t wander away from his signature police procedural drama writing in retelling this complicated tale of power mongering and self-annihilation.
Yet, there is something quite amiss despite the beautiful rendering of all characters reimagined and aptly fitted to function within an unnamed 1970s Scottish town. Considering the plot is widely known — it is after all a tale told many times — Nesbo’s Macbeth has a whodunnit feel to it, even though you know who did what. Adding to the thrill, Nesbo does away with the indescribable hold of Lady Macbeth (renamed as Lady and owner of the local casino), making the reasons for Macbeth killing Duncan a bit muddled.
At over 500 pages, you would think there is a lot more than just the premise of the story, which has power struggle at the foundation of it. And there is — just that Nesbo delves mostly into the characters and their thought processes instead of relying on the supernatural elements from the original content.
The plot is simple: At the beginning of the book, Macbeth is a good cop in the unnamed Scottish town, who only thinks of serving the people. Nesbo’s Macbeth has your typical tortured past — an abused orphan who was formerly a drug addict—is the hero who is the head of the local SWAT team and adept with blades, thanks to a stint with the circus. But, as he climbs the ranks, he hungers for more power which is more addictive than any substance he might have used. He commits murder to hasten his ascent to the top, and his ambition is fuelled by his “beloved dominatrix” Lady as well as the own misinterpretations of his paranoia and power-hungry ways, but like the original Macbeth, results in his downfall.
Even while this is a gem for all Nesbo fans, this retelling is more slasher-noir as the bloodbath increases as Nesbo’s story moves forward, which might not go down too well with Shakespeare loyalists. And if that’s not all, the final battle, which culminates in the tragedy is something of a letdown. And even after finishing the book, there is a feeling of unfinished business that remains. Read at your own risk.