This scene introduces us to a new Macbeth no longer brave and confident but “cabin, cribbed and confined in his doubts and fears”. Macbeth’s character is no longer polished but now stained because he now greets the acts of evil saying “Blood will have blood” and his involvement with the murderers. Also his return to hear more of the witches’ prophecies shows him yet again welcoming evil doings. Shakespeare’s writing allows us to understand Macbeth’s personality change through Macbeth’s reactions and his responses to his wife and the murderer also through his diction. This shows me that Macbeth is becoming a more vengeful person foreshadowing more bad deeds “We are yet but young in deed”.
Shakespeare further cultivates Macbeths quickly changing character through soliloquy and dramatic irony. His success in doing so is disclosed as the once ‘noble’ Macbeth goes against all odds to convey his idea of fulfilling the witches’ prophecies: to kill King Duncan. Macbeth also notifies us that to even anticipate slaughtering the sacred King is an act of treachery and betrayal nonetheless he delivers himself as quite motivated and determined to do so. The “horrid image”, “doth unfix” his hair and make his “seated heart knock”; his lust for ultimate power poisons his loyalty and decays at his integrity. As the play moves on, the audience observe the hasty crumbling of his devotion to God and the King.
As the play goes on, Macbeth slowly looses his morality as he strives for more control whilst Lady Macbeth steps into a frantic stage of guilt. After killing the king, Macbeth starts to plot other evil undertakings as he becomes nervous that someone will take away his power. At one point he goes from wanting to needing the sovereignty, which makes him loose sight of his integrity. As Macbeth begins to immorally act in order to achieve what he hungers, the line between good and evil starts to fade. “I am in blood / Stepp’d in so far, that, should I wade no more, / Returning were as tedious as go o’er.” (3.4.136-138) In this quote, Macbeth is telling himself that because he has stepped into evil so deeply, it will be hard to go back to morallity because he will never be able to rid of this guilt brought onto him.
The authors, Caroline B. Cooney, Harper Lee and William Shakespeare wrote violence in their novels and games. Enter three witches, writes the author that people who do not like them and is angry perhaps meets a violent end. In To Kill a Mockingbird, Lee wrote that people who are racist are dishonest and possibly will also meet a violent end. Shakespeare also argues that people who do not, except that others will gather the tragedy. Cooney MacBeth uses to prove his thesis; then Bob Ewell Lee uses the character to prove its case, and Tybalt Shakespeare to prove his point.
Laica Clerge Mr. MCAlmount A.P. English December 19 2011 Rhetorical analysis on Shakespeare Macbeth Shakespeare’s Macbeth edited by Barbara A. Mowat and Paul Werstine is a story of betrayal manipulation and greed. The story shows the reader an impact of the horror at the darkness in humans. Shakespeare use’s rhetorical devices such as imagery, irony, foreshadowing and aside. The devices make a suspenseful, shocking, spine-chilling play.
It could be that he has damaged himself so that he is unable to feel empathy for others - or that the evil is innate. Macbeth displays some very evil characteristics - selfishness, coldness, obsession and cold-blooded murder. Shakespeare explores the degree to which he alone is responsible, and how far others contribute to Macbeth is perhaps Shakespeare's greatest exploration of the problem of evil. Evil is positioned both within and without. The witches are objective figures but Macbeth's first utterance in act 1, scene 3 suggests that he shares a similar thought with the witches.
Throughout the play Lady Macbeth is the driving influence behind Macbeth and the immoral path that he chose to follow. To put it simply Lady Macbeth started the rot and persuaded the hesitant and indecisive Macbeth to “be a man” and do the deed of killing Duncan. Macbeth initially decided to “proceed no further” in the matter of killing Duncan because he had been kind to him of late bestowing the position of Thane of Cawdor on him. She responds to this by saying that if he can lose his ambition so readily, his love for her must also be changeable. Then she insults his masculinity and questions his courage.
As such Macbeth is morally vulnerable to them. The ways in which Shakespeare’s language gives us the imagery that the witches are so evil is when it quotes the oxymoron: “Fair is foul, and foul is fair.” This quote is important because it introduces the idea of deception which will be picked up in the imagery further through the play. Macbeth from the beggining of Act 1, scene 2, is always associated with blood. At first this is a positive view of imagery as it quotes: “Bellona’s bridegroom.” We get the impression that Macbeth is a “Noble hero,” other quotes such as: “ For brave Macbeth, he deserves that name” or “ O, valiant cousin, worthy gentleman,” show us that Macbeth is presented as a man that is one in a million. Further through the play however the image of blood is used to soak “ Devilish Macbeth,” a quote such as: “Untitl’d tyrant, bloody-sceptr’d” show this.
It is an odd quote because she is calling on the spirits to make her into more of a man and give her the power to do terrible things. When she asks to be "unsexed" she is asking to gain the typically male characteristics of violence and hatred and unfeeling. Quote 2 Line numbers: Act 2 Scene 1 33-34 First five words: “Is this a dagger which I see before me,/The handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch thee.” Context: Macbeth says this quote. This is right before Macbeth will kill Duncan.
The other interpretation is that something supernatural and scary is at work, that the dagger is a sign from the witches Macbeth spoke to. This part of his soliloquy uses a rhetorical question, as if he is questioning his own sanity, especially when he realises that it is his own blade, ‘such an instrument I was to use’, covered in ‘gouts of blood’. This shows the reader that Macbeth is already seeing the horror of Duncan’s murder and it creates tension for the reader. It then moves onto the dagger and how it ‘marshall’st’ Macbeth towards Duncan’s chamber, suggesting that the witches are beckoning him to kill the king. This in turn makes the reader feel apprehensive and afraid of the supernatural beings corrupting Macbeth, as it gives a feeling that they are always watching, and also highlights the mystical powers they seem to have.