This also points to how unintelligent Macbeth really was. This is true for Lady Macbeth as well, as she convinced Macbeth to follow through with the plan, even with Macbeth doubting himself so much. I don’t think anyone could have predicted how Lady Macbeth and Macbeth both responded to Duncan’s murder. In committing the murder, Macbeth became king, but he would also become a nervous wreck that could be executed at any
For example, she easily influences his confidence by fooling around with his masculinity and his courage, “When you durst do it, then you were a man / And to be more than what you were, you would / Be so much more a man” (I.vii.51-53.) When Macbeth is considering to not complete his plan to murder Duncan, Lady Macbeth mocks him when she receives his second thoughts. She is fortunate in altering his determination and seems to be the person who takes control in the relationship. Lady Macbeth desires Macbeth to be a strong and dominant man and her only drive is to assist him in taking Duncan’s throne. However, Macbeth has the ultimate decision in whether or not to commit the assassinations, but he loves Lady Macbeth and wishes to please her.
What appears to be evil, is really her loyalty and love for her husband. Just as Macbeth is ambitious for the throne, so is Lady Macbeth driven to assist him. Although her actions are undoubtedly misguided, they are done out of devotion and allegiance to Macbeth, and she ultimately pays a heavy price for this engagement with evil. We first meet Lady Macbeth as she reads the news of the witches’ prophecies in a letter from Macbeth. However in her soliloquy she does not once refer to herself.
Firstly, the first great crime highlighted the early contrast between Macbeth and his wife. Lady Macbeth plans to kill Duncan for power while Macbeth believes that he can find another way to gain power. Lady Macbeth’s tough exterior and very daunting personality was stronger than Macbeth’s weak and frail morals. After the murder took place, Lady Macbeth describes her change. “My hands are of your colour: but I shame/ to wear a heart so white.” (II, ii, 64-65).
While she prepares to exterminate the current king, she cries out “Unsex me here,/ and fill me from the crown to the toe top-full/ Of direst cruelty.” (Shakespeare. 1.5.48-49). Lady Macbeth is portrayed as a strong female character in the play because she goes against all expectations in order to become an ambitious and dominating female. She does not perform the typical maternal role as the weaker gender but gives up her female qualities in her pursuit of power and ambition. Because of this digression from the norms of society, Lady Macbeth stands apart from the other women of her society.
Shakespeare uses language, structure and dramatic devices to convey and create the effect of strong emotions through his ambitious characters, which is similarly portrayed in laboratory with the narrator’s strong and bitter emotions towards her husband’s infidelity. These characters can also be compared to the narrator of Porphyria’s lover whose intense emotions of love become too overwhelming for him to handle. Both Shakespeare and Browning show Elizabethan society as patriarchal, where men were considered to be the leaders and women subservient. Women were regarded as the weaker sex not just in terms of physical strength, but also emotionally. Women were also depicted as kind and caring as well as being the perfect mother and housewife, on the other hand men were portrayed as brave, strong and loyal.
Ultimately, it is Macbeth’s wife, symbolic of temptation and evil, that is responsible for pulling out the monster of Macbeth. She is the one who sets off the trigger that ultimately leads to Macbeth’s demise, however it is Macbeth that is to blame. He doubted his wife’s judgment however chose not to act on it. This is shown through the scene when he questions Lady Macbeth’s plan to kill Duncan by asking, “If we should fail?” (Macbeth 1.7.64). If it weren’t for his conscience, which he chose to
Ambition is not Macbeth’s only fatal flaw, but it is certainly one of the most predominant ones. He desires so much, but doesn’t have the strength to fight for it, but he has such a strong ambition for his dream that he pulls through and fights for it. He loves his power and is so ambitious that it is scary to a reader. He pursues his goal all the way to the end and shows his ambition by not surrendering when he is about to be killed. Macbeth is the strong, valiant warrior who has won in battle and brought victory to Scotland.
If he did not allow his wife to manipulate him and did not become obsessed with the prophecy, he most likely would never have considered killing King Duncan, which is the single most influential reason Macbeth dies. The thirst for power and the power struggle with Lady Macbeth are significant reoccurring subject in the story that seems to play a lot into the
Thus, Lady Macbeth, despite how malicious and sinister she is, at the beginning of the play originally has a great amount of love and ambition for her husband’s success. Upon the murder of Duncan Macbeth feels as though had had betrayed one whom Macbeth has great respect for and whom had