How is the character of Lady Macbeth presented in Shakespeare’s play ‘MacBeth’?

She continues her aggressiveness by using intense emotive language, showing her loyalty
to him and asking for return. She utilises the hyperbolic reference of their passed away child
in order to emotionally manipulate Macbeth. In her soliloquy she said that “I have given suck”
which portrays a graphic image of their passed away child, showing her capacity of violence.
Hence, her determination to reach the desires for her husband that she would kill her own
child without a doubt, in order to seize the throne for Macbeth. It attributes to the emotional
manipulation of her, conveying that had she made a promise for him, she will never go back
on that. Lady Macbeth utilises the emotive image that persuades him to show his loyalty to
her as she does, to what extent is she willing to sacrifice should he do the same, which is to
commit regicide. It further shows her manipulative behaviour and forceful determination of
transferring her desires to him, as if he is a puppet of hers.

By foreshadowing the consequences of Lady Macbeth’s outcome later in the play, her
domination and forcefulness could be easily seen. The quotation “make thick by blood” infers
Lady Macbeth’s suicide which is driven by all the remorse and guilt of regicide. The
imperative “make”demonstrates her domination or moreover, subverting the gender roles at
her time. By giving the strength both physically and mentally there will be no remorse and
guilt, which is what drives her into madness later in the play, contributing to her death.

The prediction shows how closing up the mental “access and passage” both internally and
externally benefits Macbeth from being the Lord. With the lack of apathy, locking up all the
emotions, he could rationalise and dictate his feelings in order to succeed in his way to
become king. Lady Macbeth’s domination and ambition over her husband is cleverly
presented through the foreshadowing of her own death, which is an example of the
consequences with guilt and remorse. The modal verb “wouldst” infers the hypothetical
future of Lady Macbeth. Where she underestimates the power of her remorse and guilt, not
her husband, leading to the miscalculations or her own grief crushes her and takes away her
own life.

Later in the scene reveals the fragile mental side of Lady Macbeth, where she is incapable of
tackling the remorse and guilt through regicide. Foreshadowing the consequences of herself,
she manipulates her husband’s mental world in order to wipe away his good wills. In her
soliloquy she emphasises the consequences of underestimating the power of remorse. The
quotation “make thick by blood” foreshadows Lady Macbeth’s death which is led by the
miscalculations of her own grief. She clearly understands the right way to success is by
closing up the “access and passage” both internally and externally, locking the apathy inside
for both herself and Macbeth. Lady Macbeth, however, is incapable of fighting against her
conscience. It shows her incapability of shutting her emotional door as well as convincing
herself committing regicide is the right thing to do.

Lady Macbeth’s use of feminine wiles, as the back steel of Macbeth, perfectly demonstrates
her ambition and ruthless determination of transferring her desires to him. Lady Macbeth
utilises comparatives in order to persuade Macbeth. “Great” holds hyperbolic meanings
which at the same time positively connotes flattery. Comparing to the “worthy Cawdor”, who
he currently is, and the monarch, Lady Macbeth attempts to feed Macbeth’s ego and
superiority of being the future Lord. This achieved her goal of manipulating his thoughts to
become the next “all-hail” Macbeth, fulfilling her own ambition. Demonstrating not only the
manipulation over her husband, but dictating the whole kingdom behind him.

Shakespeare utilised irony to show how Lady Macbeth fears the “milk of human kindness”,
of which Macbeth himself is too full. She believes treachery is what helps him possess the
throne, and uses his manhood to wipe away his nature. The false mask hides the remorse
which helps him get away from murder. As if Macbeth was the vehicle that drives her
ambition and goal to succeed. Behind the truth of Macbeth being the murderer through each
and every scene, it seemed that it is him who fulfils the wants of Lady Macbeth, manipulated
by her as a whole. Transferring the remorse and guilt to him and leaving herself with a pair of
clean hands.
Shakespeare’s use of hyperbole through Lady Macbeth's speech shows the dark,
manipulative side of herself.

Lady Macbeth

Scene V – soft and complimentary

* incapable of killing Duncan – unable to make her Queen
appearance vs reality, confusion
Scorns her husband’s good qualities
Later lady macbeth invokes evil spirits to help her achieve her goal
“Like the innocent flower, but be the serpent under’t
Serpent = one of the oldest and most widespread mythological symbols, representing
unknown humankind and evil
Serpent = intextual
- Allusion
- Reference to the garden of Eden
- Corrupting him as the vehicle for the ambition just like the serpent corrupting them
through the tree of knowledge, causing them to be sent out of the garden of Eden
Macbeth is trying to be innocent

“Is as a book”
Easily read by others
Taking out the qualities that she thinks it is not right and changing him
“Read” - extended metaphor
- He is too open and too good
“Time” metaphor symbolises innocence
“Time”is an object “to beguile the time, look like the time”
If you want to trick those who are innocence, you must look you’re innocence
Incompass innocence in all ways, hiding from in to out
Analogy
“eye , hand, tongue” what he looks, touches and speaks
Need to look innocence because he needs to be king
The only way to be king is to look completely innocent
Macbeth will become suspicious because he is gaining all the benefits after Duncan’s
death
Leading to macduth’s accusation
When Lady Macbeth brings up that they will have to kill Duncan, macbeth said “we will
speak further”
His wife looks down on him in someway while all the nobleman fears Macbeth
Acts as an important consequence through the story later
She weights between his strength and weaknesses
She knows that he got ambition like she does but there are also something that could get
him away
Project of making Macbeth the king, only obstacle is the human kind of him

Act I Scene VII

There is a significant twist in Lady Macbeth’s attitude towards Macbeth further into this
scene. She shifts from a soft and complimentary tone into a harsh and aggressive one. In
Macbeth’s soliloquy he mentioned the “ingredients of our poisoned chalice”. The word
“poisoned chalice” acts as a juxtaposing metaphor that the poisoned gift – the crown, which
is given to him is insecure. He fears committing regicide pushes him into an irreversible
situation. Lady Macbeth immediately indignifies and challenges his manhood “then you were
a man”. She manipulates him by questioning his lack of the stereotypical traits of man –
fearless. Calling him a coward as if he is not brave enough to commit regicide. As well as
comparing her desires with the love they possess, she denigrates his love by saying “Such I
account thy love?” She hurts Macbeth, linking two unrelated subjects, the assassination and
their love, in order to manipulate him, killing Duncan to fulfil her desires. The use of extreme
emotive language clearly demonstrates her twist into a more negative, aggressive
manipulative character.

“Was the hope drunk?”, “Such I account thy love?”.

Shift of Lady Macbeth’s attitude towards him, she turns into extremely aggressive
“Ingredients of our poisoned chalice”
Chalice = glass
Poisoned gift = gift that is bad for you
Juxtaposing metaphor that means what gift (crown) given to Macbeth is not secure, danger
Third prophecy the other people’s son is going to be king
“Ingredients” = process of how all these things will happen
Gifted leads to danger outcomes
“Our” possessive pronoun = he and she are active participants of seizing the crown
“Commends the ingredients of our poison’d chalice to our own lips.
Soliloquy

If we should fail
“If” she convinced him
Conditional
Shows that she is the active participant in the murder
Convinced+almost forced her husband to do it
Reacts harshly on Macbeth when he doesn’t wanna kill
“If” confirmed that he is convinced
Embolden, she feels convinced by the prophecies from the witches of him being king
ACT 2 SCENE II
One paragraph:
“The owl that shriek’d, the fatal bellman”
The folklore, omen for death
Onomatopoeia – shrieked
Create pathetic fallacy, natural imagery
Their talking about the night before, something has broken the law of nature
Using the owl as the fatal bellman – it is the bringer of death

Macbeth:
“I have done the deed” Duncan is killed off stage
“The owl scream and the crickets cry”
Referring to the omen
Alliterative phrase “crickets cry” harsh sound
Onomatopoeia of crickets cry
Phoneme = single sound
Phonetically learn a word
*Supernatural, connection of themselves to powers are seen as a daily practice
Relying on omens to show what’s happening at that time

—---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Lady macbeth
“These deeds must not be thought”
“it will make us mad”
Auxiliary words(helping verb)
FORESHADOW Lady macbeth’s death
She sees illusion of herself
“Will” definitive – 100% confirmed, definitive auxiliary verb confirms the foreshadow of her
suicide
Still advising him but at the same time really forceful by saying the modal verb “must”
She is concerned about what remorse will do to her, fracture her sanctity
Supernatural to dictate her way of her character from this point

Superstitical

She doesn't have to be manipulative because macbeth has done what she want him to do,
he complied to his desired – less aggressive

“Give me the daggers”

“Give” imperatives – a lot of force
Fulfilling the plan, the plan requires the daggers
Shows that she is the active participant in the murder
“The sleeping and the dead are but as pictures”
She knows that she doesn't want to feel because of what these due to her
“Pictures” metaphor of making these unreal to her, deceiving herself
She is threatened by this
Does Not deter her at this point, but Macbeth is not settled, his kingship is not stable and
weak.
*she plotted the murder but being the indirect character
Goes from conspiracy to active involvement, she is taking the dagger behind
He is not alone in it, she is also involved in it

“My hands are of your colour but i shame to wear a heart so white”
When lady macbeth is behind
Becomes an active participant in the murder
- Colour imagery – extended from how macbeth ends
- Macbeth “making the green one red” colour of crimson
- Extending the colour imagery when she says the hand are of your colour
Possessive pronouns of “my” and “your” in conjunction with one another
figurative language
Red = violence and blood and dead
White + innocent and purity, talking about fear, goes white when we are fear

“A little water clears us of this deed”

Petual decline of from a good man into a tyrant

ACT III SCENE IV

After he has be king, he has to kill banquo
He hires assassins to kill Banquo

“This is the very painting of your fear”

Metaphor, painting = unreal, illustrating, imagining
She is troubleshooting the problems that are arising
Macbeth is fractured, she resistant with his idea of killing Banquo
Different version of lady macbeth
The way of maintaining their power
Metaphor of imagination
Lady macbeth is trying to maintain the order of control
Unleashed macbeth out of the world and he sees the way is killing people
He doesn't see remorse and guilt but at the same time killing people
And the accumulation of guilt and remorse lead to him into madness and losing himself
Lady macbeth fears this to happen

Reference to daggers
“A woman’s story at a winter’s fire”
Woman story = witches
James I has the keen interest in demonology, to apple polish the king
Winter is used as a cycle, near the end of their life
“Impostors to true fear would well become”
They’re just been crowned and already issues and fractures of their positioning
She is frustrated and panicking
She is trying to pull him back to reality
“You look but on a stool”
Construction of his own fracture mind
Troubleshooting it
But he is not seeing reality but seeing the version of the construction of his guilt

If macbeth is king it’s finite, they have no arse and blood = child to take over the throne
Hollow victory from Macbeth’s point of view

Sisyphean reference
Divine right of kings
Because they think kings are gods
** link to the remorse and guilt for committing regicide

Lady Macbeth
P.118 “You have displaced … admired disorder”
Accusing/manipulation → troubleshooting alleviating problem
Killed the king – become monarch themselves
Result of killing Banquo → loss of morality
Prophecies are open ended, not specifying, → false sense of security
Not a normal standard giving birth, ripped out
“You *have*”
accusing , strong
triplet , negative verbs “
“Admiring, juxtaposing idea, admiring disorder happened

Not as strong as she was before → becoming more sensitive to the irrationality of Macbeth
He is trying to kill people
Uneasy for her, different character compared to Act 1 and 2
What she wants macbeth to do has been attained
Foreshadows 5 times before, result of death due to sense of sanctity and remorse

Context:
If macbeth is king it’s finite, they have no heirs and blood = child to take over the throne
Hollow victory from Macbeth’s point of view
Linking to Queen Elizabeth no heirs to pass over the throne

**Allegory “blood on your hands” literal and figurative together

Literal when it was in Act 2 but she fears it happening figuratively