Tuesday, March 29, 2011

In the play Macbeth, compare and contrast Lady Macbeth's previous attitudes and actions and her current condition.

As Lady Macbeth is not a real person, she does not have a "current condition." But, if what you want to know is how Lady Macbeth is different when we first meet her in the play and what becomes of her in the end, well that can be answered.


We first see Lady Macbeth in Act 1, Scene 5. She is reading a letter written to her by Macbeth. The letter tells of the prophecies of the witches. After reading the letter, she says:



...Hie thee hither


That I may pour my spirits in thine ear,


And chastise with the valor of my tongue


All that impedes thee from the golden round



She can't wait for Macbeth to come home so that she can get him to kill the king. She figures all she has to do is be cunning, strong, and merciless, and they will live happily ever after as King and Queen of Scotland.


She eventually convinces him to do the deed, but everything doesn't go as swimmingly as she had planned. First, her husband gets all upset and guilty about murdering the King, then there's a knock on the castle door, and they have to change and go to bed, then Macbeth has to kill more people to cover his tracks, and all the while Macbeth is feeling more and more guilty... he can't sleep and does more and more awful things. Lady Macbeth tries to keep it together and to calm her husband, but it's a very tough job.


By Act 3, both Lady Macbeth and Macbeth, now Queen and King, are quite unhappy and dissatisfied with their lives. She says ruefully:



Nought's had, all's spent,


Where our desire is got without content.


’Tis safer to be that which we destroy


Than by destruction dwell in doubtful joy.



Macbeth tells her everything will be alright; all he has to do is kill Banquo. He has Banquo killed, but Banquo's ghost appears to Macbeth and ruins a dinner party. Lady Macbeth is mortified and horrified by her husband's reactions to the ghost and has to make all kinds of excuses for him, and then she sends all the guests home.


In short Lady Macbeth has had to hold her composure all through the play, and she has had to deal with her husband's state of mind at the same time.


It obviously all becomes too much of a burden for her, for, by Act 5, a doctor has been sent for because Lady Macbeth is losing her mind. She is sleepwalking and sleep talking, and what she sleep talks about is blood and murder and murder and blood. Eventually everything falls apart for Macbeth and Lady Macbeth and she kills herself.


So, to summarize: in the beginning of the play, Lady Macbeth started off saying, Leave everything to me, and things will be great. But by the end of the play, she has seen the world crumble smash down on both of them; Macbeth is killed by Macduff and Lady Macbeth ends her own life.

No comments:

Post a Comment