Lady Macbeth

This is the first time I am reading Macbeth and I had no idea how much I would enjoy reading it. The play is very similar to Richard III but I think that Lady Macbeth adds a little twist to the plot. I was struck by how she was more evil then Macbeth. Lady Macbeth makes him feel like less of a man when he thinks about not killing King Duncan stating “When you durst do it, then you were a man; And to be more that what you were, you would/Be so much more the man” (1.7.49-51). She wants Macbeth to know that in her eyes her was more of a man when he wanted to kill Duncan and he must do it to be a real man. She clearly gave him the kick in the rump he needed to enact the murder of Duncan. One of her best examples which highlights keeping a promise is when she says:

“...I have given suck, and know

How tender 'tis to love a babe that milks me./

I would, while it was smiling in my face,/

Have plucked my nipple from his boneless gums/

And dashed the brains out, had I sworn/

As you have done to this.” (1.7.54-59)

Her words are gruesome and bold because as a mother she is basically saying she would kill her child to keep a promise. To even think about using your child as an example is awful especially when you think of a moment that is supposed to be so tender turned into something so ugly. You have to wonder, would she really do it. Lady Macbeth's speech shows how ludicrous she truly is and it makes me wonder why she is so intent on instigating Macbeth. Does she want the power as Queen? Her words and actions reveal her as one of the most powerful women Shakespeare has created in one of his plays. Unlike the docile female characters, Lady Macbeth has a voice and she wants it to be heard.

Why Witches?

I’m curious as to why witches play such a key role in the beginning of Macbeth. What is the relationship between their prophecy and Macbeth’s own ambition? And Lady Macbeth’s influence?

I would guess that the witches’ role in the story is to sort of unlock Macbeth’s inner ambition. While Lady Macbeth does not interact directly with the witches, she knows from Macbeth’s letter of their prophecy, and I would guess that the witches unlock ambition in her too.

Shakespeare is playing with human and inhuman sources of ambition. Every person goes through life with some amount of ambition, and some people do truly awful things to reach their ambitions. I’m not convinced that the witches in the play are real witches (I know they are supposed to vanish into thin air, but who knows, right?), so I’m wondering if the witches are kind of a sad “joke” or commentary on human ambition. Some people have to feel like a power greater than themselves has sealed their fate and led them to do terrible things. In other words, it’s apparently really easy to justify something by a made-up twisted logic if the supernatural is involved.

It’s really important to note that the witches never tell Macbeth how he will become King. It’s never implied that he is supposed to do so actively. How old is King Duncan? Old enough to die of old age soon? And Malcolm? He could be killed in another battle. Macbeth and Lady Macbeth decide that Duncan must be killed.

 I also interpret the witches as being a collective physical manifestation of ambition. That is to say, witches are traditionally thought of as ugly, and ambition can be very ugly too. I also think their paradoxes are a linguistic manifestation of ambition. Paradoxes can be confusing, just like ambition confuses your reasoning. They also have double meanings, of course, while ambition has a sort of double meaning—the chasing after whatever is desired and the consequences of getting it.

King Duncan says to Banquo after promoting him, “I have begun to plant thee and will labor to make thee full of growing” (1.4.29-30). I think this is a great allusion to the witches and to Lady Macbeth. They’ve all planted a sort of “seed” in Macbeth’s head (that he should kill the king). If this is the way to think about the witches and Lady Macbeth, then there’s also a sort of reverse fertilization/pregnancy metaphor going on here (maybe?), which is pretty fascinating.