Lady Macbeth
The letter, read alone by Lady Macbeth, reiterates the witches’ prophecy of Act 1. Significantly, in his letter, Macbeth says nothing of their prophecy to Banquo; perhaps he is already afraid of its implications. Equally significant, he sets up Lady Macbeth as his “Dearest partner of greatness.” She will indeed become his partner of in crime, but much more than that. Apart from the fatal itself, she will be responsible of controlling Macbeth’s passions and – to an extent-his actions. Immediately after she finishes the letter, Lady Macbeth’s mind goes to work. Her words shalt be uncannily reflecting those of the witches’ prophecy. At this point, Lady Macbeth herself has virtually become an agent of Fate, just like the weird sisters. But immediately her thoughts turn to possibly failings in her husband. He is “too full of the milk of human kindness” to commit murder; he would be great, he would have a high position, he would wrongly win that position, but in case, some other, aspects of his character would not. In this case, she says there is only one solution. She must “pour (her) spirits in thine ear”. The scene is rapidly becoming darker.
Lady Macbeth is one of the most powerful female characters of literature. The fact that we meet her alone on stage means that we are privy to her innermost thoughts, which are filled with imagery of death and destruction. And when she speaks, in her soliloquy, of her “fell purpose”; her intentions are described in the most ridiculous and frightening terms. First she bids the spirit to literally deprive her of her femininity, to thicken her blood, and to stop her ability to weep. Secondly, she prays that those same spirits should suckle her, converting what should be her nourishing mother’s, milk to “gall”. Thirdly, she calls upon the night itself to hide her actions in a “blanket” of darkness. It is no coincidence that these last words reflect those of Macbeth in the previous scene: Shakespeare is creating a strong verbal bond between husband and wife that will continue throughout the play.
When Macbeth enters his castle, his wife greets him in a way that again recalls the words of the Witches; in a particular the words “all-hail” and
“hereafter” chill the audience. The dialogue that follows their initial encounter is fast, urgent and disturbing. Shakespeare uses half-line breaks to intensify the drama of the moment, each “partner in crime” picking up the rhythm of the other’s speech.
Shakespeare uses the same technique immediately after the murder.
In the lines that follow, Lady Macbeth uses several significant metaphors of concealment: Macbeth’s face is like “a book, where men/May read the stranger matters “; then in brilliantly ironic reference to the Genesis story, “Look like the innocent flower, / But the serpent under it”. The apparent paradise promised by the witches is so soon to become hell. An important psychological point is also made: Lady Macbeth herself does not hide her feelings in the same way that Macbeth does. She is not rapt in wonderment, simply practical. The last line of the scene, “Leave all the rest to me,” is quite modern in its tone. With this blunt and chilling imperative, Lady Macbeth completes her transformation from woman to man. From now on, she plays on the reversible roles; she adopted the role of “man of action” forcing her husband into the more passive role of accomplice.
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