Lady Macbeth

Created by: Tiffany
Created on: 21-04-13 21:08


	Personality	Role
	Full of self-will and discipline Determined - The chain of imperatives ('come', 'fill', etc) gives her speech a special urgency and determination. Predatory - She prays for darkness to hide her planned actions, 'Come thick night/And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell'. Evil - She calls on 'spirits' to 'tend on mortal thoughts' Manipulative - She tries to convince her husband to go along with the plan to kill Duncan and questions his manhood, 'What beast was't then/That made you break this enterprise to me?/When you durst do it, then you were a man/And to be more than what you were, you would/Be so much more the man.' Deceptive - She acts 'like the innocent flower' but the 'serpent under't' Ambitious - 'I feel now the future in the instant'	Lady Macbeth is Macbeth's wife and the mistress of Dunsinane Castle. She persuades Macbeth to murder King Duncan. She becomes his active accomplice, even returning the bloody daggers to Duncan's bedroom when Macbeth fears to return them himself. Represents the women who are a source of evil and violence. She brings out these themes in the play. She begins to feel the emptiness of their achievements, seeing only 'doubtful joy'. Victim of her own crime/malice/evil played by guilt. Shakespeare does not show Lady Macbeth's decline into nervous breakdown and suicide, giving only one glimpse of that horrifying process: the torment she experiences in her sleepwalking.
	Development (Growth & change)	Other information
	After reading the Macbeth's letter she last mobilised her whole being towards the task of Duncan's murder. She is prepared to sacrifice her femininity and her humanity - 'unsex me', 'Come to my woman's breasts/And take my milk for gall.' Her relationship with her husband changes over the course of the play. She mocks him for being weak, 'Was the hope drunk wherein you dressed yourself?' But Macbeth begins to show leadership, and it is her who becomes weak. She shows signs of being the victim by the end of the play. She is overwhelmed with guilt and is entrapped with her own conciousness.

Personality

Role

Full of self-will and discipline
Determined - The chain of imperatives ('come', 'fill', etc) gives her speech a special urgency and determination.
Predatory - She prays for darkness to hide her planned actions, 'Come thick night/And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell'.
Evil - She calls on 'spirits' to 'tend on mortal thoughts'
Manipulative - She tries to convince her husband to go along with the plan to kill Duncan and questions his manhood, 'What beast was't then/That made you break this enterprise to me?/When you durst do it, then you were a man/And to be more than what you were, you would/Be so much more the man.'
Deceptive - She acts 'like the innocent flower' but the 'serpent under't'
Ambitious - 'I feel now the future in the instant'

Lady Macbeth is Macbeth's wife and the mistress of Dunsinane Castle.
She persuades Macbeth to murder King Duncan.
She becomes his active accomplice, even returning the bloody daggers to Duncan's bedroom when Macbeth fears to return them himself.
Represents the women who are a source of evil and violence. She brings out these themes in the play.
She begins to feel the emptiness of their achievements, seeing only 'doubtful joy'.
Victim of her own crime/malice/evil played by guilt.
Shakespeare does not show Lady Macbeth's decline into nervous breakdown and suicide, giving only one glimpse of that horrifying process: the torment she experiences in her sleepwalking.

Development (Growth & change)

Other information

After reading the Macbeth's letter she last mobilised her whole being towards the task of Duncan's murder.
She is prepared to sacrifice her femininity and her humanity - 'unsex me', 'Come to my woman's breasts/And take my milk for gall.'
Her relationship with her husband changes over the course of the play. She mocks him for being weak, 'Was the hope drunk wherein you dressed yourself?' But Macbeth begins to show leadership, and it is her who becomes weak.
She shows signs of being the victim by the end of the play. She is overwhelmed with guilt and is entrapped with her own conciousness.

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Lady Macbeth

Personality

Role

Development (Growth & change)

Other information

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