Macbeth

'The battlefield, thunder and lightning'

The stage directions 1,1

Pathetic fallacy with the weather and battlefield suggests the play will be a long battle

'Fair is foul, and foul is fair'

1,1	Chiasmus is alluring, strange balance to the Witches' speech. The fricative alliteration sounds like ominous whispering Paradoxical language is mysterious and untrustful

'When the hurly-burly's done, When the battle's lost, and won'

1,1	Paradoxical language is mysterious and untrustful, the oxymoron of lost and won suggests untrustworthiness and untruthfulness Rhyming couplet sounds like a spell The witches speak in trochaic tetrameter which sounds like an incantation

'There to meet with Macbeth'

1,1	The witches' are the first to introduce Macbeth suggesting they will play a big role in his character

'Brave Macbeth'

1,2	Macbeth fought bravely in the battle between Scotland, Ireland and Norway

'Disdaining Fortune, with his brandish'd steel, Which smok'd with bloody execution'

1,2	Foreshadows the executions Macbeth will make in the future - of Duncan and Banquo Fortune is anthropomorphised

'Valour's minion'

1,2	Valour is anthropomorphised

'unseamed him from the nave to th'chaps'

1,2	Macbeth's visceral actions suggest his power

'What he hath lost, noble Macbeth hath won'

1,2	The Witches' riddle is answered by Duncan to be about Macbeth. This means the witches' seem trustful. The audience knows that Macbeth will become Thane of Cawdor but he doesn't know yet

'So foul and fair a day I have not seen'

1,3	Macbeth is connected to the witches

'your beards'

1,3	The witches are liminal creatures, not women or men

'All hail Macbeth, that shalt be king hereafter'

1,3	The witches' prophecy for Macbeth

'Thou shalt get kings, though thou be none'

1,3	The witches' prophecy for Banquo

'Stay' 'Tell me more' 'Speak, I charge you'

1,3	Macbeth is using imperatives to try and control the Witches but they don't listen. This undermines his authority and suggests Macbeth's insecurity.

'Good sir, why do you start and seem to fear things that do sound so fair?'

1,3	Macbeth has powerful feelings and a strong reaction to the prospect of being king

'seeds of time'

1,3	Image of fertility = growing plants. Banquo's fertility will lead to children with time which Macbeth doesn't have

'Your children shall be kings' 'You shall be king'

1.3	Implies unity with Banquo and Macbeth as they speak similarly

'Why do you dress me in borrow'd robes?'

1,3	Macbeth to Ross about his new title of Thane of Cawdor. Lots of textile imagery

'Whose horrid image doth unfix my hair / And make my seated heart knock at my ribs'

1,3	Macbeth about the idea of killing Duncan

'If chance may have me king, why chance may crown me / Without my stir'

1,3	Macbeth seems to think fortune (chance) is on his side. 'Without my stir' implies he will not need to do anything to be crowned king but he is a man of action  -seen by his executions on the battlefield - so he will do what is needed

'There is no art to find the mind's construction in the face. He was a gentleman on whom I built absolute trust'

1,4	Duncan about the Thane of Cawdor betraying him. This foreshadows Macbeth's betrayal and his duplicity. Duncan says that there is no way to tell what someone is thinking by looking at their face - irony is that Macbeth is even more untrustworthy and deceptive Craft imagery

'o'erleap'

1,4	Macbeth's vaulting ambition ….

'Stars, hide your fires, let not light see my black and deep desires'

1,4	Macbeth wants to conceal his true murderous nature. Light imagery

'my dearest partner of greatness' 'my dearest love'

1,5	Dearest = superlative. Lady Macbeth thinks highly of Macbeth. She uses her words whereas Macbeth uses his actions to gain power Macbeth also respects Lady Macbeth back

'I do fear thy nature is too full o'th'milk of human kindness'

1,5	LM about Macbeth’s kindness

'Unsex me here... Take my milk for gall'

1,5	Lady Macbeth uses imperatives upon the spirits to remove her of her femininity.

'your face, my thane, is a book where men may read strange matters'

1,5	LM can easily read Macbeth's true thoughts

'Look like th'innocent flower but be the serpent under it'

1,5	Biblical allusion to the garden of Eden, the serpent was manipulative. We see LM telling Macbeth to conceal his true action of killing Duncan by acting innocent. Simile

'the air is delicate' 'This castle hath a pleasant seat'

1,6	Banquo and Duncan lulled into a false sense of security when entering Macbeth's castle

'fair and noble hostess'

1,6	LM is acting as a sycophant (obsequious(obedient) towards Duncan)

Repetition of 'done'

1,7	Macbeth's soliloquy, one word is repeated

'I have no spur to prick the sides of my intent, but only vaulting ambition which o'erleaps'

1,7 - Macbeth's soliloquy

O'erleaps used again. Ambition is Macbeth's hamartia.

'return to plague th'inventor'

1,7 ''

There is a cycle of violence which will eventually kill Macbeth

'He's here in double trust'

1,7 ''

Macbeth knows he is betraying Duncan, as a monarch and a guest

'the horrid deed'

1,7	Macbeth cannot say the word murder

'I have bought golden opinions from all sorts of people, Which would be worn now in their newest gloss'

1,7	Macbeth wants to enjoy the praise he has earned from Duncan like new clothes

'When you durst do it, then you were a man'

1,7	Conditional tense, LM is attacking Macbeth's masculinity which forces him to complete the murder

'Dash'd the brains out'

1,7	LM describes how she would rather kill her own child than live through the shame of going back on their word of killing Duncan. She is desperate for the crown

'False face must hide what false heart doth know'

1,7	Macbeth's duplicity is shown as he needs to pretend to be loyal to Duncan whilst knowing about the murder

'Is this a dagger which I see before me...?'

2,1	We see Macbeth's murderous intent and the start of his insanity.

'Hear it not, Duncan, for it is a knell, That summons thee to heaven or hell'

2,1	Knell = funeral bell. The rhyming couplet makes it seem like Macbeth is in a trance. The rhyme also signifies completion as Macbeth cannot go back on his actions.

'Had he not resembled my father as he slept, I had done't'

2,2	We see LM's vulnerability. She might not be as cold-blooded as she seems to be. Foreshadows her suicide due to the guilt. She may feel more guilt than Macbeth

'the owl scream and the crickets cry'

2,2	The natural world is revolting at Macbeth's act of regicide, he has disrespected the Great Chain of being

'But wherefore could not I pronounce Amen?'

2,2	Not being able to say 'amen' was thought to be a sign of being bewitched. Macbeth is going insane

'Macbeth does murder sleep'

2,2	Due to his guilt, he will never be able to sleep

'Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood clean from my hand' 'Multitudinous seas incarnadine' 'the green one red'

2,2	Macbeth's guilt is so big that no amount of water can wash the blood from his hands, instead, the blood will stain the sea red

'My hands are of your colour, but I shame to wear a heart of white'

2,2	LM does not feel guilty for Duncan’s murder

'Here's an equivocator... Who committed treason enough for God's sake'

2,3	The porter is pretending he is the gatekeeper of hell, referring to the Gunpowder plot of 1606

'they eat each other'

2,4	The Old man describes how the world is going mad because of regicide. The horses are eating each other. In this act, Malcolm and Donaldbain have fled and Macbeth has been chosen to be the next king.

'I fear thou played'st most foully for't'

3,1	Banquo is suspicious that Macbeth killed Duncan but feels safer as he will be the father of kings

'Myself should be the root and father of many kings'

3,1	King James I was supposedly one of Banquo's descendants.

'To be thus is nothing, but to be safely thus' 'Our fears in Banquo stick deep'

3,1	Being the King means nothing to Macbeth unless he is safe of Banquo's children taking over.

'Upon my head they placed a fruitless crown and put a barren sceptre in my hand' 'no son of mine succeeding'

3,1	Macbeth doesn't have any heirs, he is in danger of losing the throne. He has a bitter tone as he has committed regicide for nothing if Banquo's sons become king.

'To make them kings, the seeds of Banquo kings'

3,1	Basically says 'I've given my eternal soul to the devil for Banquo's sons to become King!' Macbeth won't let his hard work go to waste. He calls upon murderers to kill Banquo and Fleance. (Banquo dies act 3 scene 3)

'Both of you know Banquo was your enemy'

3,1	Macbeth is telling the murderers to kill Banquo. This marks the rise of his tyranny. Absolute power corrupts absolutely

'What's done is done'

3,2	Suggests damnation, no repentance will save them now

'We have scorch'd the snake, not kill'd it'

3,2	Even with Duncan out of the way, Macbeth still has many other threats.

'O, full of scorpions is my mind, dear wife'

3,2	The vocative 'O' sounds as if Macbeth is wailing. His guilt has gotten the best of him now

'I am cabin'd, cribb'd, confin'd'

3,4	Tricolon, Macbeth is trapped

'Thou canst not say I did it; never shake thy gory locks at me!'

3,4	Banquo's ghost is judging Macbeth, his imperatives again don't work as a ghost is supernatural.

'Are you a man?'

3,4	LM is commanding the whole room to keep everyone sane and distract from Macbeth who is clearly unfit to be king.

'blood will have blood' 'blood stepp'd'

3,4	The visceral cycle continues, evocative visceral imagery

'a dismal and fatal end'

3,5	Hecate plans Macbeth's outcome

'this tyrant holds the due of birth'

3,6	A Lord says how Macbeth took Malcolm's birth right to be king

'by the pricking of my thumbs something this way wicked comes'

4,1	the witches say ‘wicked’ Macbeth is coming

'beware Macduff'

4,1	The first apparition warns Macbeth to look out for Macduff

'None of woman born shall harm Macbeth'

4,1	The second apparition = bloody child

'Macbeth shall never be vanquish'd until Great Birnham wood to High Dunsinane hill shall come against him'

4,1	Third apparition. After this the witches show Macbeth the procession of Banquo's sons and a mirror (clever stagecraft) to show their sons etc to form the bloodline. They are Banquo's descendants

'He has no children. All my pretty ones? ... I must also feel it as a man'

4,3	Shakespeare suggests that masculinity is an asset.

'she has light by her continually, 'tis her command'

5,1	Spoken by the gentlewoman. LM has changed from fearless to aware and guilty of her actions. She cannot bare to be in the dark because she sees things, the darkness represents the evil and she is trying to ward it away

'Out, damned spot! Out I say!'

5,1	LM appears crazy, we see her declining physical condition

'All the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand. O, O, O.'

5,1	Hyperbole, we see how deep LM's guilt goes. She is haunted. O, o, o - tricolon and epizeuxis emphasises her mental state and the vocative 'o' sounds as if she is crying.

'what's done cannot be undone'

5,1	LM repeating ‘done’

'like a giant's robe upon a dwarfish thief'

5,2	Said by Angus. The textile imagery suggests to us that Macbeth cannot fulfil his position.

'I cannot taint with fear'

5,3	We see Macbeth's hubris as he says he can't lose courage.

'was he not born of woman?’

5,3	We see Macbeth's arrogance

'I have supp'd full with horrors'

5,5	Macbeth has become desensitized to brutality as he doesn't care that there are women crying. His murders have turned him into a tyrant

'tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow'

5,5	Nihilistic (nothingness) view of life. LM has just died.

'Out, out, brief candle'

5,5	Alludes to the candle LM was holding to keep evil at bay. The candle is a metaphor for life

'Life's but a walking shadow... It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury signifying nothing'

5,5	Extended metaphor of life being a shadow

'the wood began to move'

5,5	The witches' prophecy has come true

'Macduff was from his mother's womb untimely ripped'

5,8	Violent language about Macduff’s birth

'I will not yield To kiss the ground before young Malcolm's feet'

5,8	Macbeth will not live to be humiliated so he chooses to fight and die

'Behold where stands th'usurper's cursed head'

5,9	Everyone is now free of Macbeth's tyrannical reign

'signs of nobleness like stars shall shine on all deserves'

1,4	Duncan believes a good person’s nature is reflected in their face. light imagery. good people shine like ‘stars’ suggesting they are illuminated by god

'our country sinks beneath the yoke; it weeps, it bleeds'

4,3	Malcolm is the rightful heir and a symbol of hope. he is worried for his country