Macbeth Quotes

Power (Kingship v Tyranny/Abuse of Power & Corruption)

“Give solely sovereign sway and masterdom” - Lady McB 1:5 (ultimate power/tyranny)

“Yet who would have thought the old man to have had so much blood in him?” - Lady McB 5:1 (divine right of kings)

“His title [hangs] loose about him, like a giant’s robe upon a dwarfish thief” - Angus 5:2 (divine right of kings)

Appearance vs Reality

“Look like the innocent flower but be the serpent under it” - Lady McB 1:5

Gender & Masculinity

“Unsex me here and fill me… full of direst cruelty” - Lady McB 1:5

“Yet do I fear thy nature. It is too full o’ the milk of human kindness” - Lady McB 1:5

Guilt, Innocence, Conscience & Paranoia

“Stop up the access and passage to remorse” - Lady McB 1:5 (doesn’t want to feel guilt)

“What, will these hands ne’er be clean?” - Lady McB 5:1

“Yet who would have thought the old man to have had so much blood in him?” - Lady McB 5:1

“What’s done is done” - Lady McB 3:2 to “What’s done cannot be undone” - Lady McB 5:1

“A little water clears us of this deed” - Lady McB 2:2

The Supernatural

“The instruments of darkness tell us truths… to betray’s in deepest consequence” - Banquo 1:3

“This supernatural soliciting cannot be ill, cannot be good” - McB 1:3 (lack of morality, act only for themselves)

Ambition

“The Prince of Cumberland! That is a step on which I must fall down, or else o’erleap,, for in my way it lies” - McB 1:4

“Art not without ambition, but without the illness should attend it” - Lady McB 1:5

Secrecy

“Stars hide your fires; let light not see my black and deep desires” - McB 1:4

Fate (vs Free Will)

“If chance will have me King, why, chance may crown me without my stir” - McB 1:3

Evil (?)

Setting

“Alas, poor country!… It cannot be call’d our mother, but our grave” - Ross 4:3

“When shall we three meet again? In thunder, lightning, or in rain?” - Witch 1:1

“So foul and fair a day I have not seen” - MacB 1:3,

Light vs. Dark

Blood

Sleep

Order vs Disorder