Macbeth Key Quotes

“Stay, you imperfect speakers. Tell me more.”

A1S3

• Highlights his desire to learn more about the prophecy.

• Declarative sentence indicates his seriousness towards fulfilling his ambitions of gaining power

• Imperative command “Stay” highlights his desire to take control, depicting his desperation and thirst for power, emphasising his growing ambition

“{Aside} Glamis, and Thane of Cawdor: / The greatest is behind.”

A1S3

• Grows in depth and secrecy once he learns that he has earned his title of Cawdor

• Declarative “The greatest is behind” highlights his awareness and belief of the Witches’ prophecies as to the fact that earning the titles of Thane of Glamis and Cawdor were accurate

• The “greatest”, being the title of King of Scotland, is far behind

• Highlights his lack of discomfort in the face of his desire for power.

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

1:3

• Use of tactile imagery in “unfix my hair” and “knock at my ribs” highlights Macbeth’s fear towards the thought of killing to obtain the throne, to which his emotions influence his physical actions.

• His actions emphasise how he knows that killing King Duncan to obtain the throne is not morally right, depicting how his guilt outweighs his ambition.

“Stars, hide your fires, / Let not light see my black and deep desires,”

1:4

•  Macbeth’s demand that the stars and the heavens hide from view highlights how he seeks to conceal his desires of obtaining the throne from view

• Understands the wickedness of his actions, revealing his moral consciousness as he moves towards the path of evil

Link to “signs of nobleness like stars shall shine / On all deservers” A1S4

"From this moment / The very firstlings of my heart shall be / The firstlings of my hand."

A4S1

• Macbeth will act on his own impulses without any hesitation or reflection

• Moral deterioration, he has abandoned all conscience and will no longer consider the morality of his actions

• Transformation from agonising over Duncan’s death to a tyrant who acts on violent impulses without remorse

“False face must hide what the false heart doth know.”

A1S7

• Hide guilty intentions to murder Duncan under welcome/loyal exterior

“I am in blood / Stepped in so far that should I wade no more, / Returning were as tedious as go o’er.”

A3S4

• He has committed so many murders that turning back to goodness would be just as difficult as continuing forward with more violence

• Trapped by his own actions, redemption is impossible, and he might as well continue his bloody path

• Complete moral corruption and resignation to evil

• No way out, except to commit more atrocities 

“But now I am cabined, cribbed, confined, bound in / To saucy doubts and fears”

A3S4

• Trapped by his fear

• Alliteration emphasises the trapped feeling

• Wish to be “As broad and general as the casing air” (A3S4)

“He chid the sisters / When first they put the name of king upon me. Then prophet-like, / They hailed him father to a line of kings”

A3S1

• Banquo as more noble, could rat on MB

• “Royalty of nature” → implies Banquo’s bloodline

• Foil to MB

• Unable to change his destiny & fate

“Upon my head they placed a fruitless crown / And put a barren sceptre in my gripe”

• “Fruitless crown” - no heirs, sons and daughters, whereas Banquo is destined to have many king descendants

• No heirs to inherit → benefits Banquo instead of him + decendants can’t be king = no benefit for him, dammed his soul

• Motivates him to arrange for Banquo and Fleance’s murderers: attempting to change fate and secure the throne for his future descendants

“It is too full o’th milk of human kindness / To catch the nearest way.”

A1S5

• LMB: thinks that MB has ambition but not the ruthlessness to commit murder

• Milk as compassion, tenderness = LMB sees this as a weakness

• “Nearest way” = kill King Duncan

“Come, you spirits / That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here / And fill me from the crown to the toe topfull / Of direst cruelty.”

• Jacobean era: masculinity was defined through acts of violence and bravery

• Reinforced throughout the play, as shown when Macbeth is driven to carry out his acts of tyranny when his masculinity is questioned by Lady Macbeth

• LMB’s actions throughout the play are not seen as violent, but rather manipulative and deceptive.

• Does not wish to deprive her of her gender, instead to unsex her womanly qualities of being innocent, nurturing and kind. 

“Make thick my blood, / Stop up th’ access and passage to remorse”

• Motif of blood symbolises the violence and guilt that she will feel and cause

• By ordering the supernatural forces to thicken the blood in her veins, Lady Macbeth unintentionally thickens the guilt she will feel later on in the play

“Come to my woman’s breasts / And take my milk for gall”

• “It is too full o’ the milk of human kindness”: purity and maternity

• The role reversal of Lady Macbeth removing the milk from her body, and Macbeth being full of milk highlights Lady Macbeth’s dominance

• The juxtaposition of breastmilk and bitter poison highlights Lady Macbeth giving up her nurturing qualities in favour of filling her with destructive cruelty: a more sinister and powerful quality which she believes will help achieve her goals

“Was the hope drunk / Wherein you dressed yourself? Hath it slept since?”

A1S7

• Rhetorical questions highlights Lady Macbeth’s view of Macbeth’s weakness and timidity, targeting Macbeth’s lack of manliness and masculinity

• Personification of hope being drunk: was it a drunken fancy which became intoxicated?

• Mocking Macbeth

“Have plucked my nipple from his boneless gums / And dashed the brains out”

A1S7

• Verbs of “plucked” and “dashed” emphasise the innocence and vulnerability of the infant

• Highlights her own ambition as being more ruthless and manly than Macbeth’s hesitation

“But I must also feel it as a man.”

A4S3

• Emotions are important, needs reflection and practice

• Feels responsible for the deaths of his family 

• MB lets guilt consume him; emotions are expressed unhealthily, and he dismisses and suppresses them

• MD expresses his guilt and takes responsibility

• Shows his humanity and depth of character as he refuses to suppress his grief, honouring his feelings before taking action

• Demonstrates how true masculinity requires emotional vulnerability

“Ha: they pluck out mine eyes. / Will all great Neptune’s ocean wash this blood / Clean from my hand?”

A2S2

• Hyperbolic image: unable to wash away all the blood, consumed by guilt & recognises the magnitude of his crime

• Blood is a permanent moral stain, indelible

• LM: guilt can easily be dismissed, to be cleaned up → initial emotional detachment (“A little water clears us of this deed”)

“Methought I heard a voice cry, ‘Sleep no more: / Macbeth does murder sleep’, the innocent sleep, / …chief nourisher in life’s feast.”

A2S2

• Symbol of sleep signifies peace and rest; Macbeth describes sleep as the “balm of hurt minds” and “chief nourisher in life’s feast”, connoting sleep as the restorative force of life and mind.

• For Macbeth to murder Duncan in his own sleep suggests that his crime will lead to his own permanent psychological torment and insomnia

• Macbeth has destroyed his own peace of mind and ability to rest, establishing his guilt as an inescapable consequence

“But wherefore could not I pronounce ‘Amen’? / I had most need of blessing and ‘Amen’ / Stuck in my throat.”

• ‘Amen” is used as a concluding term at the end of a prayer; his inability to profess ‘Amen’ emphasises Macbeth’s lack of connection to divinity and God

• By killing King Duncan, a righteous king appointed by God, he has sinned against the Lord.

• Macbeth’s declaration that he “had most need of blessing” highlights how his conscience has struck him; the verb “need” highlights Macbeth’s desperation for God’s blessing and protection; his inability to say ‘Amen’ paints him as the victim, as someone unable to obtain God’s help

• The metaphor of ‘Amen’ being stuck in Macbeth’s throat signifies a barrier blocking Macbeth from the divine

• He has been denied God’s forgiveness, and thus his guilt signifies to him that he will be damned and sent to Hell

“Tis safer to be that which we destroy / Than by destruction dwell in doubtful joy.”

A3S2

• It is easier to be dead rather to live with the guilt as a cause of the destructive pursuit of power

• LM doubting her own happiness

• Reinforces guilt

• MB: insecure, doubtful of his joy, leads to his own destructio

“All the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand”

A5S1

• Nothing can rectify the sins that she has committed

• Olfactory imagery (smell) emphasises her guilt

• Hyperbole (all the perfumes): absolute and irredeemable guilt.

"Out, damned spot! Out, I say!... Yet who would have thought the old man to have had so much blood in him?”

A5S1

• Reveals that guilt cannot be suppressed or washed away

• Earlier claim: "a little water clears us of this deed” → psychological consequences of guilt are inescapable and can destroy sanity

• Even for LMB, who originally appeared to be remorseless.

• LM and MB role reversal: A1&2, MB weak, LMB powerful; A3&4, MB powerful, LMB weak

  • Symbiotic relationship; they are joined and rely on each other

  • Tied to each other, LMB feels the sins of MB

“Out, out, brief candle, / Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player / That struts and frets his hour upon the stage / And then is heard no more”

• Irony, as an actor is playing a character on the stage

• We are just fools in this world: a human life is a performance with no lasting significance/purpose

• Everyone’s life is unreal (not a true life) → a character 

• MB sees life as meaningless and temporary 

• Shows his complete despair = life is empty and futile

“She should have died hereafter… tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow”

A5S1

• Apathetic

• Tomorrow x3: repetition, no time for grief (there are more important things than LMB’s death)

• Complete spiritual and emotional emptiness; he has become so desensitised by violence that even his wife’s death cannot move him, showing his isolation and despair

“The moon is down; I have not heard the clock. / …There’s husbandry in heaven, / Their candles are all out.”

A2S1

•  Contrast of light and dark highlights the growing influence of the supernatural

• The symbolism of darkness through the lack of moonlight and candlelight highlights a lack of divine protection or influence

• The metaphor of the “candles” for stars being extinguished emphasises Macbeth’s wish that the “Stars, hide your fires, / Let not light see my black and deep desires”, highlighting the dominance of Macbeth and the supernatural over the natural world. 

• ALSO: imagery of a starless sky reflects Duncan’s statement in Act 1 Scene 4 that “signs of nobleness like stars shall shine / On all deservers”, emphasising how Macbeth is not a worthy king and undeserving of the throne.

• Unlike Macbeth’s previous acts of valiance and nobility, which awarded him the title of Thane of Cawdor, heaven’s stars being hidden from view highlights his fall from grace from brave soldier to bloody tyrant

“Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible / To feeling as to sight?”

A2S1

• Use of the adjective “fatal” to describe the vision of the dagger highlights both King Duncan’s death as caused by the dagger

• As well as foreshadowing the crippling psychological consequences that Macbeth will face from the dagger, as well as his own demise, as a prophecy of his own doom

• Dagger as marking the point of no return as it is both fatal to Duncan, but also fatal to his own psyche through the guilt which he will feel.

“Art thou but / A dagger of the mind, a false creation / Proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain?”

A2S1

• Adjective “heat-oppressed” highlights how Macbeth’s conscience is already pressuring and tormenting him

• His state of mental exhaustion caused by his guilt oppresses and affects his brain, connoting guilt with a disease

• His reactions to the vision of the dagger highlights how Macbeth is not a natural murderer, and that his mind is warning him against committing regicide

“{Aside} This supernatural soliciting / Cannot be ill, cannot be good.”

A1S3

• Juxtaposition of “ill” and “good’

• “Cannot be ill” sets an optimistic and promising tone: the witches and the prophecy cannot be evil as the truth has been told,

• Contrasts with “cannot be good”, where killing King Duncan becomes a temptation in Macbeth’s mind.

• Highlights Macbeth’s internal conflict as to his actions as a result of knowing the prophecy and inner struggle for the temptation of obtaining the crown.

'For none of woman born shall harm Macbeth'

A4S1

• MB cannot be harmed by anyone born of a woman

• Irony being that the witches’s prophecies are double-edged and turn against MB

• Ambiguous prophecies; uses equivocation to withhold key detains about MB’s fate

“Look like th’innocent flower / But be the serpent under ‘t”

A1S5

• Simile: depicts Lady Macbeth guiding Macbeth to appear welcoming and harmless like an innocent flower but to actually be a deceitful serpent underneath

• Hide his murderous intentions when killing King Duncan

• Macbeth’s shift from honourable and valiant thane to ruthless killer, highlighting how initial appearances can deceive

• Connection to Garden of Eden; biblical allusion to betrayal

• Overthrowing the Divine Right of Kings