Act 5 Scene 1

Act 5 Scene 1

1. sleepwalking scene

   • Gentlewoman reports to the Doctor that Lady Macbeth sleepwalks- she enters asleep holding a candle
     • She tried to wash imagined blood from her hands
       • Overall we get the sense of her disorientation and guilt as a result of the murders
   • sleeplessness
     • Link to Macbeth

2. Staging

   • 'fast asleep' yet 'her eyes are open'
     • Her lack of observing the doctor and the gentlewoman highlight how she is uncharacteristically unaware of her surroundings
     • abnormal behaviour
   • 'She has a light by her continually'
     • enters holding a candle
       • vulnerable- like a child afraid of the dark
         • Contrast to before where she was summoning darkness and evil spirits

3. Change in Lady Macbeth

   • language
     • Breakdown of her language
       • 'O, O, O!'
         • Reflects her mental fragmentation and deterioration
         • Making sounds- animalistic
           • dramatic elongated moans- showing her pain/discomfort
         • repetition+ exclamation mark
         • intense emotion
       • Loses the ability to communicate in words
   • Structure
     • First time shift from poetry to PROSE for Lady Macbeth
       • Not as composed and coherent
     • Short sentences that are incoherent
       • Non-sequitur
         • jumping between events
           • Her language is dreamlike, disjointed recollections of Macbeth's misdeeds
             • dwells particularly on the murder of Duncan
               • One she was most involved in - traumatic event
         • Lines 36-37
           • Where she jumps from the death of lady Macduff to the scene of Duncan's murder- despite the time gaps between these events
             • heavily punctuated- 2 question marks, dashes and commas
               • indicate the the fragmented language
                 • mental breakdown
     • Repeated references to her having blood on her hands
       • She is seen 'rub[bing]' her hands
         • verb
           • Instructs the actress to scrub violently in a frantic manner
       • Metaphor
         • 'all the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand'
           • echo of Macbeth's 'Great Neptune's oceans'
           • contrast to 'a little water clears us of this deed'
           • vast quantities of strong smelling perfume indicated cannot rid her of the foul smelling blood
             • sensory image
               • Effective at showing how Lady Macbeth feels both responsible but also damned forever
         • Used to describe how the blood (metaphor for the sin) is permanent
           • We begin to see how her conscience is taking hold of her- she is overwhelmed
             • guilt of what she has done
               • false facade of before- she feels the guilt inside
                 • Before she appeared unaffected by the murders
   • Different to the powerful, controlling woman at the start