Macbeth revision- Keira Power

Macbeth revision- Keira Power

1. Themes and quotations

   • Ambition
     • Yet do I fear thy nature It is too full o’ th’ milk of human kindness To catch the nearest way. Thou wouldst be great, Art not without ambition, but without The illness should attend it.”
       • In this quotation, Lady Macbeth is saying that here that her husband is too cowardly to kill the king
     • 'Take my milk for gall'
       • This quote shows the Lady Macbeth is willing to do anything for the chance to be queen
   • Guilt
     • Will all great Neptune’s ocean wash this blood Clean from my hand?
       • Nothing is powerful enough to rid Macbeth of his guilt
         • 'Out, out damned spot' spoken by Lady Macbeth has these same themes to it
           • 'All of the perfumes in Arabia could not sweeten this little hand'
   • Appearance vs reality
     • 'Is this a dagger I see before me?'
       • Macbeth is hallucinating
     • 'Look like the innocent flower but be the serpent under't'
   • Superstition
     • The fact that there are witches and they are shown in a negative light as in the Jacobean era many feared witches
       • Fair is foul and foul is fair hover the fog and filthy air
   • Feminism
     • 'Unsex me here'
       • Lady Macbeth feels she cannot do what is needed of her because she is a woman
     • Sexism was rife during the Jacobean era
     • Lady Macbeth is unusually powerful for a woman however she does fall into madness as the expectation of the time was women must be subhuman to men
     • Although she is a strong female lead, proving that women can be powerful, she oon surcomes to madness and kills herself, like many of Shakespeares heroines tha reinforce the sexism which was rife in the Jacobean era
   • Other themes include:
     • Kingship
     • Tyranny
     • PTSD
     • Witchcraft
     • Loyalty
   • Supernatural interference
     • Throughout the story, it is deliberately unclear as to whether the Macbeth's have been possessed or if this there own doing
       • 'Come you spirits that tend on mortal thoughts',
         • It could be argued that Lady Macbeth is asking to be possessed
   • Reversal of nature
     • 'They say the horses ate each other'
       • Nature is angry and turning against people
         • God is angry
           • This is important because most of the country was protestant at the time of writing this

2. Characters

   • Macbeth
     • A good soldier, plagued by ambition and greed -the main character
       • He starts as the protagonist and ends as the antagonist
   • Lady Macbeth
     • Wife of Macbeth, pathologically manipulates her husband in attempts to get him to kill the king
       • It could be argued that she is a witch
   • Witches
     • The supernatural element of the play, often depicted as old and hag-like
       • They speak in rhyming couplets throughout (“Double, double, toil and trouble, / Fire burn and cauldron bubble” ), which also separates them from the other characters who mostly use blank verse to speak. A common technique that Shakespeare uses is to switch rhyme and meter to capture peoples' attention
     • Hecate is the Witches' mistress
   • Duncan
     • A good king who is loved by everyone
   • Banquo
     • Banquo is Macbeth's friend who is later killed in his fit of paranoia
       • Banquo's sons are prophesied to be king
         • Fleance is Banquo's son who marginally escapes the killing
   • Malcom
     • Son of Duncan who later becomes king
       • He is a capable and fair ruler unlike Macbeth
   • Donalbain
     • Ducans other son
   • Ross
     • Ross is a Scottish nobleman and Lady Macduff's cousin. He brings Macbeth the news that Duncan has made him Thane of Cawdor.
     • He is accompanied by Angus
   • Macduff
     • Thane of fife who kills Macbeth
     • Lady Macduff is his wife who is killed by Macbeth
   • Siward
     • Earl of Northumberland, general of the English forces and brother of the late King Duncan. He leads an army of ten thousand men to oppose Macbeth.
     • Young Siward is his son who is killed by Macbeth
   • Seyton
     • Seyton is Macbeth's chief servant when his thanes are abandoning him. The fact that his name rhymes with 'Satan' may be coincidental

3. Plot

   • Three Witches predict great things for Macbeth who is at this point is a noble soldier
     • Lady Macbeth persuades Macbeth to kill King Duncan to get the throne.
       • Macbeth kills King Duncan and becomes King of Scotland.
         • Macbeth has his best friend, Banquo, murdered.He then has Macduff's family murdered. Later at his coronation, he sees Banquo's ghost
           • Macbeth begins to think that he’s invincible.
             • Lady Macbeth commits suicide
               • There is a battle and Macduff decapitates Macbeth.
                 • Malcolm becomes king causing a cyclical structure
             • Macduff convinces Malcolm to lead a revolt against Macbeth who is now a tyrannous king

4. Context and writers intention

   • James 1 was king at the time and he was a protestant king in a largely catholic king, when he came to power he was viewed as incompetent and was largely disliked
     • Since he funded the Lord Chamberlain's Men, Shakespeare had to abide by his wishes or risk going out of business
     • James 1 commissioned Shakespeare to write a piece that would deter the public from committing regicide
       • The chain of divine being is a prominent theme within this play as it reinforced the notion that God will correct all and this was a lesson James 1 was keen on because it kept the country in order
   • He also lived in a sexist society that was unaware of mental health issues which may explain why Lady Macbeth met such a tragic end
   • Comedic scenes are interspersed throughout as Shakespeares plays were aimed at the general public, a large percentage of whom were poor and uneducated
     • This may explain why the piece was so violent as many poor people would have not understood the politics of it but could be easily entertained by blood and gore
       • Poor folk, who would stand in the pit, may through tomatoes, drink and even furniture if bored with the performance

5. Structure

   • The plot had a cyclical structure, starting with the downfall of a traitor and ending with the downfall of a traitor
     • This emphasises the Great chain of Devine being and the theory that everything will return to its proper state eventually moreover, wrong people would get what they deserved