Macbeth Essay

5 Pages 1241 Words

Committing a murder isn¡¦t an easy task. It¡¦s not only about a knife and an alibi; but also involves a brew of inner-struggle and guilt that are often buried under the stereotypical image. Shakespeare successfully separates Macbeth from these stereotypes, which appears startling among these hackneyed murder tales. In Macbeth, Shakespeare digs into the raw side of murderers, placing their inner struggle and guilt in the limelight. The characters, mainly Macbeth and Lady Macbeth, experience surprising stages of emotional metamorphosis - peaceful loyalty, cold-blooded murder, and hateful revenge ¡V which, in the end, gradually replace their original behavior with their antithesis.
In the early scenes, Macbeth and Lady Macbeth believe in different sets of morals. A Loyal Thane of Cawdor, Macbeth, in Lady Macbeth¡¦s words, is ¡§too full o¡¦th¡¦milk of human kindness to catch the nearest way.¡¨ (23) He is too decent and squeamish to murder Duncan for the crown, and even if he does, his face ¡§is as a book where men may read strange matters¡¨. (27) Shakespeare uses a handful of metaphors and imagery to portray Macbeth¡¦s loyalty and decency, which Lady Macbeth considers as cowardice. However, his lack of self-confidence is made up by the opportunism of Lady Macbeth, which Shakespeare reveals with the use of dark metaphors and imagery. Lady Macbeth reveals her evil and ambitious character by hoping the evil spirits will ¡§come to [her] woman¡¦s breasts and take [her] milk for gall¡¨.(25) She even further reveals her ambitious and opportunistic personality by her wish of being ¡§unsexed¡¨ and ¡§filled from the crown to the toe topfull of direst cruelty¡¨.(25) Shakespeare uses strong, ominous words and phrases, such as ¡§thick night¡¨, ¡§the dunnest smoke of hell¡¨, ¡§keen knife¡¨ and ¡§peep through the blanket of the dark to cry¡¨ (25), to further enroot Lady Macbeth¡¦s enviousness into the...