Scene Three returns to the witches and we find them discussing the way in which they have ‘drained’ a shipman of his human quality. This can be seen as a prophecy of Macbeth’s future – as he is gradually reduced to inhuman evil. There is a sense of dramatic irony as we see what the witches are up to as Banquo and Macbeth are unaware of their presence. Macbeth’s statement: ‘So foul and fair a day I have not seen’, a repetition of what the witches earlier said, clearly links Macbeth to the witches. The witches prophecy that Macbeth will become Thane of Cawdor and King and that Banquo’s children shall be kings. The two friends dispute about what the witches had to say, and there seems to be a sense of rivalry and jealousy between them.
We see Macbeth starting to tread his own path, as he feels certain that the witches’ prophecies are true, especially when King Duncan bestows on him the title of Thane of Cawdor. Macbeth is already quaking – with both fear and excited anticipation - at the idea of becoming King and we hear in a soliloquy that he is already contemplating murder – high treason. Banquo is more suspicious of the ‘instruments of darkness’ (the witches). However, Macbeth also starts to back out of murder, thinking of a way that ‘Chance’ personified will be able to make him King without having to commit murder. Macbeth’s use of language ‘Come what come may, Time and the hour runs through the roughest day’ is beginning to reflect that of the witches in the sense that he is now chanting rather than speaking; they seem to have a strong influence over him and they now become the focus of his thoughts.
Malcolm’s speech about the deceitfulness of the previous Thane of Cawdor indicates the way in which Macbeth will do the same. The way in which Duncan then speaks about the previous Thane is very ironic in the sense that Duncan cannot see through Macbeth’s thoughts either, as Duncan says ‘There’s no art to find the mind’s construction in the face’.
From the very beginnings of the play, Lady Macbeth is viewed as very controlling, strong, and certain – Shakespeare portrays her – arguably from her introduction – as unwomanly; saying that Macbeth ‘Shalt be what thou art promised´. This reveals Lady Macbeth´s positive thinking and her having command over Macbeth. In the context of the play and the time Shakespeare was writing this can be seen as a reversal of roles and directly contradicts the accepted ideal that women were ornamental, the weaker sex, the servants of men. She is ordering Macbeth to become what the witches have foreseen, rather than questioning whether he will achieve it, or perhaps not even try to do so. From the very start therefore we see just how powerful Lady Macbeth is - she can command her husband to murder the king of Scotland. Her power is also shown in the way she taunts Macbeth, saying he is ‘too full of the milk of human kindness´. This indicates how cold, and certainly how un-motherly Lady Macbeth is, as milk is the food of newborn children. She is implying Macbeth is too much like a mother, a woman to murder anyone. Her scorn for him is another indication of her unnatural un-womanliness – which Shakespeare reinforces throughout the play with forceful and profound imagery such as this example. Comparing this high-ranking, brave and battle-hardened warrior to a woman is a huge insult, which she uses as another method to enrage and spur Macbeth on into killing his king. It is perhaps one of the main ironies of the play that Lady Macbeth, a member of the “fairer” sex is in fact one of the “foulest” creatures in the play.
Her coldness and control is again conveyed when she begins to plot Duncan’s murder with Macbeth, saying that he should ‘look like the innocent flower but be the serpent under it’, more advice for the killing of his king, and ‘leave the rest to me´ reveals her cool control and blinkered ambition over the matter. Lady Macbeth also shows a more helpful side, offering help. ‘I may pour my spirits in thine ear’, which although seemingly providing a contrast to her cold hearted plotting earlier, is in fact another way in which she is convincing Macbeth to kill Duncan, her words are sweet to Macbeth’s ear, but are in fact rooted in evil, and this shows the serpent under the ‘innocent flower’ side to Lady Macbeth.
Macbeth however is on the other end of the scale in their relationship, and he plucks up the courage to tell her he does not want to continue with the murder – and this remaining noble trait in his character almost redeems him. But she rallies, calling him a ‘coward’, saying that if he could murder Duncan ‘he were a man’. This to Macbeth, a proud and mighty warrior is a deep insult, and he is soon convinced that he will carry out the murder. Lady Macbeth’s cold-hearted side is again revealed when she says she would ‘dash´ out the brains of her own child if it were to make him happy – another repulsive image that serves to further portray Lady Macbeth as the evil, grotesque, unnatural almost inhuman being that she is. She thereby implies that he should be prepared to commit a deed of similar gravity for her sake. We also see how Lady Macbeth’s attitude has rubbed off on Macbeth, as he says ‘False face must hide what the false heart doth know´, which is very similar to Lady Macbeth’s words of the ‘innocent flower´ earlier and arguably another manifestation of the theme “Fair is Foul…”. She is cunning and calculating, and despite the fact that Macbeth is the seasoned warrior, the man, she is the one who laughs at murder and Macbeth who recoils from it; however we see her exert her power over Macbeth to make him want to murder Duncan, arguably showing how the power in the relationship is all in Lady Macbeth’s court in the first act.
Theme in the opening sequence “Fair is Foul and Foul is Fair”, stays closely to the play and reappears throughout Act One, most notably through the characters of Macbeth and Lady Macbeth who appear to be “fair” but are plotting “foul” things. To others they appear as the “innocent flower”; however to themselves, and in reality they are the “serpent underneath it”. This deceitful, hidden image is repeated throughout the play, from the opening chant of the witches to the traitorous nature of the previous Thane of Cawdor and the carefully concealed evil of Macbeth and Lady Macbeth. Shakespeare’s use of imagery serves to reinforce the theme and how it is portrayed in the characters of Macbeth and Lady Macbeth. Macbeth later pronounces those same opening lines: “Fair is foul and foul is fair”, a paradox which indicates how appearances may be deceptive: an innocent image may conceal a “foul” reality.
