GCSE Shakespeare Coursework: Macbeth

This scene reveals that the thanes think the king is not so stable or honest anymore. After becoming delusional about the ghost of Banquo he doesn’t feel safe at all which is why he killed Banquo to feel safe. This contributes to the development of the character by making him make bad decisions because everything he does is to try and make him feel safe from the last thing he did. The role of the ghost is to show the audience what Macbeth’s state of mind. The ghost represents the fact that even though Macbeth killed Banquo to feel safe he’s still haunted with fear. The role of a ghost in the 17th century was to show that the person haunted had something to hide. On stage I would have the ghost on stage because it is more obvious what’s going on and it’s easier for the actor to react to it.

Macbeth is very paranoid about anything during this scene ‘why do you make such faces? When all’s done, you look but on a stool.’ This shows that all the thaines and lady Macbeth can see is Macbeth cowering from a stool. ‘Which of you have done this?’ again all the thaines can see is and empty stall. The connection between his actions and words is that even though he’s cowering from the ‘ghost’ but yet he’s trying to send it away ‘let the earth hide thee.’ In the last speech of the scene Macbeth talks about going to the witches. ‘To the weird sisters.’ Macbeth’s behavior at the beginning and end differ hugely. He starts as a boisterous almighty king and is reduced to a paranoid mess. This shows us that if there is no threat or no knowledge of a threat the Macbeth is an excellent king. ‘I had else be perfect. Whole as marble.’ But if he knows what’s going to happen or what can happen then ‘I am cabined, cribbed, confined.’

Lady Macbeth’s role is to make sure Macbeth doesn’t make any stupid decisions or mistakes. In Macbeth and lady Macbeth’s relationship lady Macbeth is the brains behind the killing when she knows about it. She is also very powerful over the king managing to change his decisions just by talking to him. Lady Macbeth gets Macbeth to calm down by dismissing all the thaines so there is nothing for him to be paranoid about and so he doesn’t give any information away. This has happened before when he hallucinates about the dagger that he killed Duncan with. In public Macbeth seems more in control because lady Macbeth is ‘only a women’ so she tries to act like she knows nothing about anything and does things like faint when Macbeth kills the guards. The stronger one out of the two is lady Macbeth but even she cracks when she dreams of their being blood on her hands and tries washing it while sleepwalking. Lady Macbeth is a very powerful and demanding person at the right times. ‘Stand not upon the order of going but go at once.’ This is bad because if the thaines feel there is something wrong with their lord they will become suspicious when a woman takes over his job.