In act 1, Scene 7, Macbeth says
“As his host, I should against his murderer shut the door, not bear the knife myself.” Here Macbeth is still not that evil because he is disagreeing with his wife and he is saying that he should protect the king not kill him. He also tells Lady Macbeth “We will proceed no further in this business.” But Macbeth’s wife keeps on pressuring him and attacking his manhood so that he kills the king. She says
“What beast was’t then,
That made you break this enterprise to me?
When you durst do it, then you were a man”.
She is saying that he is not a man. At this stage in the play Lady Macbeth is in control and she is telling Macbeth what to do, she is the real evil person. This shows us that Macbeth is weak because he is so easily persuaded by his wife, and that he doesn’t use his own brain because his wife is doing all the thinking and telling Macbeth what to do.
In Act 2, Scene 1, Banquo says, “How goes the night, boy?” he says this in order to show that it is night because this play would have been performed in the daylight so that line is just in the play to alert the audience that it is night time. Just before Macbeth kills the king he sees a dagger before him and says
“Is this a dagger which I see before me,
The handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch thee.
I have thee not, and yet I see thee still.”
Here Macbeth asks a rhetorical question. Shakespeare used this because he was trying to show that Macbeth is confused about whether there is a dagger in front of him or if his conscience is playing a trick on him. This is Macbeth’s conscience playing a trick on him, the dagger is leading him to Duncan’s room and it has spots of blood on it. In the book it does not say whether the audience are able to see the dagger or not, so directors have the choice of whether to show it or not. Personally, I would show the dagger. When he first sees the dagger it is his conscience telling him not to do it, and when the dagger changes to being bloody it is Macbeth’s conscience telling him that his dagger will look like the one he sees before him with spots of blood when he has done the deed on it and that this act will have consequences. Also in the play, Macbeth kills Duncan offstage, but in a remake of the film that I watched you could see Duncan being killed. I think they did this because films are visual, so they showed Duncan’s death. I thought this was good because it showed me of how bloody it was and then the viewer can understand why Macbeth’s conscience attacks him throughout the play.
Shortly after Macbeth has killed the king he says,
“Methought I heard a voice cry ‘Sleep no more! Macbeth doth murder sleep!’” Macbeth has just killed the king and he thinks he can hear voices; this is his conscience playing on him again. These attacks of conscience show us that Macbeth is sorry for what he has done and that he isn’t that evil because he feels remorse for what he has done.
In Act 2, Scene 3, Macbeth kills the guards, who are completely innocent, in order to take suspicion away from himself and Lady Macbeth. He is changing because at the start of the play he wasn’t evil but now he is starting to kill more people who are innocent and he is ignoring his conscience.
In Act 2, Scene 4, Macbeth is crowned king, which is a major change because now he is the supreme power.
In Act 3, Scene 1, Macbeth is planning to have Banquo and Fleance killed because he sees them as a threat, but he is a coward because he is not killing them himself, he is getting two other people to do it for him, which will send them to hell. This was a big thing because when this play was written religion was a very big thing and people believed in heaven and hell. This tells us that Macbeth is a superstitious man and he knows that if he kills someone that he is bound to go to hell.
“Oh full of scorpions is my mind, dear wife!” this is saying that Macbeth is being plagued by guilty thoughts. Macbeth has changed because he doesn’t tell Lady Macbeth about his plot to kill Banquo and Fleance, when before they were partners in crime and they discussed everything.
Later Lady Macduff and her children are killed. Macbeth has changed because at the start of the play he is killing people who are trying to kill him (in the battle) and protecting the king but throughout the rest of the play he is killing people who are entirely innocent of any crime. He has become more evil whilst Lady Macbeth has become less evil. I think that Lady Macbeth and Macbeth possess only one conscience between them and at the start of the play it belongs to Macbeth because he was reluctant to kill Duncan, however later in the play I think the conscience has gone to Lady Macbeth because she is doing nothing evil whilst Macbeth is killing people without any remorse. In Act 5, Scene 1 Lady Macbeth says,
“What, will these hands ne’er be clean? … Who would’ve thought the old man to have so much blood in him?” Lady Macbeth suffers from extreme guilt, and she keeps washing her hands in her sleep. Lady Macbeth is going mad. She has changed because before she was extremely evil but now she isn’t. Some people start to feel sorry for her because she is suffering and she is stuck because if she confesses then she and Macbeth will both be hung and if she doesn’t say something, she is running the risk of becoming insane.
In Act 5, Scene 3, everybody deserts Macbeth and people are only obeying him out of fear not because they love their king.
“And that which should accompany old age,
As honour, love, obedience, troops of friends,
I must not look to have; but, in their stead
Curses, not loud but deep, mouth-honour, breath,
Which the poor heart would fain deny, and dare not. Seyton!”
Macbeth has realised that he won’t have a happy old age because everybody hates him except for his wife. He is desperate for his wife to be cured of her madness because she is all he has left and maybe because he thinks that she might tell people that they killed Duncan. In this scene the audience will feel sad for Macbeth and begin to see that he is not that evil in his heart of hearts. This shows us that Macbeth has a soft and gentle character because he loves his wife.
In Act 5, Scene 5, Lady Macbeth commits suicide because she can’t contain the guilt anymore. Macbeth’s response is to say,
“Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day
To the last syllable of recorded time.
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more: it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.”
Macbeth has realised that he has killed all those people and done lots of other bad things, all for no reason. I think at this point Macbeth doesn’t care if he wins or loses the battle because he will have no one to celebrate a victory with and no one will care if he dies. Macbeth is told that Birnam wood is moving towards Dunsinane, now he knows that he has lost and he decides to go out with a bang. This tells us that Macbeth is a superstitious man because the witches said that he could not be defeated until Birnam wood moved to Dunsinane, but he didn’t have to believe them and that he is not really that evil because he is saddened by his wife’s death.
Macbeth dies honourably in battle at the hands of Macduff. In the last Act I think that the audience will feel sorry for Macbeth because even though he is evil , it is sad the way his world falls apart so quickly, and I think that many of the audience would be hoping that Macbeth won the battle at the end because everything is going bad for him, so the audience will be wishing that something goes right for him, which would be him winning the battle and remaining king.
In conclusion Macbeth changed a lot during the play, at the start he was a honourable man but slowly the prediction by the witches of him becoming king got to his head and he decided with help from his wife to kill Duncan. After that he killed lots innocent people, but was plagued by his conscience for the rest of his life. At the end his wife died, which saddened him greatly. Then Birnam wood moved to Dunsinane and Macbeth knew he was going to die, Macbeth battled until his last breath but was killed by the suzerain born Macduff.
