Throughout the scene it is apparent that Lady Macbeth is in command because she is the one that is making the demands and telling Macbeth about the plans and how the plans are going to be carried out.
Lady Macbeth tells Macbeth to appear innocent but to act viciously, showing she has power over her husband and as a result she can control what he does.
Macbeth does not speak as much as his wife and is interrupted by her when he tries to have some say in the dialogue.
“We will speak further-.”
“Only look up clear…”
Lady Macbeth interrupts him taking back the authority that Macbeth tried to gain. Interrupting someone is usually done by people who have an influence over the others; in this occasion Lady Macbeth seems to feel that what her husband has to say is less important compared to what she has to say. By making Lady Macbeth interrupt her husband Shakespeare creates a final and firm sense that Lady Macbeth is in control until the end of the scene.
In order to express Lady Macbeth’s desires to have the power and control Shakespeare fills her speeches with powerful imagery giving the effect that Lady Macbeth is desperate to have control and will do anything to get it; this point is seen near the very beginning of the scene.
Lady Macbeth – “…unsex me here and fill me…of direst cruelty…”
Lady Macbeth asks the spirits to make her evil, by making Lady Macbeth’s speech to the spirits it makes her appear grand because she is asking the spirits to do her a favour.
Shakespeare ends this scene with Lady Macbeth speaking the last words. By giving her the last words the audience is sure that she is the one in power.
“Leave all the rest to me.”
Shakespeare also made Lady Macbeth’s last words very powerful in meaning, making Lady Macbeth appear to be superior and powerful as she is the one making the plans for Macbeth. Shakespeare ends this scene very well by making Lady Macbeth’s last words effective and powerful, something the audience will remember.
In the beginning of Act 3 sc. II the audience can sense the shift in power that has taken place. The scene begins with Lady Macbeth being uninformed and questioning Macbeth, this creates the feeling that Macbeth has power as he knows what is currently happening and has the answers to her questions.
“We have scorch’d the snake, not kill’d it”
Shakespeare has begun to make Macbeth more demanding and confident. This makes it more difficult for Lady Macbeth to gain back her power and control, nevertheless she does try to gain it back. Shakespeare must have added Lady Macbeth’s attempt and failure to get back her power and control because it creates a competitive atmosphere between the two characters and therefore when Macbeth is in power it seems to have a much greater effect.
Although the audience might not notice at first both Macbeth and Lady Macbeth have similar traits of when they are in power; both characters speak about dangerous things that illustrate dark powerful images, such as when Lady Macbeth refers to poison and hell etc in the first scene and Macbeth refers to dangerous animals.
Another similarity that is noticeable in both scenes is the form in which both Lady Macbeth and Macbeth refer to each other and the emotions they express towards each other. Shakespeare seems to have created a pattern in the way they treat each other in correlation to who is in power.
In the first scene discussed when Lady Macbeth is in power, it is evident to the audience how Macbeth feels about his wife when he calls her “My dearest love”. This gives the audience the sense that Macbeth is weak trying to stay on his wife’s ‘good side’, this can also show fear or insecurity and therefore, compared to Macbeth, Lady Macbeth appears to be more confident and consequently more powerful. Ironically in this scene the audience can see that Macbeth, who is not in power, sees himself and his wife as equals when he says ‘Dearest Partner of greatness’.
In the second scene chosen, where Macbeth is more powerful, the audience can perceive that Macbeth is not so weak or insecure any more but rather the opposite even degrades his wife, who used to have such a great effect over him, by referring to her as ‘dearest chuck’. In this seen Lady Macbeth then seems to take the position that Macbeth used to have, referring to Macbeth as her “dear lord”, in the first scene and here is another result due to the shift in power.
