How Does Shakespeare Present The Way Lady Macbeth Changes Throughout The Play

Lady Macbeth pretends to overhear and exclaims, "What, in our house?” she looks as she is shocked. She then acts as if she has fainted when she discovers Duncan's death, this tells us that she is really good pretender. Throughout the scenes Macbeth does not keep Lady Macbeth informed, for example in Act 3 Scene 2, he tells Lady Macbeth that he is going to take some action, be he will not tell her what it is, this makes Lady Macbeth look frightened and irritated, this changes the relationship between Lady Macbeth and Macbeth from a hot intense to a dull and confused one. Lady Macbeth is in control of Macbeth because she helps him to not have the vision of the ghost of Banquo. Lady Macbeth turns on her husband again and chastises him for spoiling the party. She says to her friends and his family that he will be well soon in a moment of time, "Sit, worthy friends: my lord is often thus, and hath been from his youth: pray you keep seat; the fit is momentary; upon a thought. He will again be well. If much you note him, you shall offend him and extend his passion: feed and regard him not."

Shakespeare has let the audience know how Lady Macbeth has been behaving and the effect of her behaviour, when she is sleep-walking is when the doctor and the gentlewoman were having a conversation about her. Shakespeare plays about with dramatic devices in Act 5. Lady Macbeth then enters the scene in a staggering tiring state, unable to see the others even though her eyes are open. Lady Macbeth pauses and rubs her hands, as if washing them. When she can't get her hand-clean, she screams, "Out, damned spot". She tries over and over to clean the evidence from her person, but the blood always remains, just as her guilt remains. She has found out the hard way that guilt is never easy, but a powerful force that destroys both her and her husband. Lady Macbeth's conscience becomes too great for her and her mental and physical condition worsens. A gentlewoman observes her sleepwalking, and talk to a doctor. The doctor and the lady observe Lady Macbeth sleepwalking, madly trying to cleanse her hands of the blood of Duncan and Macduff's family. Still in her sleep, Lady Macbeth asks, "what, will these hands ne're be clean?" foreseeing that she will never have peace of mind. She also retells events of the day Duncan was murdered. The doctor tells the gentlewoman that what Lady Macbeth needs is spiritual and not physical help. She cannot stand the darkness and keeps a candle always by her side, almost as if trying to remove the darkness of her. This shows that Lade Macbeth has gone crazy and mad.

Lady Macbeth feels petrified because she gets tortured by gory imagination over her past conversation with her husband Macbeth. She talks about killing acts as if trying to be away blood from her hands. Lady Macbeth's language in this scene betrays her troubled mind in many ways. Out, damned spot, out, I say! One; two. Why then, 'tis time to do't. Hell is murky. Fie, my lord, fie, a soldier and afeard? What needs we fear who knows it, when none can call our power to account? Yet, who would have thought the old man to have had so much blood in him. The Thane of Fife had a wife. Where is she now? What, will these hands ne'er be clean? No more o’ that, my lord, no more o’ that. You mar all with this starting. In this speech, Lady Macbeth's language is changing, jumping from one idea to another idea as her state of mind changes. Her sentences are short, reflecting a mind too disturbed to speak expressively. She spoke in iambic pentameter before. "How now, my lord, why do you keep alone, of sorriest fancies your companions making, using those thoughts which should indeed have died with them they think on? Things without all remedy should be without regard: what's done is done." These languages reflect what is going in her mind that the entire nightmare might happen again and again, she also thinks that she might be executed or killed by the thanes for persuading Macbeth to kill Duncan (Past of the King of Scotland). As said by the Doctor and the Gentlewoman, that Lady Macbeth's behaviour is not really sustained. Lady Macbeth became victim to guilt and madness to an even greater point than her husband. Her conscience affects her much, a point that she eventually commits suicide.

Lady Macbeth was all bad throughout the scene because she is responsible for the evil doings of Macbeth. Lady Macbeth is responsible for this by using his love for her to persuade him into killing King Duncan. Because Macbeth loved and trusted his wife, he was vulnerable to her opinions and suggestions. We also know that she is responsible for these heartless things because she has so much guilt that she commits suicide. Macbeth would never have done any of those horrible things if it were not for the murder of King Duncan, which was forced on by Lady Macbeth. Macbeth would not kill Duncan without her input. She is much stronger, more ambitious and more ruthless than her husband throughout the play. Lady Macbeth is the one that convinces Macbeth that he must commit the murders so that he can become more powerful. We also see a more difficult side to her personality. We see many examples of Lady Macbeth being much stronger and more determined to achieve her ambition of becoming powerful and important than Macbeth. She had no redeeming point throughout the scenes. Shakespeare seems to use her, to undercut Macbeth's idea that "undaunted mettle should compose nothing but males”. This is how Shakespeare present the way Lady Macbeth behaves throughout the play of Macbeth.