How does the audience’s opinion of Lady Macbeth change throughout the play?

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Becky Wilding 11Y

“How does the audience’s opinion of Lady Macbeth

change throughout the play?”

In ‘Macbeth’, the audience’s view of some of the characters changes dramatically at various points in the play. In particular, the audience’s view of Lady Macbeth changes considerably, which affects our perspective on other aspects of the play.

        The first scene in which we see Lady Macbeth is Act 1 scene 5, where we see her reading a letter from Macbeth.  In this scene she plots to kill Duncan, and says that Macbeth “art not without ambition, but without the illness should attend it”.  This implies that she sees Macbeth as weak, and that evilness is a quality that he does not possess.  Furthermore she says accuses him of being “too full o’ the milk of human kindness”, saying he is overly kind and she would respect him more if he was more masterful and immoral.  This makes the audience see her as powerful and dominant. The audience see her as the more controlling half of the relationship. At this point, we agree with her, as we see Macbeth as weak for not wanting to kill Duncan when we feel that it is necessary. The audience becomes involved in their relationship and success, and it does not matter that they plan to commit murder as we are amoral and want to see their plan succeed.

        Also in this scene, Lady Macbeth call on the “spirits that tend on mortal thought”, which shows she has great faith in the supernatural, which is also shown in her instant acceptance of the words of the witches and does not question it at all. This makes the audience mock her slightly, and suspect that she is fairly eccentric, but the line also shows her tremendous determination to convince herself to be strong for Macbeth’s sake.

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        We see Lady Macbeth later in Act 2 scene 4, just after Macbeth has killed Duncan. After hearing a noise, Lady Macbeth says cries, “Alack! I am afraid they have awaked”, and seems nervous. This gives the impression that she is feeling guilty and regretful.  She then says that she is afraid that “the attempt and not the deed confounds us”, and she is only afraid that Macbeth was found out before he had the chance to finish, and now their plan is interrupted. This makes her seem very callous and unemotional to the audience.

Becky Wilding ...

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