Whilst Banquo and Macbeth are talking you recognise that the structure of the conversation is very stilted, distracted and suspicious. The structure of the dialogue uses enjambment this speeds up the convasation and suggests that both characters are tense and trying to create small talk.
The dagger speech is the main part of Act 2 scene 1. This soliloquy shows macbeths state of mind. The structure of the lines echo the swings from precision to mental disturbance that characterize Macbeth throughout the play. There are three false alarms: "I see thee still . . . I see thee yet . . . I see thee still!" Between each of these alarms comes a moment of relief in which Macbeth appeals to the world of the physical senses: "Art thou not . . . sensible to feeling?" "Mine eyes are made the fools of the other senses," and "It is the bloody business which informs thus to mine eyes."
Shakespeare here creates a different sort of tension when Macbeth is left alone on stage to do his soliloquy. Here we see a personal inner tension. Macbeth then starts ordering his servant around; “go”, “ get” but then loses a sense of reality, is this an apparition, the question is, is it the supernatural or is it Shakespeare suggesting that his conscience is playing on his mind? Shakespeare uses the vision of the dagger to suggest a distracted mind or the power of the supernatural using Macbeth as a pawn. Macbeths apparent shock creates tension because he doesn’t know whether to believe it or not although does this suggest that he is on the edge of insanity?
Nevertheless, as in the earlier scene with his wife, Macbeth eventually goes mental . The urge to become king is now strong in him. In his final lines, as he ascends to the king's chamber, he imagines himself as Murder itself, cunningly making its way towards its victim. The distinction between word and deed in the last line is an idea that occurs frequently in Shakespeare. What we say and what we do are frequently very different matters.
Macbeths references to supernatural figures such as “Hecate”, “Tarquin” all help to add to a sinister image. The references to “ghosts” too make it clear that Macbeths between hell and earth otherwise known as limbo. The soliloquy is broken by return to reality the bell “death knell” almost shocks him bringing him back to the present and to the “bloody business”. Here Shakespeare appeals to the audiences senses by almost shocking because we know he and the audience are waiting for the bell but shocks both when it happens.
Shakespeare uses images of death and a series of rhetorical questions to create a sense of self doubt, nervousness and fear which all help to create tension. “Is this a dagger I see before me, the handle towards my hand?” He uses three rhetorical questions which adds to the audiences concern over Macbeth’s state of mind. Is he going insane or is he possessed?
The tension is continued in Act 2 Scene 2. The audience never see Duncan’s murder but presume it is brutal. Scene 2 is after the death of the king and shows the response of the characters. One factor that shows this is the use of speech; Shakespeare creates tension by the use of dialogue rather than images and soliloquy.
At this point Lady Macbeth is on her own on stage .Lady Macbeth's opening words introduce a new level of emotional strength, the original leader is now waiting nervously on stage waiting to hear from Macbeth. Fear of failure has been replaced with fear of discovery, and even though she describes herself as drunk with boldness and on fire with passion, she is just as easily alarmed as her husband is by the tiniest noises and movements. Her speedy changes of thought and speech indicate the language of her final fall.
At this point all noises are shocking Lady Macbeth because she is scared of being caught “Hark! Peace!”, “The owl that shrieked the fatal bell man” she is also full of adrenaline and feeling nervous but very courageous. Macbeth is not yet back on stage but his nervousness is conveyed by the surprised calling out,” Who’s there? What. Ho!” this is a suggestion of guilt and maybe some regret.
The short pacey dialogue creates tension and shows the characters response to the situation in hand. There are numerous questions, exclamations and four orders throughout the text and show that the characters are constantly worried about being found out. Shakespeare uses the image of Macbeth steeped in blood which also adds the the tension.
Yet, despite all this, Lady Macbeth appears to be more fragile to the deed to be able to make several horribly ironic comments, including the observation that she would have committed the murder herself, had she not been put off the idea by the similarity of the sleeping king to her own father.The similarity of this line “by which she seems to excuse something lacking in herself with her earlier taunt to Macbeth that she would have dashed out the brains of her own child had she sworn to do so”. The fact is that what Lady Macbeth would do her husband has actually done. The total reversal of roles that she anticipated cannot now occur because, despite his guilty conscience, Macbeth has done what she could never do.
The quick-fire dialogue and split line structure in this part of the scene indicate a sense of frightened urgency in both characters. Macbeth's concern centers on two major areas. First, he believes he has "murder'd sleep." Sleep, he argues, ought to bring physical calm in the same way that prayer soothes the spirit. But in his case, the ability both to pray and to sleep has been cancelled. Macbeth is haunted by the knowledge that he will never again rest easy in his own bed: "Glamis hath murdered sleep, and therefore Cawdor / shall sleep no more, Macbeth shall sleep no more!" Elizabethan audiences would immediately know this was a sign of witchcraft and the realms of all evil. Lady Macbeth, refusing to accept such "brainsickly" thoughts, reminds Macbeth of the familiar comparison that "the sleeping and the dead / Are but as pictures." Ironically, she is the one who will be kept from sleeping by the picture of death long after it has left Macbeth's mind.
The second area of Macbeth's concern is the bloodiness of the deed and in particular the fact that his own hands that show witness to the unnatural deed of murder. Again, for Lady Macbeth, blood is only like paint used to cover the picture of death and can be easily washed off. But Macbeth is aware of the deep stain beneath the surface. His ability for recognizing the length that he went to, which indicates his later remark that he is "in blood stepped in so far," is missing in Lady Macbeth.
At this point, the knocking begins. Like the beating of the heart the noise is partly the knocking of their consciences and partly an actual knocking. Symbolically, the knocking is the knocking of justice, or of vengeance it then refers to the audiences sense of hearing the knocking becomes more frantic which then makes the tension rise.
Shakespeare creates tension by using a series of dramatic devices which help to draw the audience in and create a realistic sense. Act 2 scenes 1 and 2 are pivotal to the play as without the murder Macbeth would not take power. This play has a significal historical context as James 1 was related to Banquo but also was obsessed and unnerved by the supernatural. It has comtempory significance and is still important in modern audience because it includes elements and flows in human nature such as betrayal, tragedy and ambition.
