Anthony St.John-Bond The Judd School
With reference to the soliloquies, analyse the way
Shakespeare portrays Macbeth’s mental deterioration
Over the course of Shakespeare’s Jacobean play Macbeth; Macbeth’s mind deteriorates greatly, the play showing how our thoughts and feelings can be affected by greed, temptation anxiety and guilt. Shakespeare’s portrayal of Macbeths incorporates and reflects many Jacobean beliefs about the nature of sin and the natural order of the universe, for example, the idea that anyone who committed the ultimate crime – the murder of a king – would be summoned to eternal damnation. It could be argued that Macbeth’s mental deterioration stems from his refusal to live by God’s will. During the play Shakespeare uses soliloquies to reveal to the audience Macbeth’s mental state and character. With each soliloquy, our understanding of Macbeth’s mental decline becomes more detailed until, by the final scene of the play, we witness his tragic realisation of his own naivety and inability to control his fate.
The third soliloquy (Act 2 Scene 1) is the first sign of Macbeth’s mental deterioration. Macbeth is in a difficult situation at this time as he is deciding whether or not to murder Duncan. In the second line, “Come let me clutch thee” Shakespeare expresses Macbeth’s desire to give in to temptation by using this command and that his anxiety is seizing his mind and making him follow the witches prophesies, although does not have the mental strength to commit murder. He is attempting to convince himself that he truly does want to usurp Duncan’s power and his throne. But in reality he has been unwillingly forced into it by Lady Macbeth as shown to us in Act 1 Scene 5 “hie thee hither, that I may pour my spirits into thine ear”. His level of paranoia increases when he pulls out his own dagger to signify to the hallucination that he thinks he does have the courage to commit such a sinful act. When Macbeth says “Mine eyes are the fools” this is alerting the reader that Macbeth’s mind is completely insecure and he is so fixated on his task ahead that his mind is being diminished and so is his self-control. Additionally, when Shakespeare uses caesuras “I see thee yet,” it breaks up the rhythm of the speech and the pentameter, implying and reinforcing the idea of Macbeth’s uncertainty, the pauses signalling his careful thought and observation. Shakespeare shows us that, however reluctant, Macbeth is considering very carefully both plans of action, therefore reinforcing his uncertainty within. The blasphemous nature of Macbeth’s proposed crime is given added weight by Shakespeare’s use of supernatural imagery such as “pale Hecate’s offerings” and “wither’d murder”
