‘Macbeth’
“…this dead butcher and his fiend-like queen”. How far do you agree with Malcolm’s assessment of Macbeth and Lady Macbeth at the end of the play?
As Malcolm’s assessment of Macbeth as a “dead butcher” and of Lady Macbeth as a “fiend-like queen” is quite subjective, I cannot fully embrace or object it. However, there is evidence throughout the play that shifts the balance towards evil and occasionally towards good. I personally agree with Malcolm’s evaluation, to an extent however, as no human being can mechanically be set upon doing evil only, but can be closer or further from performing it.
The couple’s first diabolical act consisted of planning to commit the highest of all crimes, regicide, subsequently putting the plan into practise by murdering Duncan, King of Scotland. This ignited a series of slaughters on the part of Macbeth that could lead the reader to consider him a cold-blooded butcher. Deviating from the bloody plan, Macbeth impulsively performed his second set of murders by killing Duncan’s guards, not to jeopardise his apparent innocence. Due to the witches’ prophecies, which, at the time were also regarded as equivocations that were told by “instruments of darkness” to “win us to our harms”, Macbeth furthermore bathed in blood by killing the loyal Banquo and attempting to deprive his son, Fleance, of his life, so that he couldn’t be heir to Macbeth’s throne. At that point, he had become completely ruthless and he, himself, admitted that in order to maintain his status as King, he would eliminate all possible obstacles, even if that would mean continuing to butcher innocent people: “For mine own good/ All causes shall give way. I am in blood/ Stepped in so far that I should wade no more/ Returning were as tedious as go o’er.” The people of Scotland envisioned him as a manipulative “tyrant”, as he kept “a servant feed in every house” and had transformed the country into a place of famine, anxiety, and, above all, murder; but he only entirely impersonated the role of the butcher when he recklessly decided to brutally annihilate Macduff, “But yet I’ll make assurance double sure…thou shalt not live”, and his family “No boasting like a fool;/ This deed I’ll do before this purpose cool.” He succeeded in slaughtering his wife, babes and servants. There are several indications about Macbeth being damned for all his murders and sins, especially for killing a king, thus proving that he is a merciless butcher: “The deep damnation of his (Duncan’s) taking off.” His indifference and cold attitude towards Lady Macbeth’s death can also be interpreted as one of the last evidences of his cruelty, before he is decapitated by the patriotic and vengeful Macduff.
