Lady Macbeth realises her husband’s ambitious intentions to become King, and although it could be argued that the witches planted the seeds of ambition, it was Lady Macbeth who helped nurture this in his mind. This is emphasised when she claims, ‘unsex me’ as she wants to get rid of her innocent, feminine features and become evil, calling the dark forces to fill her with enough malevolence to commit regicide. During this time period, masculinity was associated with bloodshed and violence so her sex limited her from being able to physically kill Duncan herself. She calls upon the spirits to unleash the male soul ensconced within her female body given that she wants to be as tough and ruthless as a man. Macbeth’s phrase, “Bring-forth men-children only” also suggests this as she is so masculine that Macbeth believes she should only give birth to males as they will be so powerful and resolute. Men are courageous and Macbeth is in total admiration of her planning and confidence. On the other hand, Lady Macbeth doesn’t at any time yield to the moral dilemmas that Macbeth has. This shows that she does not really care for her husband’s feelings and fears about what is to happen, illustrating her cruelty.
Since Macbeth saw his wife as an equal, he was happy for her to execute the plots and schemes. Lady Macbeth manipulates and uses him as a vehicle through which she realises her own ambitions. She can be seen as fiendish, when she exclaims, “That I may pour my spirits in thine ear”, as she wishes to control him by pouring evil thoughts into his mind. This shows that she is naturally more violent than Macbeth. Moreover, the sibilance that is portrayed in this phrase highlights the sinister meaning behind her words. Shakespeare uses a soliloquy in this scene to show Lady Macbeth’s trail of thought, where the audience interpret her soul as being evil and categorise her as the fourth witch. Her fiendishness is portrayed when she says, “The raven himself”, as she talks about ill omens and wickedness. In this time, the audience sees the negative language as something supernatural, especially since ravens were associated with witchcraft. Her personality is also anomalous since she feels the need to threaten the life of her own child. The phrase, “dash’d the brains out,” affirms that she would do anything in order to prove herself to Macbeth. She uses maternal juxtaposition by contrasting gentle loving of breast-feeding a child with violence. In addition to this, the harsh attack of consonants in this sentence shows her propensity for violence. This highlights her unnatural side both as a woman and as a mother.
Lady Macbeth admits that Macbeth is too feeble to kill Duncan but she persuades her husband to kill the King. She can be seen as cunning and controlling when she orders Macbeth to, “look like th’ innocent flower// But be the serpent under’t.” It is wretched of her as she is asking Macbeth to betray his own goodness and become like her. Macbeth is seen as a weaker character than Lady Macbeth as he is taking orders from his wife. As the ‘serpent’ denotes duplicity, it shows that Lady Macbeth wants her husband to put on a façade. Thus, it could be argued that Lady Macbeth is a fiend-like wife and queen since she uses mockery and questions Macbeth’s masculinity in order to challenge him to prove himself. Lady Macbeth uses evil and degrading methods in order to manipulate Macbeth so that he would agree to murder Duncan and this is reiterated when she says: “When you durst do it, then you were a man.” This shows that she is the dominating person, emasculating her husband by emotionally criticizing him. By manipulating him Lady Macbeth emasculates him to execute her desires, giving him no other option and we can see this when she claims “Infirm of purpose!” By calling him weak-minded and pathetic as opposed to the ‘brave Macbeth’ that we were first introduced to, we see that questioning his masculinity is one of the manipulative techniques she uses. Thus, she is able to get Macbeth to agree to her wishes and do as she pleases. This shows us that at this point in the play Lady Macbeth is in control of the relationship and we can see that she is fiendish as she influences her husband to commit regicide, which was considered a sin.
By killing King Duncan, Lady Macbeth shows a direct rejection of God as in this period the King was thought to be God’s representative on Earth. She is one of the strongest characters in this play and is exceptional at plotting and scheming. We observe Lady Macbeth trying to encourage Macbeth to kill King Duncan in Act 2, Scene 2. She tries to justify the reason she could not kill him by saying, “Had he not resembled// my father as he slept.” This shows that Lady Macbeth is not very masculine since she isn’t exceptionally brave, proving that this is an outward projection of how she wants herself to be perceived. The fact that she knows regicide is wrong and yet she is still going ahead with the plan shows the extent of her wickedness. Moreover, we can perceive her hypocritical nature when she said she would kill her own child and yet could not bring herself to kill the King. This example shows us that Lady Macbeth is always the instigator but never the perpetrator. She is never held culpable for the crimes, though she does all the scheming. Macbeth is forced to execute these plans, due to his wife’s constant haranguing, “Wouldst thou have that// which thou esteem’st the ornament of life//And live a coward in thine own esteem.” She insults Macbeth, a proud soldier, by constantly attacking and emasculating him. She claims that any man will take what he wants and deserves, in Macbeth’s case, the crown. Furthermore, she uses societal views of gender roles as a reason not to carry the plans out herself, and she uses this to her advantage.
At the opening of Act 3, Scene 2, Lady Macbeth begins to betray her humanity. As she is talking to herself, she says, “’Tis safer to be that which we destroy” revealing a sense of weakness within her. She states that a person who commits murder is left with insecurities whereas the person who has been killed will have no dilemmas at all. Lady Macbeth’s fragile inner self appears as she begins to sleepwalk due to the guilt of committing regicide. Although Lady Macbeth is thought of as a ‘fiendish queen’ by Malcolm and many others in this play, during this scene we see her devilish self breaking down to show an inner humanity that the audience never knew Lady Macbeth possessed. In a way this contradicts Malcolm’s description of Lady Macbeth as a ‘fiend-like queen’.
Towards the end, we see that Lady Macbeth is constantly haunted by the guilt of regicide. This can be seen when she exclaims, “Out damned spot, out I say!” This affirms the fact that her mind is starting to play tricks on her. The ‘spot’ she refers to is the blood stained on her hands and her inability to wash away the guilt of her crimes. It shows her downward spiral into the depths of madness, portraying her as a fragile subject whose true humanity finally comes into the open, since she has finally allowed herself to feel guilty and not hide her true feelings. Her obsession to clean her hands marks the disintegration of Lady Macbeth in ironic contrast to earlier, when she was strong and was easily able to rid her hands of the blood with a little water and forget about Duncan’s murder, “A little water clears us of this deed.” As she is no longer indispensible, Macbeth becomes mentally and physically independent whilst his wife becomes psychologically unstable. Unlike Macbeth, she is not able to live with the legacies of her crimes and thus their relationship deteriorates. On the other hand, Macbeth gets over the murder of his King by moving ahead and killing many others. When he claims, “[He is] in blood// stepp’d in so far” he indicates that he is caught in a risky circumstance as there is no way out of their situation of committing regicide. During the Jacobean period, killing the King was thought to be a heinous crime and the offender committed treason, especially as the King was thought to have a higher power, similar to that of the gods. This shows the great extent of the crime, helping us to understand Lady Macbeth’s guilt and grief.
The evil deeds that Lady Macbeth has been capable of may have instigated the view that critics have called Lady Macbeth the fourth witch. No matter how evil she has been, we see her humanity through the guilt she feels and the suicide that follows. The evil that the witches represent is beyond human comprehension and they are wholly evil. Lady Macbeth is only partially responsible for the downfall of Macbeth. Although, Lady Macbeth is evil she is not wholly evil as she does have a conscience that prevails in the end. Hence we can partly agree with Malcolm’s description of her as a ‘fiend-like queen’. She is strong at first but is unable to live with the crimes she committed. At the end of the play, we see her power deteriorate as she becomes consumed by madness. This allows her to finally face her repressed guilt. Of course, she wanted the best for Macbeth, for her husband to become ‘King’, although after a certain point it becomes so important that she is willing to do the worst to achieve it. Although she is linked to sin, evil and power her humanity is shown through her madness. I believe that she really isn’t a ‘fiend-like queen’ as she is portrayed since her guilty conscience causes her distress which results in her committing suicide.
