Shakespeare creates the idea that Lady Macbeth is a weak character, but she is hiding it by being dominant on an even weak character which is Macbeth, but as soon Macbeth gets stronger, she loses her control over him, which leads to her dominancy to decay, which makes her weak character to show up gradually. Unlike women in the 11th century, Shakespeare started presenting Lady Macbeth as a dominant, superior character in her relationship with her husband, this can be seen in Act 1 Scene 7 when Lady Macbeth was maculating Macbeth when she said “When you durst do it, then you were a man” this mirrors her dominant character because if a women in the 11th century is maculating a heroic, fearless, valorous warrior that just got promoted to be thane of Glamis she should’ve bold, brave, confident, which all come beneath the dominant character, also the adverb “then” is sometimes used to make a statement or a rule, or a new condition, so she created a new condition for Macbeth for being a man, and people who make rules and conditions are people at the top of the hierarchy who have power, so Lady Macbeth is playing the role of people with authority. Moreover the sequence of the aggressive rhetorical questions at the begging of the act underlines the idea that Lady Macbeth is in a position of power and authority because rhetorical questions are usually asked from the dominant side to the subservient side, so as we can see in this acts, Lady Macbeth (which resembles the dominant side) is asking Macbeth( which resemble the subservient side) some aggressive rhetorical questions, not looking for answers obviously, she just wants to impose her dominancy on him and make him seem foolish to himself. Furthermore the imperative verb “Go get some water” from Act 2 Scene 2 clearly demonstrates that she is the one who is making the orders and decisions, and she is controlling him so she is acting like a leader, which is a sign of powerful character, especially form a women to her husband at that time.
After presenting to the Jacobean audience Lady’s Macbeth dominant character, Shakespeare gradually uncovered her weak character that was hiding under her dominant one. Shakespeare gives a glimpse at this in Act 2 Scene 2 when Lady Macbeth lost a part of her dominancy when Macbeth refuses her command for the first time and she replied with “Infirm of purpose! ...'tis the eye of childhood” this aggressive replay reflects her anger, which means that she lost control of her calmness and lost control of her self which is a sign of weakness. Then Shakespeare reveals more of her weak character in Act 5 Scene 1 to make it clear to the Jacobean audience, this can be seen when Lady Macbeth said “The thane of Fife had a wife, where is she now” this confirms that after she was the prominent character because she was who is in charge and make decisions, while now she can’t be noticed because she doesn’t have any effect since she lost her control. Besides that the noun “wife” resembles that after Lady Macbeth was close to her husband trying to support him because she is his wife, now Macbeth became an independent individual and stopped being close to her, and Macbeth took full control of himself, meaning that she can’t control him any more, which prevents her from making decisions, which slowly decays her dominancy. In addition the sequence of rhetorical questions she asked herself, reflects a weak character because the purpose of these questions was to hide and get away from the cruel truth, this resembles her as a weak character because after what she had done she did not bear the consequences of her actions, and she is not brave enough to face this cruel trust, which both are symbols of a weak character. Also at the end of the scene, Lady Macbeth said “come, come, come, come, give me your hand. What's done cannot be undone.--To bed, to bed, to bed!” These words coming out from Lady’s Macbeth mouth means that she finally understood the situation and she know that she can’t do anything about it, which conveys her inability, powerlessness, and weakness. In addition the noun “bed” is usually where people have their rest and sleep, but in this situation, it is not sleeping it is death, and Lady Macbeth knows that, so the repetition of the noun “bed” evokes the idea that Lady Macbeth totally gives up, and accepted her destiny. As well as that in Act 5 Scene 5 when Macbeth had been told about Lady’s Macbeth death, he responds with a cold, calm, and careless response saying “She should have died hereafter; There would have been a time for such a word.” Suggests that he is too busy to deal with her with implies his careless attention to it, this reinforces my point above because when Macbeth became the king and has a powerful character, this made Lady Macbeth worthless because there is no one she can control, so she can’t be dominant on anyone, so her weakness materialize. Which makes the Jacobean audience know the truth behind Lady’s Macbeth character
Shakespeare paints a picture of Lady Macbeth that she is a naive character that has a lack of knowledge and shallow minded, that looks at things with little depth. This is exemplified in Act 2 Scene 2 when
Lady Macbeth saw blood in Macbeth’s hand, then she commanded him saying “Go get some water,
And wash this filthy witness from your hand.” From this command we can get the idea that Lady Macbeth thinks that the problem of the blood in hands is that it is just filthy, so she thinks it is just a physical problem, so she solved it with a physical solution which is washing it with water, this confirms her superficial look at deep meaning of blood. She didn’t realise the connotation until she felt the effect of it on her in Act 5 Scene 1 when she said “Yet here's a spot... Out, damned spot! out, I say!” Now Lady Macbeth is totally confused why the blood is still there, this is because of her limited knowledge about murder and guilt that comes after that, which made her not understand what is happening which lead her to go totally crazy, and the sequence of exclamation intermittent sentences support the idea that Lady Macbeth is suffering, confused, and going crazy. Also, the noun “spot” means that will not vanish forever, and this guilt will be chasing her until she dies. This may split the Jacobean audience into two parts, one are people who felt sympathy and sorry for her because she is uninformed about the implications of it, and the other part which may be the majority of people who thinks that she deserves that, and everyone is punished depending on their action so Lady Macbeth should’ve thought about these punishments before her murder, so now she must accept these punishments because they are the cost of her actions. Apart from this, Lady Macbeth asked herself an interesting rhetorical question saying “Yet who would have thought the old man to have had so much blood in him.” This quotelady Macbeth is surprised, and didn’t expect that to happen, and not expecting something obvious reflects the Jacobean Audience how naive she is. Ending without ignoring the noun “blood” which in this quote resembles guilt and regret, reinforces the idea that Lady Macbeth is short sighted because she can not see the upcoming guilt.