Show how Lady Macbeth changes through the course of the play

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Show how Lady Macbeth changes through the course of the play

Lady Macbeth, when first introduced appears as a dark and sinister character. As the play progresses we see this change as her true feelings are made known to us.

Lady Macbeth breaks all the traditional values of male dominance in marriage. She doesn’t conform at all to the idea of what a wife should be.

We first see Lady Macbeth in Act 1 Scene 5. She reads that it has been prophesised that Macbeth shall become king and she is overcome by dark ambition and joy. She says:

‘…Yet I do fear thy nature,

Is too full o’th’milk of human kindness

To catch the nearest way’

She thinks Macbeth is too squeamish to murder Duncan, she thinks he is too humane and full of emotions. This is her first idea of how Macbeth will become King; murdering the current one. She fears Macbeth will not be able to act without pity;

‘Thou would’st be great,

Art not without ambition, but without

The illness should attend it.’

She suggests Macbeth is not evil enough to kill Duncan.

When Lady Macbeth is given word that Macbeth is coming to the castle, she calls on spirits to help her with her evil plans;

‘Come, you spirits

That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here

And fill me from the crown to toe topfull

Of direst cruelty.’

She wants to be stripped of all gentle feeling and to be made stronger. She wants to become purely evil. She continues to say;

‘…Make thick my blood,

Stop up th’access and passage to remorse…’

She is asking the spirits to stop from feeling any remorse; she wants to be more savage. She then says,

‘…Shake my fell purpose nor keep peace between

Th’effect and it. Come to my women’s breasts

And take my milk for gall…’

She is asking the spirits to replace the milk in her breasts with bitter poison; she wants to become more masculine. As a whole this speech is horrifying and could be interpreted as a spell. Lady Macbeth is almost witch-like.

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When Lady Macbeth greets her husband she express’s feeling that he looks guilty:

‘Your face my thane is a book where men

May read strange matters.’

She thinks people will be able to tell what he is thinking by looking at his faces. She uses the imagery of a book to express this, saying that his face is like a book. She wants his to hide his dark thoughts:

‘Look like th’innocent flower

But be the serpent under’t.’

She wants him to be welcoming to Duncan to hide his true intentions. She uses the imagery ...

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