MacBeth - CharacterChanges "This dead butcher and his
fiend like queen", is the way in which Malcolm describes Macbeth and
Lady Macbeth. Describe the way in which these two
characters changed during the course of the play. At the
beginning of the play Macbeth is seen as a courageous soldier who is
loyal to the King but is corrupted from the witches prophecies
and by his and Lady Macbeth’s ambition. This is because of the
weakness of Macbeth’s character and the strong power of
Lady Macbeth and how she is easily able to influence him. Her strength
motivates him at the start but after he realises what he has
done it is himself that continues in his murderous, bloody path. At the
beginning of the play Lady Macbeth appears as a kind wife of
Macbeth’s but underneath lies a scheming and treacherous woman.
In the beginning of the play Macbeth is a strong soldier who fights
for the King without mercy but his strive for ambition and his
curious nature leads him to the witches who give him a prophecy. Banquo
realises that there must be a trick hidden in the witches
prophecies somewhere but Macbeth refuses to accept that, and when
Lady Macbeth finds out about the witches her strong desire
for ambition and her cold nature leads Macbeth astray. Macbeth is a little
ambitious at first, but Lady Macbeth’s far exceeds his and so
she is able to get Macbeth to agree with her to kill King Duncan.
Macbeth still has a conscience at this stage because he is very
hesitant about killing the King but his weak nature over
comes him. He has a conscience throughout the entire play as this is
seen by the hallucinations of the dagger and the ghost of
Banquo and his vivid imagination and his constant worry also provokes
him. This is also evident in his terrible dreams which gives the
solid theme that he has indeed "murdered sleep". Throughout
the play we see the character of Macbeth change not from just the way
he thinks and what we hear from the play, but from the
actions he takes in the play, from killing Banquo, then having Lady
Macduff and her children murdered, shows the insecurity that
was present in Macbeth. After the murder of Duncan Macbeth becomes
paranoid and his first step of killing the guards is one of many
that Macbeth takes to secure himself. Macbeth is also very superstitious
and this is shown when he believes the prophecy the witches
told him that Banquo’s offspring would become Kings.
Towards the end of the play when Macbeth’s wife has died and the battle
is drawing closer Macbeth shows some good which may have
been. He wishes for a normal life for which he would have lived to an
honourable age but he recognises that he has denied himself
of this. Even when Macbeth hears that the prophecy has become true of
Birnam Wood coming to Dunsinane, he rejects this idea and
fights on until he realises that Macduff wasn’t born in a natural birth but
instead was "Untimely ripped" from his mother’s womb. When
Macbeth hears of this he realises what he has done and how he has
been tricked by the witches but instead he realises that it is
useless and so he fights on only to be slain. Macbeth can be
summarised into a character although strong physically he is very weak
mentally and it is this weakness which causes the downfall
and change of Macbeth. Other factors do however also contribute to this
change such as his wife whose ambition is very strong at first
and is much more stronger mentally than Macbeth but it is also Macbeth’s
ambition and his trust in the witches which ultimately change
him. Lady Macbeth seems to be almost opposite compared to
that of Macbeth in physical and mental power. Lady Macbeth
is the person who is able to persuade Macbeth into killing Duncan,
assuring Macbeth that it will succeed, as Lady Macbeth’s
ambition is far greater than that of Macbeth. This change in the character
of Lady Macbeth is apparent after she reads the letter from
Macbeth as she goes and talks to the evil spirits to make herself evil with
lines such as "Fill me from the crown to the toe-top full of
direst cruelty! Make thick my blood". She goes to the extent of planning
the murder of Duncan and assumes full responsibility of this.
She exerts a lot of power over Macbeth in this part of the play and even
calls him a "coward" and this shows just how determined she is
and how much ambition she has for her husband. It is this
confidence in herself plus the persuasiveness on her words that makes
Macbeth act on her words without hesitating. After performing
the necessary acts in preparation for the murder of Duncan she thinks of
performing the act herself but shows a sign of humanity and
doesn’t because it resembles "My father as he slept". After the muder has
been done Lady Macbeth shows just how strong a person
she really is by using kind words and confidence to clam Macbeth down
and prevent him going insane. Lady Macbeth however jokes
with Macbeth about forgetting the incident as "These deeds must
not be thought after these ways: so, it will make us mad". Afterwards
she gets the daggers that Macbeth had brought with him and
smeared them with blood and then told Macbeth to change into a
nightgown. At this point Lady Macbeth is in complete control
and has tried to make Macbeth free of guilt even though he in fact did
perform the deed. Lady Macbeth is then able to exclaim in
horror "What! In our House!" to the murder of Duncan but whilst in
complete control, to draw away the suspicion from Macbeth.
When however she finds out that Macbeth has killed the guards she
faints "Help me Hence" but is this a another sign of an act to again
draw away the suspicion from Macbeth or did she faint from
shocked dismay. I believe she was shocked because I think that Lady
Macbeth was surprised that she was able to get Macbeth to
commit the murder of Duncan, but was shocked at how over one night
and in fear, Macbeth could kill two more men in cold blood.
Lady Macbeth is still strongly in control as the play proceeds
and is able to handle crises very well which is shown at the
banquet incident where Macbeth sees the ghost of Banquo, but Lady
Macbeth is quick to lie for Macbeth to conceal the real ideas
that are happening. As Macbeth progresses with his evil acts, however,
Lady Macbeth starts to go mad which is almost like what her
prophecy mentioned. She also hallucinates like her husband but this time
about trying to cleanse her hands of the blood that will not
wash off. Even though she may be a strong character greatly supporting
her husband she is reduced and battered by the deeds and
her conscience which she was able to rid from Macbeth, eventually drives
her insane. She then kills herself unable to remove the
"damned spot". At his wife’s suicide Macbeth has already thrown
away his conscience, so much so, that Macbeth commits even more
evil acts afterwards without even admitting her to his
conscience. Over the course of the play Macbeth and Lady
Macbeth greatly change with respect to their characters and their
personalities. Although Macbeth was weak at first it was the strong
Lady Macbeth who helped him through the first murder but in
sacrifice to controlling Macbeth and his conscience she lost control of
hers and in consequence turned insane and killed herself.
Thus in the end it was worthy to call Macbeth and his wife "a dead
butcher and his fiend like queen" but it must not be forgotten
that at the beginning of the play Macbeth and his wife were ordinary
nobles at the time.
. MacBeth - Character Changes "This dead butcher and his
fiend like queen", is the way in which Malcolm describes Macbeth and
Lady Macbeth. . Lady Macbeth s
ambition is far greater than that of Macbeth. This change in the character
of Lady Macbeth is apparent after she reads the letter from
Macbeth