Download Macbeth quotes showing character

Character of Macbeth
12EN RYN
By tracing Macbeth’s reactions and words, we can see how his character
develops throughout the course of the play.
Act 1 Quote
Attribute
1
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Macbeth likes the idea of being
Aside ‘If chance will have me king, why,
crowned king one day, and is happy
Chance may crown me,
enough to leave the matter to chance
Without I stir.’
or fate (until his wife takes over later!)
4
5
‘My dearest love,
Macbeth defers to his wife, and the
Duncan comes here tonight.’
way he tells her this news suggests he
is in the habit of letting her make
decisions.
He seems to say, we need to discuss
this later. We get the impression he
‘We will speak further.’
cannot make decisions on his own. But
she has already made up her min
(‘Leave all the rest to me.”) What has
he started? Can he stop her once she
is determined to follow through on one
of her ideas? Who wears the pats in
this marriage?
6
7
‘… He’s here in double trust…I am his
Macbeth is far from sure about killing
kinsman and his subject…as his host, Who the king. He reasons with himself
should against his murderer shut the door, (inner conflict) to the point where he
Not bear the knife myself…his virtues
decides not to go ahead.
Will plead like angels…
I have no spur
To prick the sides of my intent, but only
Vaulting ambition…’
Macbeth dares to tell his wife he
refuses to go ahead with her plan for
‘We will proceed no further in this
him to kill the king.
business…’
Macbeth defends himself against his
wife’s scorn and threats. She insulted
his manhood by suggesting he had no
‘Pr’thee, peace (Shut up, woman)
courage. That touched a raw nerve;
I dare do all that may become a man;
after all, Duncan himself has just
Who dares do more is none.’
rewarded him for his bravery in battle.
Macbeth gives his wife a backhanded
compliment – she is as strong as a
man, and that awes him. He is
inspired by her to be confident about
the plan to kill Duncan.
1
‘Bring forth men children only!
For thy undaunted mettle should compose
Nothing but males.’
Macbeth has been persuaded by his
wife to go ahead and murder King
Duncan. It is a ‘terrible feat’ because it
is the sin of regicide, one that creates
chaos in the Natural order of the world.
He knows he will go to hell.
‘I am settled, and bend up
Each corporal agent (all the strength in his
body) to this terrible feat.’
Act 2
1
Quote
‘Is this a dagger which I see before me,
The handle toward my hand?...
…Whiles I threat, he lives…’
2
‘Sleep no more!
Macbeth doth murder sleep’.
3
‘I am afraid to think what I have done;
Look on’t again I dare not.’
‘Whence is that knocking?
How is it with me, when every noise appals
me?’
‘Will all great Neptune’s ocean wash this
blood
Claen from my hand?’
Attribute
Macbeth has last minute nerves about
murdering the king, and hallucinates,
seeing a blood-covered dagger just out
of his reach. But he recovers when he
hears the bell signal from Lady
Macbeth, and resolves to carry out the
act, one that will mean Duncan goes to
heaven or hell.
After murdering King Duncan, Macbeth
is convinced that some sort of ghost
cried out a curse, saying he would
never more be able to sleep.
He is filled with fear about what he has
done to the king. Lady Macbeth
scorns his fears, and takes over his job
of retrieving the bloody daggers and
smearing the grooms’ faces with blood.
Macbeth is startled by every noise, so
deeply so by the noise of Macduff
knocking on the castle gates.
He gazes at the blood on his hands,
wondering if he will be found out when
he washes them and the ocean turns
from green to red with the blood.
4
Act 3
1
2
Quote
‘To be thus is nothing,
But to be safely thus. – Our fears in
Banquo stick deep…There is none but he
Whose being I do fear…’
‘O! full of scorpions is my mind, dear wife!”
Attribute
Macbeth is unnerved by Banquo, and
cannot forget the witches promised him
a line of kings. He is nervous and
jumpy.
Macbeth is in mental torture, as
Fleance got away, so he has not killed
the future king after all.
Macbeth is resolute in his plan to
murder Banquo and Fleance. This
2
3
‘…there shall be done
A deed of dreadful note…
Be innocent of the knowledge, dearest
chuck,
Till thou applaud the deed.’
‘Which of you have done this?’
‘Thou can’st not say I did it. Never shake
They gory locks at me.”
4
5
Banquet scene.
Ironically, Macbeth tells his guests to sit in
their assigned seats: ‘You know your own
degrees, sit down; at first and last.”
‘…blood will have blood;
Stones have been known to move, and
trees to speak”
‘How say’st thou, that Macduff denies his
person
At our great bidding?”
‘I hear it by the way; but I will send.
There’s not a one of them, but in his house
I keep a servant fee’d.
time, he does not need his wife’s help
– he just wants her approval when he
succeeds. He is falsely confident he
can do this deed alone.
Macbeth reacts at the sight of
Banquo’s ghost by accusing his guests
of putting the wraith-like corpse in his
seat. He shows paranoia and fear.
Macbeth then tries to tell Banquo’s
ghost that he himself didn’t kill him (he
paid the murderers to!) but he shows
his guilt nevertheless. He is trying to
avoid blame, but ironically draws
attention to his involvement. This
scene shows his fear, self-doubts and
paranoia.
This is ironic, as he himself has broken
the natural order, Chain of Being, the
God assigned ranking of human
beings, by killing the king to replace
him as king. He has not adhered to
the ranking rules.
Macbeth recalls tales he has heard
about the natural world exposing
secrets like murder. He is uneasy and
afraid following the banquet and
Banquo’s ghost.
Macbeth shows paranoia when he
asks his wife why Macduff chose not to
come to the feast celebrating
Macbeth’s kingship.
Macbeth tells his wife he has spies in
every household to keep him informed
of what is going on. This shows he is
full of fear about the possibility of
betrayal or treachery against him. He
is unable to relax his guard and enjoy
his ill-gotten gains.
6
Act 4
1
Quote
Apparition: ‘Be bloody, bold and resolute;
laugh to scorn
The power of man, for none of woman born
Shall harm Macbeth.’
Attribute
Macbeth is re-assured, but resolves to
kill Macduff regardless, to quell his own
fears, and force Fate to stick to its
contract. However, he is betrayed in
the end by his own foolish trust in evil
spirits, ghosts and their prophecies.
3
‘From this moment
The very firstlings of my heart shall be
The firstlings of my hand…
…No boasting, like a fool;
This deed I’ll do, before this purpose ‘cool
From this point on, straight after his
visit to the witches, he resolves to act
while still fired up to do the deed. He is
falsely confident that he does not need
to fear anyone or anything from now
on.
Quote
Attribute
‘I will not be afraid of death and bane
(destruction)
Till Birnam forest come to Dunsinane’
False confidence in his future
“I begin to be aweary of the sun…Blow
wind! Come wrack!
At least we’ll die with harness (armour) on
our back.
He starts to lose confidence when he is
told Birnam wood is moving, but
resolves to go out and fight, not stay
indoors.
7
‘They have tied me to a stake: I cannot fly,
But, bear-like, I must fight the course.’
8
‘I’ll not fight with thee.”
He feels metaphorically tied/trapped
into fighting, but still believes he will
live, as ‘none of woman born’ can harm
him. Falsely confident still.
Loses confidence, after Macduff tells
him he was born by caesarian: ‘from
his mother’s womb untimely ripped”.
2
3
Act 5
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2
3
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“Yet I will try the last: before my body
I throw my warlike shield: lay on, Macduff;
And damned be him that first cries, ‘Hold,
enough!’
Macbeth seems to accept that his
death is inevitable, but is resolute (or
desperate) in resuming the fight. He
dies and his head is cut off and
displayed.
9
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