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Exploring the character of Lady Macbeth Macbeth by William Shakespeare Read the following extract from Act 1 Scene 5 of Macbeth and then answer the question that follows. Note that in your exam, the extract will be shorter and the focus of the question will be more specific. This activity will help you prepare for any questions on Lady Macbeth. At this point in the play Lady Macbeth is speaking. She has just received the news that King Duncan will be spending the night at her castle. Starting with this speech, explain what your impressions are of Lady Macbeth here and elsewhere in the play. LADY MACBETH Give him tending; He brings great news. Exit Messenger. The raven himself is hoarse That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan Under my battlements. Come, you spirits That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here, And fill me from the crown to the toe top-full Of direst cruelty! make thick my blood; Stop up the access and passage to remorse, That no compunctious visitings of nature Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between The effect and it! Come to my woman's breasts, And take my milk for gall, you murdering ministers, Wherever in your sightless substances You wait on nature's mischief! Come, thick night, And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell, That my keen knife see not the wound it makes, Nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark, To cry 'Hold, hold!' © www.teachit.co.uk 2016 26096 Page 1 of 3 Exploring the character of Lady Macbeth Macbeth by William Shakespeare Enter MACBETH. Great Glamis! worthy Cawdor! Greater than both, by the all-hail hereafter! Thy letters have transported me beyond This ignorant present, and I feel now The future in the instant. MACBETH My dearest love, Duncan comes here to-night. LADY MACBETH And when goes hence? 60 MACBETH To-morrow, as he purposes. LADY MACBETH O, never Shall sun that morrow see! Your face, my thane, is as a book where men May read strange matters. To beguile the time, Look like the time; bear welcome in your eye, Your hand, your tongue: look like the innocent flower, But be the serpent under't. He that's coming Must be provided for: and you shall put This night's great business into my dispatch; Which shall to all our nights and days to come 70 Give solely sovereign sway and masterdom. MACBETH We will speak further. LADY MACBETH Only look up clear; To alter favour ever is to fear: Leave all the rest to me. © www.teachit.co.uk 2016 26096 Page 2 of 3 Exploring the character of Lady Macbeth Macbeth by William Shakespeare Some points you might choose to include: The connotations of the raven in lines 39-41. Use of the adjective ‘fatal’ to describe Duncan’s entrance to Dunsinane castle. What does it convey about Lady Macbeth’s immediate thoughts and reactions to Macbeth’s letter? What Lady Macbeth invites the ‘murdering ministers’ to do to her body (on lines 42-51) and why she requests their assistance. The fact she imagines committing the regicide herself in this soliloquy: she refers to the weapon as ‘my keen knife’ on line 53. However, she does not later commit the crime herself. Links with Act 2 Scene 2, when she admits to the audience in an aside why she is not committing the crime. Explain what this private admission to the audience reveals about her. The conversation between Macbeth and Lady Macbeth (lines 58-75) which conveys the dynamics of their relationship to the audience. Explain who the dominant partner is here and give evidence to prove how this dominance is conveyed. Links with Act 3 Scene 2, where we first see Lady Macbeth as queen. In an aside to the audience at the opening of this scene, explain what feelings she privately admits to, now that her ambition to be queen has been fulfilled. Links with our final impressions of Lady Macbeth, in Act 5 Scene 1. Write about the significance of having ‘light by her continually’ and how this links to her desire to be wrapped in ‘the dunnest smoke of Hell’ when first contemplating Duncan’s murder. Also explain the irony of her constantly rubbing her hands, given her comment to Macbeth on the night of Duncan’s murder: ‘A little water clears us of this deed.’ Key words you could use: soliloquy audience impression initial admission significant fiendish determined callous ironic ambitious aside © www.teachit.co.uk 2016 26096 Page 3 of 3