Free Sample Essays > Shakespeare
What is the relationship between Lady Macbeth and her husband and how well does she know him?
In the opening scenes if the play, Macbeth and Lady Macbeth seemed to enjoy a close intimacy in that they share their deepest thoughts, but as the plot unfolds, she loses her iron grip on him and his murderous momentum gathers a speed of its own. Before Duncan’s death, her opening soliquy in Scene V of Act I shows that she does know him well. But after the death, her realization that her husband had become transformed into a stranger drove her to suicide.
At the beginning of the play, Macbeth refers to Lady Macbeth as “my dearest partner of greatness” but by the end, she is described by Malcolm as a “fiend-like queen”. Lady Macbeth has a dangerous desire for power and it was her mockery and persuasion that leads Macbeth to murder the King, “When you durst to do it, then you were a man.”. Lady Macbeth presents herself publicly as a kind and gentle character but underneath lies an evil, ambitious woman. She knows what hurts Macbeth: to question his manhood.
The letter which Macbeth sends to Lady Macbeth as soon as he heard he had been made “Thane of Cawdor” reveals his closeness to his wife: the withces equivocations that he shall be “King hereafter” had to reach Lady Macbeth’s ears immediately. But she reveals a true understanding of Macbeth’s strong moral fibre which would be a major obstacle to the realization of “their” ambitions.
She knows her husband is “too full o’th’milk of human kindness” to kill Duncan. She knows she can control Macbeth like a child, and is anxious for him to return so that “I may pour my spirits in thine ear And chastise with valour of my tongue”. It is her goading contempt, scorn and derision that push Macbeth to do the “deed”. At first Macbeth agrees. But later he hesitates: “We will proceed no further in this business”. This shoes that Lady Macbeth knew her husband well: he was a good man who would not think of killing “his kinsman”. Lady Macbeth is certain that her husband’s ambition was to be crowned the King. So, in her response to her husband’s uncertainty. She questions his courage, manhood and his love for her: “Such I account thy love…..As thou art in desire? ......We fail? But screw your courage to the sticking place, And we’ll not fail.”
Kingship to Lady Macbeth is more important than anything else. She called upon evil spirits to “Unsex me here And fill me from the crown to the toe topfull Of direst cruelty;”. She is prepared to sacrifice her femininity for the sake of kingship.
Lady Macbeth is a strong character controlling her terrifying dreams at night and rescuing Macbeth from his weak conscience as in the scene when Macbeth sees Banquo’s ghost. She protects him and defends him at the banquet. However as the play progresses, Lady Macbeth’s relationship with Macbeth deteriorates and we see more of her vulnerability and fragility. During the feast, she at first delights in being the hostess [next page]