Lady Macbeth As a Fiend-Like Queen

Lady Macbeth As a Fiend-Like Queen

Lady Macbeth has weaknesses which are hidden by a strong exterior. Her

ambitions overpower her worries and doubts about behaving and acting

in a diabolical way. This makes her initially seem evil or

“fiend-like”. Yet she has different strands to her character. By the

end of the play, however, the better side of Lady Macbeth’s character

surfaces. She is so overcome by her sense of guilt over the murders

that she commits suicide. On balance therefore although she has some

fiend-like qualities she cannot be described as totally fiend-like.

When we first see Lady Macbeth, she is reading a letter, from her

husband, which encloses the predictions that the witches foretold for

Macbeth. The prophecy is that Macbeth will be King. She promptly

decides on Duncan’s murder to fulfil the prophecy,

“Glamis thou art,

And Cawdor,

And shalt be what thou are promised”.

She makes it apparent that she will do anything for the prophecy to be

fulfilled because of the emphasis on “shalt be”.

When Lady Macbeth learns that Duncan is on his way to the castle she

calls on the evil spirits to make her callous so that she can carry

out the murder of Duncan. She requests them to

“..........unsex me here,

And fill me from the crown to the toe top-full

Of direst cruelty”.

This suggests that she is not entirely or completely evil because she

needs the assistance of the spirits to help her overcome any

weaknesses.

Other than her own feminine weakness, the only thing hindering

Macbeth’s becoming King is Macbeth himself and the frailties of his

character. She realises that he might have reservat...

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she is not fiend-like because she knows what she has done is wrong. By

this time also she must know, or suspect that Banquo and Lady Macduff,

and her innocent children, have also been murdered. She may also feel

responsible for setting Macbeth on this path of bloody massacre. At

the end of the play she kills herself which shows that she doesn’t

feel worthy enough to live for all the sins she has contributed

towards.

From the beginning of the play we see Lady Macbeth, giving the

impression of her being strong and powerful, gradually become a weak

woman. This is why there is a strong argument for saying that Lady

Macbeth is not fiend-like queen, or at least not completely. Any

fiend-like qualities which she has surface only at the point of strong

desire or when she needs something for someone very close to her.