The Hallucination of the Macbeths

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In William Shakespeare’s The Tragedy of Macbeth, there are many motifs that enhance the play. A motif is a recurring object, concept, or structure in a work of literature. In The Tragedy of Macbeth, Shakespeare’s hallucination motif demonstrates Macbeth and Lady Macbeth’s progression to insanity with various visions. Throughout the play, as the body count adds up, both Macbeth and lady Macbeth Begin to hallucinate. Shakespeare demonstrates the overwhelming guilt of Macbeth and Lady Macbeth through their hallucinations of the floating dagger, the dead Banquo, and the bloody hands.

Macbeth’s vision of a floating, bloody dagger represents the guilt-ridden path he is about to embark on. Right before he kills Duncan, Macbeth sees a hallucination of a bloody dagger. Macbeth says, "Is this a dagger I see before me, 
/ the handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch thee / I have thee not, and yet I see thee still,” (322). Also, the dagger points to Duncan’s room: “Thou marshall’st me the way that I was going, / and such an instrument I was to use” (322). Pointing at the target of his in...

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