Why Does Shakespeare Present Lady Macbeth

How does Williams Shakespeare present Lady Macbeth and what is her role in the play?

In the story of Macbeth, William Shakespeare shows that Lady Macbeth’s character goes from a strong woman, who goes against the stereotypical view of the society, to the transition of her role becoming weak. At the end where the iconic strong personality of Lady Macbeth falls apart leading to the downfall of hers and her husband’s lives.

In Act 1 Scene 5, Shakespeare portrays Lady Macbeth as a strong and powerful woman. She undermines the power of a female due to the stereotypical views of the society. Lady Macbeth calls on the spirits to thicken her blood and block her veins so that she does not feel any guilt from what she plans to do. She says ‘Stop up

This questions the existence of the spirits because eventually guilt and fear does stand in the way as she starts sleepwalking and finally commits suicide. Lady Macbeth believes that due to the fact that she is a woman, it won’t allow her to proceed with the murder of Duncan. She thinks that the only way that the plan will continue successfully is to call on the spirits and strip away all her feminine softness and care. She says ‘unsex me here’ asking the spirits to fill her body with the cruelty of a man. She also says ‘take my milk for gall’ which means that she wants all women features, such as the milk from her breasts, removed and replaced with ‘gall’ which is a poisonous substance that will turn her into an evil person. Towards the end of Act 1 Scene 5 we see the contrast between appearance and reality. Lady Macbeth tries to convince Macbeth to murder Duncan. She says ‘look like th’innocent flower, but be the serpent under’t’. She is telling Macbeth to kindly welcome Duncan into the castle so that the true intentions for him visiting are hidden from reality. We soon see that Macbeth turns into a true monster, as his hideous actions continue through the course of the play. However, each time, he follows through with

These changes majorly affect Lady Macbeth as well. In the Banquet scene, Macbeth becomes a burden on Lady Macbeth due to him talking about the ghost of Banquo. Lady Macbeth becomes very conscious and tries her very best to cover up everything and make sure that the guests do not find out about the horrible sins that they had committed. Lady Macbeth says to the guests ‘he will again be well. If much you note him, you shall offend him and extend his passion’. She is trying to cover it up with an illness which, of course, we know isn’t true because there is a legit reason to his actions. The second part of the phrase could be taken as a threat because Lady Macbeth is using Macbeth’s status and saying that if any of them dare to look at him or pay attention to him he will be angered. This would help her because then the guests would stop watching and listening to Macbeth because they would be scared and therefore, Macbeth and Lady Macbeth are less likely to get exposed. Towards the end of the banqueting scene, Shakespeare starts to show us the extent to which hiding secrets can continue. And when it becomes too hard to be kept a secret people start to isolate themselves. ‘I pray you speak not: he grows worse and worse. Question enrages him. Stand not upon your order but go at once,’ this is what Lady Macbeth says with haste so that she can get everyone away from Macbeth as quickly as