Function of Lady Macbeth

Created by: mimidollins
Created on: 22-05-20 10:05

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Lady Macbeth Function
- Tell M's story
  - Yes
    - They met me in the day of success A1S5
      - First words are those of her husband
        LM's success and happiness stem from M
        Not because of his personality, but because she was powerless without her husband
        
        Power and ambition stem from M
  - No
    - Glamis thou art, and Cawdor, and shalt be/ What thou art promis'd A1S5
      - Letter followed by soliloquy
        LM dominant in conversation
        LM has more power; against gender roles
        my dearest partner of greatness A1S5
        
        LM has more power; against gender roles
        my dearest partner of greatness A1S5
- SN
  - Glamis, thou art, and Cawdor, and shalt be/ What thou art promis'd A1S5
    - 2nd words she says are that of the witches
      - 4th witch or deeply influenced by them/ prophecies
        Audience start to build a hierachry of influencers over LM
        M first and then witches
  - Association with SN goes aganst gender roles
    - Yes
      - Violates feminine qualities of passivity and subservience by adhering to gothic conventions
        role of women at the time was restricted as had to plead for spirits help
        
        Lexical field of Machiavellianism
        make thick my blood A1S5
    - No
      - Her power only comes from the SN; women can't be powerful on their own
    - Come, you spirits/ That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here A1S5
      - Witches and LM blur gender boundaries
        you should be women/ And yet your beards forbid me to interpret/ That you are so-Banquo A1S3
        SN links to masculinity
        LM in pursuit of one to be closer to the other.
  - I may pour my spirits in thine ear A1S5
    - LM=4th witch
    - Personal pronouns and LM subject
      - LM in control; possessing M?
    - my spirits
      - Homograph and double entendre
        SN
        
        equivocation
        
        poison/ alcohol
        Foreshadows M's addiction to murder/ insentience
        From this very moment,/ The firstlings of my heart shall be/ The firstlings of my hand A4S1
    - LM possessed by prophecies?
- Power dynamic with M
- Gender Roles
  - Association with SN goes aganst gender roles
    - Yes
      - Violates feminine qualities of passivity and subservience by adhering to gothic conventions
        role of women at the time was restricted as had to plead for spirits help
        
        Lexical field of Machiavellianism
        make thick my blood A1S5
    - No
      - Her power only comes from the SN; women can't be powerful on their own
    - Come, you spirits/ That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here A1S5
      - Witches and LM blur gender boundaries
        you should be women/ And yet your beards forbid me to interpret/ That you are so-Banquo A1S3
        SN links to masculinity
        LM in pursuit of one to be closer to the other.
  - dash'd the brains out, had I so sworn/ As you have done to this A1S7
    - Violent imagery distances audience from her
    - Metaphor
      - Baby represents femininity
    - unsex me here hasn't worked
  - LM opposes gender roles in marriage
    - too full o'th'milk of human kindness A1S5
      - Metaphor
        Connotes with femininity, weakness, purity, nature and maternity
        LM distancing herself from maternity due to trauma
        
        Femininity=Links to disruption of the Great Chain of Being
      - Criticism of masculinity of brave soldier A1S2
        shock audience
      - Direct juxtaposition
        takemy milk for gall A1S5
        Imperative
        Hamartia of over-ambition shared by LM & M
        Laws of the universe and the natural order
        LM and M are too alike; like charges repel
        Foreshadows breakdown of marriage
  - Defiance of the Great Chain of Being
    - unsex me here A1S5
      - Irony
        Embodies masculinty in order to defy GCB but by doing so is already defying the natural order in a different way
  - LM isolated; typical of gender roles
    - Aren't explicitly told of dead child
      - I have given **** A1S7
      - Becomes queen as compensation for being childless
      - Failed as M's wife by not providing a male heir
        Prophecies tell her that she won't have children
        Fate of women hide in fate of mens
        
        After murder, M reborn
        Metaphorical link for child she can't put on throne
        Ironic that she gives birth to a tyrant by being masculine
    - Mental state positively correlates with M and LM's relationship
      - Be innocent of the knowledge, dearest chuck A3S2
- AvR
  - LM's duplicitious nature
    - look like th' innocent flower,/But be the serpent under't
      - During gunpowder plot, James awarded medal of serpent hiding beneath flower.
        Lower class audience might not get the reference
        
        Dramatic irony
        Audience aware of result of regicide
        Know karma will put things right.
      - serpent
        Connotations with serpent in genesis which tempts Eve to eat the forbidden fruit
        Original sin
        Like how humankind are sinners from birth, LM has always been a sinner
        Links to fate
        
        Agrees with interpretation that she's the 4th witch
        
        Lack of free will
        
        Links to impact of disrupting the Great Chain Of Being/ going against will of God
        
        Links to gender roles
        Tempting M goes against her feminity as she is playing the role of the serpent and M is Eve
      - Double entendre
        M being the serpent to kill D
        
        LM being the serpent to manipulate M
    - First scene= A1S5 Last scene= A5S1
      - Direct juxtapositiion
        A5S1
        Out, damned spot; Out, I say! A5S1
        sleep= innocence= antithesis of LM
        
        Prose
        Only Shakespearean protagonist to die speaking in prose
        highlights insignificance
        
        Associated with lower class
        Socially/ appearance= top of GCB Spiritually/ reality= fallen towards hell
        Reached hell before death; immensity of regicide
        damned
        Connotes with hell,links to devil, blood is a stain on soul
        
        Lines more fragmented
        Becoming fragments of herself
        
        ! Imperatives more desperate
        
        Foreshadows suicide
        Stain on soul from regicide and suicide
        Sanctity of life
        
        Links to gothic genre and connotes with madness
        
        The Thane of Fife had a wife. Where is she now?
        Internal rhyme/ nursery rhyme
        Returned to childlike state
        Unsettling for audience
        
        Open expression of guilt
    - Possesses two personalities= awake vs asleep
      - Appear and disappear based on conflicting morals
      - Awake
        A little water clears us of this deed. A2S2
        deed
        Double meaning emulates double personality
      - Asleep (somnambulism)
        Out damned spot A5S1
    - his fiend-like queen A5S9
      - Oxymoron
        Sums up duplicitious nature
      - her last reference isn't even her name
        highlights insignificance
    - Ironic that she promoted falseness
      - Consider it not so deeply. A2S2

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Function of Lady Macbeth

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