Analysis of Lady Macbeth in Macbeth by William Shakespeare
Lady Macbeth remains one of the most iconic leading female character in all Shakespeare’s plays and sonnets. Despite being savage, ruthless in the first half of the tragedy, she let guilt consume her and eventually found death as a way of escapism.
Starting with Act I Scene 5, her assessment of her husband (to be “full of the milk of human kindness”) reveals a lot about her – an ambitious, cruel woman with an immoral nature. Immediately after receiving Macbeth’s letter, she already had meticulously planned King Duncan’s death so her husband could gain the throne. Lady Macbeth pushed her husband into betraying the king so as to fulfill the three witches’ prophecy, kept on questioning his manhood and masculinity until he gave in to her scheme. She even wished she had been born the opposite gender, going as far as asking the spirits to take away her feminity “Come you spirits that tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here”, displaying her cunning nature and challenging the common assumptions back then on the roles of each sex. After having commited the crime, Macbeth was very shaken up while his wife stayed calm, mocked and called him “Weakling!”
As the plot went on. Lady Macbeth progressed from a heartless creature to a fragile woman who got caught up in her past sins. She might appear as a strong character in most scenes but there were still vague signs of weaknesses here and there. The first one came in Act II, Scene 2, when she claimed she could not kill Duncan because he bore a resemblance to her father “Had he not resembled my father as he slept, I had done’t” . This conflicted with her intentions from the beginning, clearing every obstables on her husband’s road to claim the reign. Being wracked with guilt, she began to hallucinate and sleepwalk, became overcome with her role in the murder. She kept washing the blood on her hands but never succeeded, since the blood was not real but in her mind: “Here’s the smell of blood still. All perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand”. She had learnt that “what is done is never undone”, and there is always a price to pay. She felt that the price is being paid now: for one day their crime must be discovered. When she can no longer cope with reality and the haunting past, she committed suicide – the peak of her life tragedy.
Lady Macbeth is seen as an important piece of the play’s puzzle ( she is the mastermind behind Macbeth’ committing murder of the king which changes the whole storyline). Furthermore, she also represents the attitude towards women in Victorian Britain (often viewed as weak, which can be infer from her fake faint when she is informed that Duncan has died). By the madness and later, the suicide of Lady Macbeth, Shakespeare want to take her as an example of the price to pay when you sell your soul to the devil, despite how strong-willed and conscienceless you are.
The treacherous Lady Macbeth both defies and defines what it means to be a female villain in a Shakespeare play.
| Post date | Users | Rates | Link to Content |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2018-10-22 | Minh Nguyen CVA | 84 | view |
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Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 2, column 396, Rule ID: SO_AS_TO[1]
Message: Use simply 'to'
Suggestion: to
...hed her husband into betraying the king so as to fulfill the three witches' prophec...
^^^^^^^^
Line 3, column 443, Rule ID: COMMA_PARENTHESIS_WHITESPACE
Message: Don't put a space before the full stop
Suggestion: .
...her as he slept, I had done't' . This conflicted with her intentions fro...
^^
Line 4, column 69, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...mportant piece of the play's puzzle she is the mastermind behind Macbeth&apo...
^^
Line 4, column 430, Rule ID: HE_VERB_AGR[8]
Message: The proper name in singular (Shakespeare) must be used with a third-person verb: 'wants'.
Suggestion: wants
...he suicide of Lady Macbeth, Shakespeare want to take her as an example of the price ...
^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, first, furthermore, if, so, still, then, while, as to
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 19.0 13.1623246493 144% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 7.0 7.85571142285 89% => OK
Conjunction : 15.0 10.4138276553 144% => OK
Relative clauses : 11.0 7.30460921844 151% => OK
Pronoun: 58.0 24.0651302605 241% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 68.0 41.998997996 162% => OK
Nominalization: 2.0 8.3376753507 24% => More nominalizations (nouns with a suffix like: tion ment ence ance) wanted.
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2582.0 1615.20841683 160% => OK
No of words: 527.0 315.596192385 167% => Less content wanted.
Chars per words: 4.89943074004 5.12529762239 96% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.79129216042 4.20363070211 114% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.92090158902 2.80592935109 104% => OK
Unique words: 306.0 176.041082164 174% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.58064516129 0.561755894193 103% => OK
syllable_count: 772.2 506.74238477 152% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.5 1.60771543086 93% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 13.0 5.43587174349 239% => Less pronouns wanted as sentence beginning.
Article: 3.0 2.52805611222 119% => OK
Subordination: 5.0 2.10420841683 238% => Less adverbial clause wanted.
Conjunction: 1.0 0.809619238477 124% => OK
Preposition: 5.0 4.76152304609 105% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 21.0 16.0721442886 131% => OK
Sentence length: 25.0 20.2975951904 123% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively long.
Sentence length SD: 51.2040513562 49.4020404114 104% => OK
Chars per sentence: 122.952380952 106.682146367 115% => OK
Words per sentence: 25.0952380952 20.7667163134 121% => OK
Discourse Markers: 3.04761904762 7.06120827912 43% => More transition words/phrases wanted.
Paragraphs: 5.0 4.38176352705 114% => OK
Language errors: 4.0 5.01903807615 80% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 3.0 8.67935871743 35% => More positive sentences wanted.
Sentences with negative sentiment : 16.0 3.9879759519 401% => Less negative sentences wanted.
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 2.0 3.4128256513 59% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.144315075482 0.244688304435 59% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.06641303269 0.084324248473 79% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.094139536617 0.0667982634062 141% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.152772898732 0.151304729494 101% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0843573456904 0.056905535591 148% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 14.2 13.0946893788 108% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 54.56 50.2224549098 109% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 7.44779559118 42% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 11.9 11.3001002004 105% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 11.44 12.4159519038 92% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.77 8.58950901804 102% => OK
difficult_words: 130.0 78.4519038076 166% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 11.5 9.78957915832 117% => OK
gunning_fog: 12.0 10.1190380762 119% => OK
text_standard: 12.0 10.7795591182 111% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
Rates: 84.2696629213 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 5.0 Out of 6
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Note: the e-grader does NOT examine the meaning of words and ideas. VIP users will receive further evaluations by advanced module of e-grader and human graders.