Beginning to End: Lady MacBeth

So, as you all know from previous in class discussion, I think that Lady MacBeth is the source of all evil in this play. In the beginning, MacBeth was not evil, it was Lady MacBeth who manipulated him into thinking that killing the King was the strategically right thing to do. If we were to take Lady MacBeth's character out of the picture, MacBeth probably would not have even thought about this elaborate scheme.

With this being said, I think that not only was Lady MacBeth the root of the problem in this play, but that it was all for nothing, judging how the play ended. In the end, Lady MacBeth drives herself crazy, going from this sexy, powerful woman to this crazy, quiet, and not-confidant person who ends up committing suicide. If she decided that she was going to manipulate her husband into killing the KING, then she should have been strong enough to go through with all the damage that comes afterwards.

Because she ends up doing this to herself, I went from thinking that this book had a strong, powerful female lead, to a not-so-powerful, weak, and scared lead who could not handle the "heat," in a sense. This was a period of time where if people died, they would die with honor if they had the choice. Therefore, the fact that Lady MacBeth killed herself could possibly be portrayed as cowardly.

Comments

  1. Leah EricksonOctober 13, 2017 at 7:40 PM

    I really enjoyed reading your blog post, and it happened to be somewhat similar to mine! In my blog post, I touched on Lady Macbeth's suicide and it's relationship to what stereotypical female characteristics were at the time. Women were supposed to be emotional, subservient, and weak. The point you made about Lady Macbeth committing suicide being portrayed as a cowardly act was compelling. Although I personally do not believe that suicide is a cowardly act, I can see that Shakespeare was trying to make the point that it was. I wish that Shakespeare was able to make this text more progressive for women, as it seemed like he was in the beginning of the play.

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