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The Relationship of Macbeth and Lady Macbeth Essay

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The Relationship of Macbeth and Lady Macbeth At the start of the play Macbeth and Lady Macbeth are seen as a united couple. They appear to have no secrets from one another, and seem to the audience as though they are equal: "My dearest partner of greatness" - this is what Macbeth calls his wife - partner signifying equality and greatness suggesting standing. During the course of the play, their relationship faces serious obstacles and strains are put on their loyalties to one another. At times, Lady Macbeth is the driving force in their relationship as she seeks to advance her husband; at other times Macbeth appears to be running the show. They become more separate in their lives with one …show more content…

She speaks of it as though she is willing to do the deed herself: "Fill me from the crown to the toe top-full of direst cruelty". Lady Macbeth starts to scheme and plan how to kill the King before Macbeth arrives home. At this point in the play, her character takes a dramatic turn. What she is planning to do is against all accepted rules of womanliness, so she asks the Spirits of Darkness to help her in her cause, to change her so that she doesn't suffer from her conscience and better judgement. "Come, you spirits That tend on mortal thoughts! unsex me here…" By forgoing her femininity she hopes to have the ruthlessness necessary to commit the terrible deed. "Stop up the access and passage to remorse…" She wishes to feel no guilt "Come thick night, And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell, That my keen knife see not the wound it makes…" Her thoughts and actions must be 'cloaked' and secret - beyond interference from any source of reason: "Nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark, To cry, 'Hold, hold!'" Darkness and evil are to have the upper hand and nothing must come between her and her goal. This shows again how close Macbeth and his wife are - she is prepared to sacrifice all that makes her a woman in order to further her husband's ambitions. When asking the spirits to "pall thee in the

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