Macbeth by William Shakespeare

Emerging Themes Fate v. Free will Power Gender roles

Act I: Emerging Themes Fate v. Free will Who has control over Macbeth’s decisions and actions (The witches, Fortune, Macbeth himself, Lady Macbeth)? Scene 1: “Fair is foul and foul is fair”? (Witches ) Scene 2: “For brave Macbeth (well he deserves that name)/Disdaining Fortune…” (Cap ) Scene 3: “If chance will have me King, why/ chance may crown me/ Without my stir.” (Mac ) Scene 4: “The Prince of Cumberland! That is a step/On which I must fall down, or else o’erleap/…Let not light see my black and dark desires” (Mac )

Fate v. Free will (Continued) Scene 5: “…and you shall put/This night’s great business into my dispatch,/ Which shall to all our nights and days to come/ Give solely sovereign sway and masterdom…To alter favor ever is to fear./Leave all the rest to me.” (L.Mac ) Scene 7: “We will proceed no further in this business.” (Mac ) Scene 7: “But screw your courage to the sticking place,/ And we’ll not fail.” (L. Mac ) Scene 7: “I am settled…False face must hide what the false heart doth know.” (Mac )

Act I: Emerging Themes Power How does power, or the desire for power, influence Macbeth’s and Lady Macbeth’s actions? “What he hath lost noble Macbeth hath won.” (Dun ) “Glamis, and Thane of Cawdor!/ The greatest is behind/…Do you not hope your children shall be kings,/ When those that gave the Thane of Cawdor to me/ Promised no less to them?” (Mac ) “…Stars, hide your fires! Let not see my black and deep desires!” (Mac )

Power (Continued) “…Come, you spirits/ that tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,/ And fill me, from the crown to the toe, top-full/ Of direst cruelty!/…Great Glamis, worthy Cawdor!/ Greater than both, by the all-hail hereafter!/…This ignorant present, and I feel now/ The future in the instant.” (L. Mac ) “…I have no spur/ To prick the sides of my intent, but only/ Vaulting ambition, which o’erleaps itself/ And falls on the other-” (Mac ) “And to be more than what you were, you would/ Be so much more the man.” (L. Mac )

Act I: Emerging Themes Masculinity v. Femininity What qualities are considered masculine versus feminine? Which represent strength and which represent weakness? Scene 3: “You should be women,/And yet your beards forbid me to interpret/That you are so.” ( ) Scene 5: “…Come, you spirits/ that tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,/ And fill me, from the crown to the toe, top-full/ Of direst cruelty!/…” (L. Mac )

Masculinity v. Femininity (Cont.) Scene 6: “Fair and Noble hostess” (Dun ) Scene 7: “Besides, this Duncan/Hath borne his faculties so meek…that his virtues/Will plead like angels…And pity, like a naked new born babe…” (Mac ) Scene 7: “And to be more than what you were, you would/ Be so much more the man.” (L. Mac )