ABC Analyzing Lady Macbeth Speech Discussion

Read the following extract from Act 1 Scene 5 of Macbeth and then answer the question that follows. Lady Macbeth speaks these words as she awaits the arrival of King Duncan at her castle.

The raven himself is hoarse

That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan

Under my battlements. 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. Make thick my blood,

Stop up th’access and passage to remorse,

That no compunctious visitings of nature

Shake my fell purpose,nor keep peace between

Th’ effect and it. Come to my woman’s breasts,

And take my milk for gall, you murd’ring ministers,

Wherever in your sightless substances

You wait on nature’s mischief. Come, thick night,

And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell,

That my keen knife see not the wound it makes,

Nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark,

To cry ‘Hold,hold!’

Starting with this speech, explain how Shakespeare presents Lady Macbeth as a powerful woman in the play.

Write about:

How Lady Macbeth is presented in this speech

How Lady Macbeth is presented in the play as a whole.