Macbeth Literary Analysis

Macbeth Literary Analysis (Apperance vs Reality)
Some people can be a completely different person outside and inside. Many will act in a particular way to fit and be accepted but when apart from their group they are their own person. Overall at the end of the day people take their masks off and show their true colors. This is what happened with some of the characters in William Shakespeare's Macbeth. This showed on Macbeth, Banquo and Lady Macbeth. We’ll see how these characters have images that alter as the story goes on.
Macbeth the protagonist of the story along with his friend Banquo encounter 3 witches who tell them about their future, explaining that Macbeth would become king. Macbeth gets so caught in this when the first prediction
comes true of him becoming the Thane of Cawdor, then he starts plotting to kill the king so therefore the prediction comes true. The conflict with this is that Macbeth is scared when the King invites himself over to his castle for a party. He has thoughts of killing the king, but he is very scared to go through, this is his feeling inside, but outside he really wants to go along with the plan. Macbeth experiences another experience like this, whenever Macbeth got questioned by Banquo about the witches he denies it. Him denying it is his outside view but inside he is obsessed with the predictions. “I think not of them. Yet, when we can entreat an hour to serve, We would spend it in some words upon that business, if you would grant the time.” (Macbeth Act 2 Scene 1). He lies to Banquo who has been with him for a while showing that even people that you potentially trust have another side to them. Moving along with Macbeth killing king Duncan he is very upset with himself after he finishes the deed. “Still it cried “Sleep no more!” to all the house. “Glamis hath murdered sleep, and therefore Cawdor Shall sleep no more. Macbeth shall sleep no more.” (Macbeth Act 2 Scene 1). At the end of everything Macbeth does apologize for everything, for he thinks he’s a fool that got consumed by power.” “Hamlet's struggle is in resisting the overwhelming cause urged upon him by the Ghost; even Romeo has the cause of friendship to revenge Mercutio. But Macbeth's problem lies precisely here: he has no cause nor can he manufacture one of his own” (Hartwig Page 40). Let’s also mention how Duncan mentions that he trusts Macbeth more than anyone else but little did he know he was in for a deadly slumber “ In his great agonized soliloquy while Duncan is at dinner, the object of this dire rehearsal sternly reminds himself that he owes the King a "double trust," as subject to his monarch, and, on the basis of kindness again, simply as host to his guest” (Ramsey page 288).
Furthermore moving along with Banquo, he plays along with Macbeth. He is aware of the witches and he thinks that consequences will come along with it. He questions Macbeth about everything, he mentions that he has been having nightmares about the witches in his dreams. “All’s well. I dreamt last night of the three Weird Sisters. To you they have showed the truth.” (Macbeth Act 2 Scene 1). Banquo is pretty scared of consequences to come with these foretold predictions and he fears for Macbeth because Macbeth is extremely nonchalant about everything. Banquo is very intrigued by how Macbeth is acting, he’s overall scared which is how he feels inside. Yet outside he is following what Macbeth says, then he swears his loyalty to the king. “So i lose none In seeking to augment it, but still keep My bosom franchised and allegiance clear, I shall be counseled.” (Macbeth Act 2 Scene 1). This is how he truly feels, so he stands for himself and this gives Macbeth an upset for he wants Banquo to be there and he even asks him for his loyalty.
No doubt Lady Macbeth was big in the “Apperance vs Reality” concept because she herself is such a strong character. Lady Macbeth seems like a nice host to everyone, people even consider a fair lady. This is the the complete opposite, she is a machiavellian.
“The raven himself is hoarse That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan Under my battlements.
Comes, 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 the access and passage to remorse,That no compunctious visiting of nature Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between the effect and it! Come to my woman’s breasts, and take my milk for gall, you murd’ring ministers, Whenever 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!”. (Macbeth Act 1 Scene 5). We can see here, how sinister the woman actually is. You wouldn’t expect a woman a “good host” to wish to be unsex so she can carry on wit her task. This is the ultimate “Appearance vs Reality” illustration. This is even more interesting because it’s a woman who has these thoughts. They were templated as kind and caring, that’s also another thing Lady Macbeth tells her that he hopes to only have kids because if she had a daughter she would not want her to be like Lady Macbeth. This isn’t as cospitous to the eye because only Macbeth witnesses the how vile his wife is. She also emasculating her own husband for not wanting to kill Duncan. “Lady Macbeth provides the missing necessity when she berates him, as only a trusted woman can with
consequence, for losing his daring - his manliness, she would say. Like Adam, Macbeth fails to combat this ultimate appeal to his identity as superior being, and he too succumbs with uxoriousness to his lady’s argument.” (Hartwig page 40). Showing how she may appear like a good wife but she isn’t at all for she questions her husband and completely tears him down to nothing.”
“ The flower suggests Creation and links itself with the play's many images of growing things. The serpent suggests the deception which slithered into Eden to tempt Eve-as the Geneva Bible calls it in the gloss to Revelation xii:g, "That old serpent called the devil and Satan" which was hurled from Heaven by Michael and "which deceiveth all the worlde." Lady Macbeth here is the tempting serpent and, of course, is also the deceived. In that Macbeth is a man in a fallen world, the play concerns the further fall of man-the loss of his soul. But in that Macbeth stands closest to royal favor (with the exception of Malcolm) in a potentially redeemable world, his fall parallels that of Lucifer, who stood closest to God (with the exception of the Son). The fall of Macbeth draws for its precedent on both Genesis and Revelation, the first and the last books of the Bible, a fact which suggests the fundamental implications of his crime. "Christian philosophy", says Walter C. Curry, "recognizes two tragedies of cosmic importance: (i) the fall of Lucifer and a third part of the angelic hosts, who rebelled against God and were cast out, and (2) the fall of Adam, who was originally endowed with perfection and freedom but who set his will against God's will and so brought sin and limited freedom upon mankind" (p. 67). The fall of Macbeth draws on the combined power of those of Lucifer and Adam-and on more, of course, since it is also his own” (Herbet R. Coursen, Jr. 376). This is a great quote expressing how Lady Macbeth is like the tempting serpent encouraging her husband to do gruesome things like killing their own king.
In conclusion, Appearance Vs Reality was huge in Macbeth, it develops greatly in the characters as the play goes on its way.
We saw how characters showed their emotions from outside and what they really felt inside. We see how the characters acted the way they did and in the end they show we figure out how they truly feel. Appearance Vs Reality was a big theme, playing in a lot of characters and it’s just perfect because it fits the big characters in Macbeth. In the end we get too see everyone’s colors that being Lady Macbeth’s suicide meaning that she couldn’t handle what she had to become, Banquo dying with a honest heart staying true to himself, and Macbeth apologizing after everything he had
done.