Tuesday, September 10, 2013

What are some quotes of Lady Macbeth that show that she manipulates Macbeth?

There are numerous statements from Lady Macbeth that show she is manipulating her husband, and indeed, doing so consciously. When she reads the letter from him in Act I, Scene V, as soon as she stops reading, she says the following:

" Glamis thou art, and Cawdor, and shalt be
What thou art promised. Yet do I fear thy nature;
It is too full o’ the milk of human kindness(15)
To catch the nearest way. Thou wouldst be great;"

 

She judges him too kind, and so, a few lines later, says " That I may pour my spirits in thine ear,"

In other words, she explicitly plans to manipulate him into grasping his fate.

 

Not much later (in Act I, Scene VII), she teases him when he hesitates, saying " Wouldst thou have that(45)
Which thou esteem'st the ornament of life
And live a coward in thine own esteem,
Letting “I dare not” wait upon “I would”
Like the poor cat i’ the adage?"

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