Macbeth Acts 2-3

This is definitely my favorite book we've read so far in the semester. Although it doesn't fit my usual definition of a mystery which would include clues, a detective, and an unknown criminal, I am starting to view it as a mystery in its own way. The witches are without a doubt unexplainable, as are the ghost and imaginary objects that Macbeth sees, which I'll get into later. It makes you wonder what is reality and what isn't, and that is the mystery in this story.  It's up to the reader to pick up on evidence and choose whether or not these hallucinations are real and whether or not they are meaningful.

Aside from the "weird witches," Macbeth sees both a floating dagger and the ghost of Banquo. He sees the dagger right before he goes to kill King Duncan: "There's no such thing/ It is the bloody business which informs/ Thus to mine eyes" (2.1.48-50). Normally, readers might assume that that guilt is eating Macbeth alive and simply driving him crazy. One may hypothesize that his morals are getting the best of him and causing him to see things that aren't there. However, this is the conundrum in characterizing Macbeth: it is hard to decide if he is seeing these things because of his morals or because the witches are messing with him and sending hallucinations his way. The same goes for his sighting of Banquo's ghost; he makes a fool out of himself at the banquet dinner by exclaiming, "Prithee, see there! Behold! Look! Lo!" (3.3.72). Of course, when the dinner guests look, they do not see anything. Lady Macbeth quickly passes this off as a common madness fit that Macbeth often experiences, but I again wonder if it has to do with the guilt he is feeling or a curse by the witches. Hopefully later on in the play I will be able to determine what the correct answer is, but until then, this is the mystery that I am trying to uncover.

When I first began reading, I loved Lady Macbeth for not being the typical "irrelevant housewife" that is commonly seen in literature and instead taking a more dominant role. However, she kind of takes this too far and has become a mean and bipolar person. She is constantly making digs and Macbeth, saying things like, "My hands are of your color, but I shame/ To wear a heart so white" (2.2.64-65). It's just annoying because Macbeth went along with her plan even when he wasn't comfortable with it, and now she is just roasting him for feeling a little guilty about it. What does she want from him? It's like nothing he does is good enough and she expects him to be perfect. I did think it was funny when after Duncan's death, Macduff told Lady MacB, "O gentle lady/ 'Tis not for you to hear what I can speak:/ The repetition, in a woman's ear,/ Would murder as it fell" (2.3.58-61). First of all, "gentle" is the last word I would ever use to describe her. And second, this is insanely ironic since of course Lady Macbeth already knows all about the murder; she's the one who planned it! I'm excited to watch her character development further in the play and see if she gets crazier or mellows a little. Either way, I am super into this play and I'm happy it's 1000x's easier to read than Piers Plowman.