Key Quotations Flashcards
(11 cards)
‘I have no spur to prick the sides of my intent, only vaulting ambition’,
Macbeth
Soliloquy
Ambition is his only motive (fatal flaw)
‘Overleaps itself’ (he is doomed if he commits regicide)
‘Life […] is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing’
Macbeth - Act V Scene V
Soliloquy
Nihilism (life is pointless)
Blasphemous
Pathos - sympathy for loss of wife
Anagnorisis - hero realises his actions were for nothing
‘When you durst do it, then you were a man’
Lady Macbeth - Act I Scene VII
Attacking Macbeth’s masculinity
Subversion of Jacobean era (role reversal)
‘Star hide your fire; let not light see my black and deep desires’
Macbeth - Act I Scene IV
Soliloquy
Religious symbolism
Imperative verbs
Blasphemous
‘The dead butcher and his fiend-like queen’
Malcolm - Act V Scene IX
Final soliloquy
Noble general-> common murderer
Fiend - demon
Omission of names - immediate fall in status
‘Fair is foul and foul is fair’
The Witches - Act I Scene I
Paradoxical language and parallelism
Rhyming language - spellcasting
‘Cannot be ill, cannot be good’
Macbeth - Act I Scene III
Fate
Oxymoronic
Initially dubious about prophecies
Receptiveness to supernatural ideaa
‘A foolish thought, to say a sorry sight.’
Lady Macbeth - Act II Scene II
Reversed gender roles
Macbeth weakens
Lady Macbeth emotionless
Pragmatic response to the murder
Unexpected responses create some humour
‘Be innocent of the knowledge, dearest chuck till thou applaud the deed.’
Macbeth - Act III Scene II
Secretive
Relationship falling apart
Macbeth has upper hand in the relationship
‘There’s daggers in men’s similes’
Donalbain - Act II Scene III
The Macbeth’s deception
Link to ‘look like th’innocent flower’
Dramatic irony
Know the culprit
Regicide
‘What’s done, cannot be undone’
Lady Macbeth - Act V Scene I
Sleepwalking talking to self
Mental state deteriorated
Visions of blood
Incoherent rambling
Cannot live with the conscience
Notes innocent victims
