Macbeth - Guilt, Betrayal and Kingship Flashcards
(12 cards)
GUILT
Feels that he has murdered sleep. Personifies sleep, emphasising its caring and beneficial qualities. MB won’t be able to function properly or keep his sanity without sleep. (Foreshadowing)
“Sleep no more: Macbeth does murder sleep, the innocent sleep, sleep that knits up the ravelled sleeve of care, the death of each day’s life, sore labour’s bath”
“sleep no more” x 3
GUILT
After murdering King Duncan, Macbeth feels overwhelming guilt. He believes that not even all the water in the world can cleanse him of his crime. Shows the beginning of his loss of sanity.
“Will all great Neptune’s ocean wash this blood clean from my hand?”
GUILT
(LMB)
Lady Macbeth, once confident and ruthless, is driven mad by guilt. In her sleepwalking, she imagines blood on her hands that she cannot wash off.
“Out, damned spot! Out, I say!”
GUILT
Macbeth is tormented by guilt and anxiety after killing Duncan. His conscience is restless, especially as Banquo (another threat) still lives. Shows how murder and deceit is venomous to his conscience.
“O, full of scorpions is my mind, dear wife”
BETRAYAL
Shows him as cowardly. Light could also represent God/religion and how Macbeth doesn’t want God to see his crimes and relieve him of responsibility. Black and deep also shows how he knows that what he is going to do is wrong however his ambition to become king is too great for him to reconsider.
“Stars, hide your fires, not let light see my black and deep desires.”
BETRAYAL
Duncan speaks about the previous Thane of Cawdor’s betrayal—ironically, just before he unknowingly gives the title to Macbeth, who will betray him too.
“He was a gentleman on whom I built an absolute trust.”
BETRAYAL
After Duncan’s murder, Donalbain (his son) suspects betrayal among those who appear friendly — especially Macbeth. Shows the distrust and paranoia in the castle at the moment.
“There’s daggers in men’s smiles.”
BETRAYAL
Macbeth pretends to be loyal to Duncan while secretly plotting his murder. This is one of the most direct examples of deception and betrayal - dramatic irony.
“The service and the loyalty I owe, in doing it, pays itself.”
KINGSHIP
Duncan admits it’s hard to judge a person’s intentions — a dangerous weakness in a king, especially when surrounded by ambition and betrayal.
No way to know what someone is thinking about just by looking at someone’s face - dramatic irony.
“There’s no art to find the mind’s construction in the face.”
KINGSHIP
Malcolm is trying to see whether Macduff is a good man or not - A good man would do something awful if the kind told him to.
This reflects the fear that even the best men might act cruelly when given power—underscoring the danger of kingship in corrupt hands.
“A good and virtuous nature may recoil in an imperial charge.”
KINGSHIP
Shows how Macbeth is a horrible king who torture’s his people. No one wants him as king especially Malcolm and Macduff.
Act 4 scene 3 -
“Great tyranny”
“Tyrant’s grasp”
“Tyrant’s head”
KINGSHIP
Macduff mourns Scotland under Macbeth’s tyrannical rule, showing how a corrupt king brings suffering to the nation.
“I think our country sinks beneath the yoke; it weeps, it bleeds and each new day a gash is added to her wounds.”
