Lady Macbeth — Act 1
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Who is she?
Macbeth’s ambitious wife. She turns the prophecy into a murder plan, challenges expected female obedience and nurturing, and pressures a celebrated warrior to betray his king.
Actions and development
1.5: The letter: Reads the prophecy; judges Macbeth’s kindness an obstacle to gaining the crown.
Audience / reader: Her rejection of compassion makes the promise of greatness morally troubling.
1.5: Spirits and concealment: Calls for cruelty and instructs Macbeth to hide murderous intentions behind welcoming appearances.
Audience / reader: Invoking spirits could alarm spectators who associated demonic influence with treason.
1.6: Duncan’s welcome: Acts as a courteous hostess while preparing to betray her royal guest.
Audience / reader: Knowing her plan makes Duncan’s trust dangerous: dramatic irony turns welcome into suspense.
1.7: Persuading Macbeth: Questions his courage and love; explains the plan to drug and frame Duncan’s guards.
Audience / reader: Some Jacobean spectators might find a wife directing a celebrated male warrior socially disturbing.
What the character says — “unsex me here”
Lady Macbeth · 1.5
Method: Imperative; invocation
She asks spirits to remove qualities she associates with womanhood, treating compassion as an obstacle. This is her gender ideology, not an unquestioned truth.
What the character says — “take my milk for gall”
Lady Macbeth · 1.5
Method: Bodily metaphor; contrast
Nourishing milk becomes bitter gall. Rejecting maternal care for cruelty challenges expectations that women nurture; her repeated requests also expose effort rather than effortless strength.
What the character says — “Look like th’ innocent flower, / But be the serpent under ’t.”
Lady Macbeth · 1.5
Method: Simile; biblical association
The harmless flower conceals a threatening serpent. She teaches deception, separating performed hospitality from the violence planned inside the household.
What the character says — “When you durst do it, then you were a man”
Lady Macbeth · 1.7
Method: Conditional statement
She makes masculinity depend on murder. Macbeth’s military courage becomes leverage, but her pressure does not remove his choice or responsibility.
What others say or describe — “Bring forth men-children only”
Macbeth to Lady Macbeth · 1.7
Method: Imperative; gendered praise
He associates her resolve with male offspring, revealing how deeply courage and violence are coded masculine within their shared assumptions.
Structure and dramatic choices
Private speech, then public hospitality: the audience sees the difference between the welcome Duncan receives and the danger he faces.
Her dialogue interrupts Macbeth’s decision against murder. His final agreement matters: persuasion changes his position without making him powerless.
Relevant context
Setting: medieval Scotland. Reception: early Jacobean theatre under James VI/I, whose interests connected Scottish kingship, treason and witchcraft; her invocation could intensify unease.
Patriarchal ideals privileged male authority and female obedience and nurture. Her actions subvert these ideals; audiences could respond differently, and Shakespeare need not endorse them.
Check your understanding
How does milk imagery challenge expectations about nurturing?
Why does her influence over a warrior matter to an early audience?