Guilt

Act Speaker Quote Notes Added?
Act2 scene2 Macbeth “Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood Clean from my hand? No, this my hand will rather the multitudinous seas incarnadine, Making the green one red.” Using hyperbole to exaggerate the guilt, his violent action can pollute the ocean (Symbol of blood) V
Act5 scene1 Lady Macbeth “Here’s the smell of the blood still; all the perfume of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand.” Using hyperbole the exaggerate the guilt, nothing can cover her guilt (Symbol of blood) V
Act2 scene2 Macbeth “I am afraid to think what I have done”
Act2 scene2 Lady Macbeth “My hands are of your colour, but I shame to wear a heart so white.” “Colour”: Bloody
“White heart”: Contrast V
Lady Macbeth “A little water clears us of this deed.” Foreshadowing: The guilt of murdering will never be “cleaned” V
Macbeth “To know my deed, twere best not know myself” It was his deed alone and that no one else was to blame
Macbeth “I am in blood, stepped in so far, that, should I wade no more, returning were as tedious as go o'er” V
Macbeth “O, full of scorpions is my mind” his mind is full of worries and paranoia he has gained due to how he responded to the prophecies V
Macbeth “I has most need of blessing and ‘amen’ stuck in my throat” “Amen”, “blessing”: God and witches, the chain of social being
Macbeth “Then comes the fit again: I had else been perfect”

Supernatural

Act Speaker Quote Notes Added?
Act1 scene1 The witches "Fair is foul, and foul is fair; Hover through the fog and filthy air." Oxymoron V
Act1 scene3 Banquo “What, can devil speaks true?”
Act3 scene4 Macbeth “This is more strange than such a murder is”
Act1 scene3 Macbeth “So foul and fair a day, I have not seen” Linking to the witches’ line before meeting them, showing that Macbeth is evil in blood
Macbeth “Is this a dagger which I see before me, the handle toward my hand?” V
Macbeth “A dagger of the mind, a false creation” V
Doctor “Unnatural deeds do breed unnatural troubles” Obeying the natural law
“Compunctious visitings of nature"

Tyranny/kingship

Act Speaker Quote Notes Added?
Act4 scene3 Malcolm “The king-becoming graces - As justice, verity, temp'rance, stableness, Bounty, perseverance, mercy, lowliness,  Devotion, patience, courage, fortitude I have no relish of them, but abound / In the division of each several crime, Acting it many ways.” V
Act4 scene3 Macduff “Not in the legions of horrid hell can come a devil more damn’d In evils to top Macbeth” Comparing Macbeth to a horrid devil, reflecting that Macbeth wasn’t a good monarch V
Act5 scene2 Angus “Those he commands, move only in command, Nothing in love. Now does he feel his title Hang loose about him, like a giant’s robe upon a dwarfish thief” “Giant’s robe”-> Job of being a king
“Dwarfish thief”-> Macbeth
Using a metaphor to demonstrate that Macbeth couldn’t handle this massive job V
Banquo “I dream’d last night of the three weird sisters; to you they have show’d some truth.”
Macbeth “Give to the edge o' the sword .. (Macduff’s) wife, his babes, and all unfortunate souls that trace him in his line.”

Ambitions

Act Speaker Quote Notes
Act1 scene3 Macbeth “If chance will have me king, why chance may crown me without my stir.” The word chance is repeated twice, showing that Macbeth deeply believe in prophesies and couldn’t wait to be king
Act5 scene3 Macbeth “I’ll fight till from my bones my flesh be hack’d” Hyperbole
Macbeth “Let not light see my black and deep desires”
Lady Macbeth “When you durst do it, then you were a man, and to be more than what you were, you would be so much more the man.”
Lady Macbeth “And live a coward in thine own esteem”

Reflect on downfall

Act Speaker Quote Notes
Act5 scene5 Macbeth “Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, creeps in this petty pace from day to day to the last syllable of recorded time; And all our yesterdays have lighted fools the way to dusty death.” Repetition
The phrase tomorrow is repeated, expresses the emptiness underlining human existence and also captures the waste of human potential in his own life.
Act5 scene5 Macbeth “Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more. It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.” So many have lived before us that we are simply walking in their shadow, with the same habits, mistakes, fears, emotions, and so on, as our ancestors had. Life is, in fact, brief and meaningless. Spoken after Lady Macbeth’s death.

Pathetic fallacy

Act Speaker Quote Notes Added?
Act1 scene1 / ‘Thunder and lightning. Enter the three witches’ Every time when the witches enter, there are lightning and thunder
Act2 scene3 Lennox “The night has been unruly: where we lay, Our chimneys were blown down, and, as they say, Lamentings heard i’th’ air, strange screams of death And prophesying with accents terrible Of dire combustion and confus’d events, New hatch’d to th’woeful time. The obscure bird Clamour’d the livelong night. Some say the earth Was feverous and did shake.” The night Duncan was being killed is creepy. Everything that symbolises horror and bad luck appears.
Reflecting that supernatural is taking over the lead.
Old man “It’s unnatural, just like the murder that has been committed. Last Tuesday a falcon was circling high in the sky, and it was caught and killed by an ordinary owl that usually goes after mice.”
Ross “And something else strange happened. Duncan’s horses, which are beautiful and swift and the best of their breed, suddenly turned wild and broke out of their stalls. Refusing to be obedient as usual, they acted like they were at war with mankind.”
Old man “They say the horses ate each other.”