Importance of Sleep in Shakespeare's Macbeth

Macbeth: The Importance of Sleep

Macbeth Sleep is a time when our minds are at rest and the subconscious comes out to play. Sleep is oftentimes considered the place where we are able to see into our future and perhaps figure out how to solve our problems. Sleep is also what heals and cures our minds and bodies. Without sleep we slowly begin to disintegrate. Mind and body no longer cooperate without the healing force sleep brings with it. Shakespeare uses sleep both as a reward and as a consequence in his plays. If a character is innocent and pure, he is allowed restful, fulfilling sleep. If the character lacks these traits of goodness, he is condemned to a lifetime of insomnia and other problems. In Shakespeare’s tragedy, Macbeth, the reader can see this idea manifest itself in many different ways. From the beginning, when Macbeth hears the voice to the end of the play when Lady Macbeth sleepwalks, the reader sees many examples of this use of sleep.

One first encounters the idea of sleep in Macbeth when the central character, Macbeth, murders the sleeping king. After the murder, Macbeth believes he hears a voice cry out, "Sleep no more… Glamis hath murder'd sleep, and therefore Cawdor shall sleep no more, Macbeth shall sleep no more"(II.ii.58-60)! At this point the reader does not really think much of this warning, assuming it to merely be Macbeth's guilty conscience rather than anything important. But as the signs of the voice's prophecy begin to surface like the symptoms of a disease, Macbeth slowly becomes irrational and ruthless. This is partially due to the, "terr...

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...ally 'good' people were changed drastically after sleep was withheld from them.

King Duncan and his sons, Malcolm and Donalbain, were considered innocent in this play and therefore they were allowed to sleep. Their sleep was a restful, healing sleep that gave them clear judgment and, in the case of the sons, the will to avenge the wrongful death of their beloved father. For their 'good behaviour' they were able to sleep unhindered.

Innocence and purity in a Shakespearean play have rewards attached to them. If a character is good, he is allowed a deep, peaceful, refreshing sleep. If he is evil, he is barred from sleep as a reminder of and a punishment for his wrongdoing. This, in turn, leads to a decline in his mental, emotional and physical well being as is evidenced in Macbeth by the plight of both Macbeth and Lady Macbeth.