Lady Macbeth Is A Fiend - Like Queen

Lady Macbeth Is A Fiend - Like Queen

In William Shakespeare's play "Macbeth" the audience sees two very

different sides of Lady Macbeth. At the start of the play Lady Macbeth

is shown to be ruthless, conniving, fiend-like and remorseless. The

phrase fiend-like conjures up an image of a cruel, evil and wicked

person. In the play the audience sees that Lady Macbeth has a lust for

power. She believes that her ambition to become queen will come true

after reading Macbeth's letter with tells her of his meeting with the

witches and their prophecy that Macbeth will become king. Shakespeare

wrote "Macbeth" so that throughout the play tension is built up and

the play relates strongly to witchcraft and the supernatural to which

audiences at that time could relate to.

The play Macbeth appeals to the audience as throughout Shakespeare's

life witches and witchcraft were the object of morbid and fevered

fascination. Between 1560 and 1603 persecution of witches reached

terrifying proportions. Hundreds of people, nearly all women, were

convicted as witches and executed. Witches were credited with

diabolical powers. They could predict the future, fly, sail in sieves,

bring on night in daytime, cause fogs and tempests and kill animals.

It was believed that witches allowed the devil to suck their blood in

exchange for a "familiar," a bird, reptile or beast to act as an evil

servant. Accused witches were examined for this mark, a red mark on

the body where Satan had sucked blood.

King James I was as fascinated by witchcraft as any of his subjects.

In 1590 it was alleged that a group of witches had tried to kill him.

Fired by this experience King ...

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...agree with the idea that Lady Macbeth is a fiend but I do not agree

that she is a fiend - like queen. I believe this as when Lady Macbeth

became queen she did not act in a fiendish manner. At the end of the

play when Lady Macbeth is mad she becomes afraid of the dark and

always keeps a candle by her. Early in the play Macbeth and Lady

Macbeth are seen as creatures of the dark which symbolises treachery

cruelty and evil. By wanting to have light with her Lady Macbeth seeks

to remove the darkness of evil. However when Lady Macbeth was fiend -

like in plotting the kings murder she called upon darkness "blanket of

the dark," to help her and Macbeth commit the murder. A true fiend

would never be afraid of the dark like Lady Macbeth is at the end of

the play; this is why I judge that Lady Macbeth is not a fiend - like

queen.