Macbeth Blood Motif Essay

Macbeth is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare that follows the footsteps of an evil tyrant who will accomplish whatever he must in order to maintain his power. Throughout this play, Shakespeare uses many different motifs that help shape the themes in numerous ways. A motif is a reoccurring image, word, structure, phrase, object, idea, or action in a work of literature. Throughout this play there are many motifs such as sleep, violence, hallucinations, and blood. Blood is shown throughout the entire play making its first appearance in the opening act and its last appearance in the final act. “Blood, represents evil plans and consequences of overreaching ambition” (Royal Shakespeare Company). Through Macbeth’s murderous journey, blood

begins to symbolize their guilt and has a fatal effect on Macbeth and a different effect on Lady Macbeth.
In Act I scene II, Macbeth was known as the gallant hero who was saving Scotland from the evil traitor, Macdonwald. A sergeant is telling King Duncan, Macbeth’s heroic and valiant deeds and how Macbeth shed Macdonwald’s blood in order to save Scotland. In this occasion, Macbeth was not killing to benefit himself; he was killing because it was his duty to stay loyal to his king and his country. Blood symbolizes the strength that Macbeth had and how he would accomplish anything to show his devotion, allegiance and bounded courage to Scotland.
As the play proceeds, Macbeth receives prophecies that he will become king and now he will do whatever it may take in order to make that foretelling come true. He shares this news with his wife, Lady Macbeth, who he treats as his equal. It is Lady Macbeth, who plans to take on the murderous plan of killing Duncan. She calls on the spirits of murder to poison her blood and soul so that she may be able to kill the king with no source of guilt whatsoever. “Make thick my blood. Stop up the access and passage to remorse, that no compunctious visiting’s of nature Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between the effect and it” (Shakespeare 362). Lady Macbeth wants to make her blood thick instead of wholesome in order to carry out the plans she will enact.
Macbeth, being hesitant over killing Duncan, has agreed but his guilt begins to come out through his hallucinations.

He sees a floating dagger leading the way to Duncan’s chambers. This figure comes from the mind of his disturbed brain. The dagger is a symbol of integrity and it is foreshadowing King Duncan’s death. Soon the hallucination changes to a dagger covered with blood. Even though Macbeth has not completed the deed yet, his conscience is already punctured with his guilt. The vision of the blood on the dagger, foretells Macbeth’s bloodstained destiny. After Macbeth has committed the murder, he has the blood of the kings on his hands and on the daggers that he brings back to Lady Macbeth. The blood on his hands can symbolize both the actual slaughter of Duncan and the pain he will always have on his heart of what he did, how the murder was truly in his hands. “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” (Shakespeare 373). Macbeth is filled with so much remorse that he does not think it is possible to wash his hands even in the enormous ocean. Instead of the blood washing off it would toxin the waters turning it red. “Blood symbolizes the guilt that sits like a permanent stain on the consciences of both Macbeth and Lady Macbeth, one that hounds them to their graves” (Spark

notes)
Unlike Macbeth, Lady Macbeth thinks that he is coward when he looks at the blood as he did. She smears Duncan’s blood onto his chamberlains also having his blood all over her own hands. However this does not affect her the same way that it affected Macbeth. Lady Macbeth states that she would be mortified to have such a weak heart like Macbeth’s. Instead of feeling sorrow she expresses how water can simply purify the blood from Macbeth’s hands. This is ironic to the way that Lady Macbeth eventually commits suicide due to the guilt on her conscience for this act.
Shedding blood through murder, war, and terror is not the only way that it is shown throughout the play. Donalbain and Malcolm are King Duncan’s sons and Malcolm was named as the successor. They are all linked with their blood through their family. Shakespeare expresses this by making it seem as if blood is a life-giving principle. “The spring, the head, the fountain of your blood is stopped; the very source of it is stopped” (Shakespeare 376) Once Duncan is assassinated; it is safe to assume that they are the next targets of murder. It is because they are related to Duncan, sharing the same royal blood as he.
Scotland faces terror and absolute horror while Macbeth is the tyrant taking total control over Scotland. He now not only has the blood of Duncan on his hands, but Banquo to but this time he did not kill Banquo directly. But the guilt in the back of Macbeth’s mind creates an illusion and hallucination of bloody Banquo’s ghost at Macbeth’s banquet. Macbeth expresses how it is natural to shed blood, or die but it is very unnatural for a human to rise again as a ghost. The blood that is covered on Banquo’s ghost symbolizes that Macbeth has yet another murder on his hands. His guilt was almost revealed to his guests at that banquet when Macbeth began to panic in the presence of bloody Banquo. His guiltiness is driving him to be senseless and he is unable to stay sane and stable at this point.
Macbeth also indirectly kills Lady Macduff and her children. This is another sign of him having even more deaths on his hands. A child being murdered shows how ruthless and coldblooded Macbeth has become and how he has let the tyranny and power control his well being. This blood that has been shed by innocent people, is Macbeth’s fault.
Lady Macbeth has a different view on her guilt then Macbeth does. While Macbeth at first felt, extremely guilty he then pushed aside his guilt and began to accomplish anything in order to maintain his power. Controversially Lady Macbeth was not remorseful in any way but then as the play continues, her guilt begins to come out through her unconscious acts. Lady Macbeth sleepwalks while rubbing her hands together, as if she is washing them. She also speaks of the evil deeds Macbeth has done while she is in this state. When she is rubbing her hands, it signifies her washing away Duncan’s blood off her hands. She does not want this weight on her shoulders anymore and it has driven her to a point of insanity where she cannot take it any longer. She also mentions that she is devastated that the blood can never come off her hands. Lady Macbeth has done a deed so terrible that it will live with her forever and it can never be undone. She has a guilt-ridden heart and the only way that she could be at peace was to commit suicide and she did. Lady Macbeth killed herself due to the driving forces of the guilt that she could not get rid of.
In the last scene of the play, the vengeful Macduff murders the tyrant, Macbeth to save Scotland from wretchedness and to avenge his family. Macduff carries Macbeth’s head, which is assumed to have blood flowing down from his face. Macbeth was filled with destruction, terror, guiltiness, and misery. His blood was shed, but it was shed for the reason of saving all of Scotland and for the future of Scotland.
Throughout the play, Macbeth and Lady Macbeth have a different reaction to blood and change their viewpoints on it. Blood affects Macbeth’s growing tyranny and Lady Macbeth’s stability. It has an immediate consequence that brings both of them to have a continuous struggle. Macbeth’s evil plans and consequences of overreaching motivation comes out through the representation of blood. Blood is there as a constant stain on their conscious that can never be rid of and it eventually brings them to their deaths.