Macbeth Feminist Analysis

Macbeth is a famous play written by Shakespeare. This play like most stories had women in it, and whether Shakespeare intended to or not he showed his own views on women. The women in this play are the witches and the two wives. Witches aside the two wives are quite unique before settling in to the stereotype of playing second fiddle to a male character. “They wanted, it seemed, to be supporting actresses in their own stories”. (Kelsey McKinney) These women take the time to make it clear how awful they are before fading out. Both the wives and the witches do this masterfully before succumbing to the stereotype of fading out to a male character. In Macbeth the three main feminine themes are clearly that women should not be trusted, have little faith in others, and make foolish decisions.

Although the results are not seen until the end of the play it is foreshadowed quite heavily throughout that the women are not to be trusted. The first example is the witches. The play’s opening act is the three witches foreshadowing their evil plan as one witch asks whether they will meet again assuming it will be in thunder, lightning, or in rain. During the time period of this play it was widely believed that a person’s actions could affect the weather. Bad deeds would result in bad

weather. Another sign of untrustworthiness is appearance. Amanda Mabillard describes the witches in Macbeth as ugly androgynous hags. The witches are exactly as bad as they look, and are in fact, not to be trusted.

The women in this play also display a remarkable lack of faith in the men. Lady Macduff having learned her husband has left. She quickly assumes he has left them, and run away. She tells her son “Sirrah, your father's dead; And what will you do now? How will you live?” (Wiggins, 385), not only does she immediately give up on her husband, but she lies to her son about it. Then she continues on to question him as if she believes he will run away as well. The son even points out that she would have cried if he really left them, and she is unable to give a proper return statement aside telling him to be quiet. This prove that she indeed loves him she was so quick to forsake him. If this is how she handles loved ones then how might she respond to friend or even a stranger? Luckily the son was not so easily fooled and was able to die knowing his was not only alive, but most likely doing some good.

The women in this play also display a penchant for foolish decisions. The most notable and most significant being when Lady Macbeth convinces her husband to murder the king. This single decision sets the whole play into action, and she decided simply from a letter he sent telling her of the witches prophecy. “As soon as she's finished reading, she has decided she will make sure Macbeth is king”, (BBC News) Lady Macbeth even calls his manhood into question when he starts to realize that this is a foolish decision. Once she finally gets him to kill the king. This sets the entire kingdom and Macbeth onto a chaotic path. All do to Lady Macbeth’s hasty and ill-conceived conclusion. Marinoff and Schultz stated that Macbeth’s condition is due to his wife, Lady Macbeth, pushing him to action. Worst of all by the end of the story when her husband has very obviously gone mad, and she has been sleep walking due to guilt. Instead of simply living with her choice she commits suicide out of guilt. She pushed her husband to kill the king. An act she would have committed herself if the king did not remind her of her father,

and once the dead is done she tells hers husband “Consider it not so deeply” (Wiggins, 346). She already knows that this was a bad decision.

The feminine themes are untrustworthy women, women with little faith in others, and women making foolish decisions, and they can be seen throughout the play.

These women are just terrible between Lady Macduff’s lying, Lady Macbeths terrible decisions, and just about anything involving the witches. I don’t know if Shakespeare had some past trauma with women, or if he simply did not like them. Either way Shakespeare hits a rare margin. “Statistically, one percent of the Best Novels are about women doing something other than loving.” (McKinney, Kelsey). The women of this play manage to land in this one percent due to their lack of love, and in doing some rare themes in place for feminism in

literature.