Abbreviations and idiosyncrasies to be noted

King James: KJ
Macbeth: M
Lady Macbeth: LM
King Duncan: D
Red writing: Something to be double-checked
S: Shakespeare

1: Introduction material

1.1: Background knowledge needed for this scene – Very Important

1. This play was written in 1606 by the bard himself, William Shakespeare,
for King James 1, the patron of Shakespeare’s acting company.
2. Hence Macbeth was written to please KJ
3. KJ spoke of the Chain of Being, a social code of sorts during the Jacobean
era, in which the King was the highest human being in terms of status,
women were underneath men.
4. A year ago, the gunpowder plot of 1605 occurred, when Guy Fawkes
attempted an assassination of KJ
5. Hence, Macbeth focuses on the consequences of breaking the chain of
being.
6. M was also a real person, he was a King (1042-1057) but of a small
amount of land
7. In this play, he is the tragic hero who lets his hamartia consume and
change him for the worse.
8. M is a general in the Scottish Army under King Duncan

9. His wife, LM, was the one who convinced him to kill Duncan and is his
femme fatale.

10. In this scene, M is heading towards D’s chambers to kill him, when he
encounters a vision of a bloody dagger

11. It contains M’s famed is this a dagger I see before me soliloquy, in which
he becomes fully convinced that he needs to kill Duncan

12. The scene initially has a servant as well, but the directions account for her
early exit, leaving M alone on the stage.
13. STATE WHOM THE HELL M IS!!!
14. Themes are of Nature vs Unnatural and fate
15. M is a general in the Scottish Army under King Duncan, his wife has
previously persuaded him to kill Duncan in Act 1 Scene 7
16. This scene is the pivotal point at which he is fully convinced that he needs
to go through with it
17. It also contains one of M’s most famous soliloquys, in which he
hallucinates about a bloody dagger before killing Duncan. This
hallucination is very important because it is the final push for M, leading
to Duncan’s assassination.
1.2: Tone
Initially, panicked, until nature seems dead, after which he seems determined to
go through with the murder

1.3: Literary devices used

1. Femme Fatale: what LM is to M, alluding to Eve’s persuasion of Adam to
eat the apple in “the fall of man,” leading to their downfall
2. Pathetic fallacy in torchbearer – night time, bad stuff happens etcetera.
1.4: Thesis Statements
1. How does M justify his impending murder of Duncan through fate and the
dagger?
2. How does Shakespeare present M’s treachery and newfound evil?
3. Extra Stuff

1.5: Themes
1. Nature vs the unnatural
2. Fate

2: Line by Line analysis

SCENE I. Court of Macbeth's castle.

Enter BANQUO, and FLEANCE bearing a torch before him

BANQUO
…………..
Who's there?
MACBETH
A friend.
BANQUO
What, sir, not yet at rest? The king's a-bed:
He hath been in unusual pleasure, and
Sent forth great largess to your offices.
This diamond he greets your wife withal,
By the name of most kind hostess; and shut up
In measureless content.
MACBETH
Being unprepared,
Our will became the servant to defect;
Which else should free have wrought.
BANQUO
All's well.
I dreamt last night of the three weird sisters:
To you they have show'd some truth.
MACBETH
I think not of them:
Yet, when we can entreat an hour to serve,
We would spend it in some words upon that business,
If you would grant the time.
BANQUO
At your kind'st leisure.
MACBETH
If you shall cleave to my consent, when 'tis,
It shall make honour for you.
BANQUO
So I lose none
In seeking to augment it, but still keep
My bosom franchised and allegiance clear,
I shall be counsell'd.
MACBETH
Good repose the while!
BANQUO
Thanks, sir: the like to you!

Exeunt BANQUO and FLEANCE

MACBETH
Go bid thy mistress, when my drink is ready,
She strike upon the bell. Get thee to bed.

Exit Servant

Is this a dagger which I see before me,

The handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch thee.
 “handle towards my hand,” – the placement of the dagger as
expressed through this scene indicates that M’s subconscious wants
him to take the dagger, since after all, this is something he is
imagining.

I have thee not, and yet I see thee still.

Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible
 “fatal vision,” – diction, “fatal,” denotes something that represents
fate, hence the vision is representative of D’s fate (i.e that M murders
him

To feeling as to sight? or art thou but

A dagger of the mind, a false creation,
Proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain?
  “heat oppressed brain,”- heat was perceived to be a fluid that caused
delirium in this era, hence M thinks he is going mad. However, this
shows that he is still thinking intelligently, in order to make his later
insanity more profound.
 “heat,” – could be a metaphor for M’s ambition, explaining how it is
oppressing his higher order thinking and has become his main focus.

I see thee yet, in form as palpable

 “I see,” – repetition used to show how M doubts what he is seeing,
but this sounds like a chant by one of the witches in A1S1 and A1S3,
expressing the influence the witches have had over M’s speech
patterns alone

As this which now I draw.

Thou marshall'st me the way that I was going;
 “marshall’st me the way that I was going,”- this indicates that the
dagger is pointing towards Duncan’s bedroom, which is where M was
going. Furthermore, “marshall’st,” is synonymous with ordering,
therefore, the hallucination is ordering M to kill Duncan.

And such an instrument I was to use.

Mine eyes are made the fools o' the other senses,
Or else worth all the rest; I see thee still,
 “worth all the rest,” – showing his trust in the hallucination and its
message, since he claims that sight, the only sense with which he can
determine the dagger’s existence, is “worth all the rest,” or in plain
English, his sight is equal to the sensitivity of all 5 senses combined,
showing his trust in the dagger.

And on thy blade and dudgeon gouts of blood,

 “on thy blade and dudgeon gouts of blood,” – this phrase describes
the dagger as having droplets (gouts) of blood on blade and hilt
(dudgeon) of the dagger. Blood in this play is a symbol of violence
and hence the “gouts of blood,” convincing M that his looming
assassination of D will indeed happen. This contributes to the overall
significance of the dagger in this scene. It is a figment of M’s
imagination, albeit one with a specific purpose; to convince M that he
needs to kill D. The dagger points at Duncan’s room, coated with
specks of blood, signifying the bloody path M will be undertaking in
his murder of D. Furthermore, blood is also a symbol of guilt in
Macbeth, such as how M claims that all of Neptune’s seas cannot
clear his hands of blood. Therefore, this dagger foreshadows how M
will be consumed by guilt after the murder.
Which was not so before. There's no such thing:
It is the bloody business which informs
 “bloody business,” – b alliteration is used to place stress on how the
murder of the King will be a horrible deed and emphasises M’s
treachery and evil. “Bloody,” again is a symbol for the violence that
will occur shortly when D is murdered.

Thus to mine eyes. Now o'er the one halfworld

Nature seems dead, and wicked dreams abuse
 “nature seems dead,” – theme of nature vs unnatural explored, the use
of the word, “dead,” (diction), explains how nature will be gone
forever when D is murdered, because the chain of being would have
been broken – link to appeal to KJ

The curtain'd sleep; Witchcraft celebrates

Pale Hecate's offerings, and wither'd Murder,
 “Witchcraft celebrates Pale Hecate’s offerings,” – allusion to Hecate,
the Roman and Greek goddess of magic. The personification of
witchcraft is used to represent how every witch is celebrating because
M has decided to kill the King, giving them offerings as he has
fulfilling the prophecy from Hecate in the process.
 “wither’d Murder,”- personification and diction are used in this
phrase. M personifies himself as murder in itself, an act that is
associated with evil. Therefore, the personification is used to map
M’s degredation from loyal soldier to evil traitor. “wither’d,”
suggests the sterility of evil and emphasises M’s transformation
 This is also the point from which M speaks in 3rd person

Alarum'd by his sentinel, the wolf,

 “wolf,” – anthropomorphism to represent M as a conscienceless
killer, like a wolf

Whose howl's his watch, thus with his stealthy pace.

With Tarquin's ravishing strides, towards his design
 “Tarquin’s ravishing strides,” – allusion to infamous Roman Prince
who raped a woman named Lucrece, showing how M has
transformed into an evil man like Tarquin. Also, Tarquin attacks
Lucrece in her bed chambers, and M’s murder of D mirrors this

Moves like a ghost. Thou sure and firm-set earth,

 “moves like a ghost,” – simile shows how M’s movement is similar to
that of a ghost. “Ghost,” was used because God cannot see a ghost,
 just like how God cannot stop Macbeth from killing the king
anymore.

Hear not my steps, which way they walk, for fear

Thy very stones prate of my whereabout,
And take the present horror from the time,
Which now suits with it. Whiles I threat, he lives:
Words to the heat of deeds too cold breath gives.
 The rhyme between heat and deed is used to represent M’s
acceptance of D’s fate

A bell rings

I go, and it is done; the bell invites me.

Hear it not, Duncan; for it is a knell
That summons thee to heaven or to hell.
 The dichotomy and equivocation in “heaven or hell” is expressive of
M’s final flash of uncertainty over killing D, showing that he still
retains some amount of sanity.

3: Structural features to mention for each thesis statement

TS1: the use of caesuras from curtained sleep show how M’s resolve to carry out
the act is building. Initially lots of rhetorical questions to show his doubts but
this halts when the caesuras start