To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day,
To the last syllable of recorded time;
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor playe
- Said by Macbeth when he learns that his wife committed suicide.
- Speech of pessimism and despair.
- Insists that there is no purpose or meaning in life.
- If everything is meaningless, then Macbeth's awful crimes are somehow made less awful, because, l
Irony
- A state of affairs or an event that seems deliberately contrary to what one expects and is often amusing as a result.
- The witches' prophecy was ironic because it did not turn out as Macbeth had expected.
- Lady Macbeth told Macbeth to man up when he f
Paradox
- A situation, person, or thing that combines contradictory features or qualities
- Macbeth is ambitious, but too gentle (two opposite qualities that eventually lead to his downfall)
Theme
- An idea that recurs in or pervades a work of art or literature.
- Fate & Free will
- Ambition
- Power
- Versions of reality
- Gender
- The supernatural
- Violence
- Time
Apostrophe
- An exclamatory passage in a speech or poem addressed to a person (typically one who is dead or absent) or thing (typically one that is personified).
This website has more terms and definitions (flip to see the link)
https://studentweb.region10ct.org/groups/drizzo/wiki/24b22/
Fair is foul, and foul is fair.
- Said by three witches speaking amongst themselves.
- They are casting a spell on Macbeth while he is fighting in a battle against Norway.
- This quote is paradox and embodies a main theme of the play (the difference between appearance and reality).
- It
If you can look into the seeds of time,
And say which grain will grow and which will not, Speak then to me, who neither beg nor fear Your favours nor your hate.
- Said by Banquo to the witches after they make predictions about Macbeth.
- "seeds of time" is a metaphor for the many possible futures (some will grow, others won't)
- Banquo is thrilled to hear these great things about his friend and asks them to make
And oftentimes, to win us to our harm,
The instruments of darkness tell us truths,
Win us with honest trifles, to betray's
In deepest consequence.
- Banquo says this to Macbeth after the latter is names Thane of Cawdor
- This quote foreshadows what eventually happens to Macbeth. Even though the witches predicted amazing things for him, they only told him half the truth.
- Adds to the idea of Macbeth
If chance will have me king, why, chance may crown me.
- Macbeth says this to himself (aside) after he has been names Thane of Cawdor.
- This quote contrasts the person Macbeth was before and after the murder.
- Although he is saying that he will be crowned king by "chance", Macbeth's ambition is starting to
Stars, hide your fires! Let not light see my black and deep desires.
- Macbeth says this to the stars (or to himself) after Duncan announces that his son Malcolm will be the next king.
- Macbeth is upset because he now has two obstacles in his way of becoming king. He plans on killing Duncan and thinks he'll probably have
Glamis thou art, and Cawdor; and shalt be
What thou art promised. Yet do I fear thy nature; It is too full o' the milk of human kindness To catch the nearest way: thou wouldst be great; Art not without ambition; but without
The illness should attend it.
- Lady macbeth says this to herself after reading Macbeth's letter (in the original, she is addressing Macbeth, but he isn't actually there). This is said directly to Macbeth in the BBC version.
- In the letter, Macbeth tells his wife about all the things
Come, you spirits That tend on mortal thoughts! unsex me here, And fill me from the crown to the toe, top-full Of direst cruelty; make thick my blood, Stop up the access and passage to remorse, That no compunctious visitings of nature Shake my fell purpos
- Said by Lady Macbeth to the spirits (or herself) after a servant has just told Lady Macbeth that her husband and the king will be coming to her home.
- Lady Macbeth wants to lose her feminine characteristics/emotions and be more like a man. She thinks t
Look like the innocent flower, But be the serpent under it.
- Said by Lady Macbeth to Macbeth after the latter informs his wife that king Duncan will be staying at their house.
- She says that he will never leave (because he'll be dead) and tells Macbeth to hide the emotions on his face. She says that Macbeth, to
I dare do all that may become a man;
Who dares do more, is none.
- Said by Macbeth to Lady Macbeth after she calls him a coward tries to convince him to stick to the murder plan.
- Macbeth tells his wife that he will only do what is proper for a man to do, and that anyone who does more is not a man at all (he thinks it
I have given suck, and know
How tender 'tis to love the babe that milks me:
I would, while it was smiling in my face,
Have pluck'd my nipple from his boneless gums, And dash'd the brains out, had I so sworn As you have done to this.
- Said by Lady Macbeth to Macbeth.
- After Lady Macbeth finally convinces her husband to kill King Duncan, he reconsiders and backs down. He doesn't believe it's right to kill the man who has always treated him fairly. However, Lady Macbeth believes he is
Was the hope drunk Wherein you dress'd yourself? hath it slept since? And wakes it now, to look so green and pale At what it did so freely?
- Lady Macbeth says this to Macbeth
- Macbeth is not so sure if he wants to kill King Duncan anymore, mostly because the King has honored him and treated him kindly. He is in a good place and doesn't want to jeopardize his position of power. Lady Macbeth
Mine eyes are made the fools o' the other senses, Or else worth all the rest
- Said by Macbeth during his soliloquy
- Said when Macbeth is about to kill king duncan, and he sees an imaginary dagger that is covered in blood.
- Theme: Versions of Reality. Emphasizes the idea that people in the play can't trust anyone - even themselv
To show an unfelt sorrow is an office
Which the false man does easy.
- Said by Malcolm to Donalbain.
- After Duncan is killed, the two brothers are considering running away. They know that they are in trouble, especially since they are next in line to the throne, and don't want to end up like their father.
- This is said a
Alack, I am afraid they have awaked,
And 'tis not done. The attempt and not the deed confounds us. Hark! I laid their daggers ready; He could not miss 'em. Had he not resembled My father as he slept, I had don't.
- Said by Lady Macbeth to herself
- After letting Macbeth go off and commit the crime, Lady Macbeth awaits his return.
- Translation: I am afraid that the guards woke up and that Macbeth wasn't able to carry out the deed. Trying to kill the King and not s
Methought I heard a voice cry 'Sleep no more!
Macbeth does murder sleep', the innocent sleep, Sleep that knits up the ravell'd sleeve of care, The death of each day's life, sore labour's bath, Balm of hurt minds, great nature's second course, Chief nouri
- Said by Macbeth to Lady Macbeth
- Right after Macbeth murders Duncan and he's talking to his wife about the murder and how he thought he heard noises/voices.
- Theme: Time - everything comes to a stop when King Duncan is murdered - even sleep.
- Transla
Nought's had, all's spent Where our desire is got without content. 'Tis safer to be that which we destroy Than, by destruction, dwell in doubtful joy.
- Said by Lady Macbeth to Macbeth
- A few days after he had killed King Duncan, Macbeth was feeling guilty, and was worried about suspicions from Banquo.
- Translation ? if you get what you want, and you're still not happy, you've spent everything and gai
There's daggers in men's smiles.
- Said by Donalbain to Malcom
- Duncan has been murdered, and the princes decide to flee to England and Ireland (continuation of "to show an unfelt sorrow is an office...")
- Translation ? Wherever we go, men will smile at us while hiding daggers. Our clo
To be thus is nothing; But to be safely thus.
- Said by Macbeth to Himself when Banquo has just set off to go riding and Macbeth is planning to kill him.
- Translation ? To be the king is nothing if I'm not safe as the king. I'm very afraid of Banquo. There's something noble about him that makes me f
What's done is done.
- Said by Lady Macbeth to Macbeth
- Lady Macbeth says this in an attempt to keep her husband calm, as he is having trouble with his guilty conscience constantly reminding him that he killed the king.
- Her words are self-explanatory: lady Macbeth simply m
This is the very painting of your fear:
This is the air-drawn dagger which, you said,
Led you to Duncan. O, these flaws and starts,
Impostors to true fear, would well become
A woman's story at a winter's fire,
Authorized by her grandam.
- Said by Lady Macbeth to Macbeth during the big dinner with all the nobles. The murderers have returned, informing Macbeth that Banquo is dead. Macbeth is so consumed with guilt that he believes he's seeing Banquo's ghost sitting on a stool and begins to
And you all know, security Is mortals' chiefest enemy.
- Said by Hecate to the Witches.
- Hecate appears before the Witches and demands to know why she has been excluded from their meetings with Macbeth. She tells them Macbeth will be back to know his destiny and she proclaims that he will see apparitions tha
Out, damned spot! out, I say!
- Said by Lady Macbeth to Herself when she sleepwalks, the night before Macbeth's battle with Macduff.
- Earlier in the play, Lady Macbeth was the one who convinced her husband to kill the king and then told him that "A little water clears us of this deed
Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased,
Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow,
Raze out the written troubles of the brain
And with some sweet oblivious antidote
Cleanse the stuff'd bosom of that perilous stuff
Which weighs upon the heart?
- Said by Macbeth to the Doctor
- Macbeth has just been told that 10,000 English soldiers are coming towards the castle so he's putting on his armor (even though he doesn't have to at that moment), when he asks the doctor how his wife is doing. The doctor
Those he commands move only in command,
Nothing in love: now does he feel his title
Hang loose about him, like a giant's robe
Upon a dwarfish thief.
- Said by Angus to Menteith, Caithness, Angus, Lennox, and other soldiers (on Malcolm's side).
- A group of soldiers are discussing where they're going to meet Malcolm and his soldiers when Menteith asks what "the tyrant Macbeth" is doing. Caithness repli
I gin to be aweary of the sun, And wish the estate o' the world were now undone. Ring the alarum-bell! Blow, wind! come, wrack! At least we'll die with harness on our back.
- Said by Macbeth to himself/the messenger right after the queen has committed suicide and Macbeth has spoken the "to-morrow" passage. A messenger enters and tells Macbeth that Birnam forest is moving towards the castle.
- Translation ? And now a wood is
Accursed be that tongue that tells me so,
For it hath cow'd my better part of man!
And be these juggling fiends no more believed,
That palter with us in a double sense;
That keep the word of promise to our ear,
And break it to our hope. I'll not fight wi
- Macbeth says this to Macduff while they are in the heat of their duel when Macbeth finds out that Macduff is not woman-born (he was cut out of his mother's tomb). He realizes the three prophecies have been fulfilled and he is at risk of dying. Because o