MACBETH
She should have died hereafter;
There would have been a time for such a word.
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 player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more: it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,Signifying nothing.
Shakespeare shows us that Macbeths mind is slowly deteriorating over the course of the play. He uses a number of different methods that can be seen in this play.
In this quote Macbeth is saying that everything that he has worked for is lost. His wife has just died and now thee is an army outside his castle camouflaged as the woods. In this quote we see Macbeth say “Life’s but a walking shadow”.
Shakespeare uses personification here to put Macbeth’s thoughts into perspective. Traits of shadows are that they aren’t actually made of something. Its not a substance, it is just light being blocked off. This could show us that Macbeth believes that his life has become dark and meaningless. After all the work he had done under control of his wife, she has died. Now all that’s left is him. I believe Shakespeare us going through this and showing us how empty Macbeth is to show us the consequences of playing with fate and making immoral choices.
Shakespeare also uses the structure and the way Macbeth speaks to show that his mind is deteriorating. Throughout the play people of importance will always speak in iambic pentameter. It is a way of showing different statuses. However in this speech the use of iambic pentameter begins to phase away. It starts of in the usual tempo but as it goes on Macbeth starts talking as if he was an unimportant character. I think that Shakespeare is trying to shift main characters while also showing us that as a consequence of playing with fate he has become insane and has become a different person after all the work he has done throughout the whole play.
React!