LOVE IS BLIND

Lady Macbeth is just evil. There is no part of her that is salvageable..it's just all bad. Yet despite this, Macbeth is still with her and has thus far not spoken badly of her or opposed her. Hes a fierce man of battle but allows himself to be manipulated by a woman. She forces him to do things against his will because of her ambitions. Macbeth does it all. He is also ambitious but his ambition is tamed by his morals at times. So we could make the reasonable conjecture that he allows himself to be manipulated by Lady Macbeth because he loves her and wants to keep her happy (appease her). Love really must be blind then.

Now us as the audience, we see Lady Macbeth for the real monster that she is. Shakespeare has thus far presented her in a way that would only lead to hate from the audience. He uses her own words to corrupt her. The most obvious example of this would be when she's scolding Macbeth for wanting to back out on his promise of killing King Duncan and she tells him that keeping ones word is important and that she would kill an infant if she had promised to do so because she keeps her word. Now, Shakespeare could have used any other example but he uses this particularly gory one only to add to our hate and disgust with her.

MACBETH ACT 1 active reading notes

• Macbeth subtly introduced into the play.
• Witches foreboding and controlling.
• Macbeth accepts that he will be Thane of Cawdor and King after meeting the witches and hearing their prophecy, showing his ambitious side.
• Macbeth is pronounced Thane of Cawdor due to his loyalty in fighting the rebels for the king, this brings credibility to the Witches in his eyes.
• Thane of Cawdor before Macbeth is to be executed for treason.
• Macbeth reveals more of his ambitious side when he says that he is now Thane of Glamis and Cawdor, and the best is still to come (he becomes King). Banquo skeptical about Witches---> they usually lead men to their demise with tricks.
• Macbeth begins to think about murdering King Duncan to precipitate his becoming King. Yet despite all his battle gore and ambition, murder frightens him (irony).
• Macbeth meets King Duncan and praises him. Macbeth is dishonest and untrustworthy.
• Duncan admires Macbeth deeply. The fact that Macbeth was thinking about murdering him earlier now makes the reader resent him for wanting to kill a man who admires him as much. Ironic that last Thane of Cawdor was executed for treason, and now Macbeth occupies his place?
• Duncan is to name Malcolm heir to the thrown (could this precipitate Macbeth to take action?)
• Macbeth makes up his mind to kill the King and anyone else who stands between him and the thrown.
• Lady Macbeth is introduced, she has guts and no morals as apparent from her way of speaking and acting. She characterizes Macbeth for us as a man who wants something but is too afraid to go after it.
• Lady Macbeth determined to kill Duncan when she finds out he is coming to her castle. She is EVIL.
• As soon as Macbeth and Lady Macbeth speak it is apparent that she dominates him. She tells him what to do and how to behave.
• The deep love expressed by Duncan to Macbeth only makes the treason more unforgivable to the reader. Is Shakespeare setting us up to hate Macbeth?
• Macbeth is already feeling remorse for planning to kill Duncan but his ambition is greater.
• Macbeth has second doubts and Lady Macbeth scolds him and essentially forces him to stick to his words. She is ruthless. She says she would kill the baby eating from her breasts while he smiled if she had given her word that she'd do it.
• The plan: Get Duncan's servants drunk so they pass out. Once they are unconscious, they will take their daggers and kill Duncan. Then they will cover the servants in his blood to make everyone think they were the ones who did it.

MEET MACBETH

During the opening parts of The Tragedy of Macbeth, Macbeth is introduced through indirect characterization, such as when the Sergeant describes acts of gore committed by Macbeth during the battle. Another instance of indirect characterization occurs during his conversations with the Three Witches and Banquo. During the conversations he is revealed to be gullible, pensive and easily swayed. Three random women tell him he will be king;  he is at first shocked by this but then embraces it. After this encounter with the witches he begins to think deeply and discuss with Banquo how the three Witches gained that knowledge and how he will be the new king if the position is already occupied.

The most obvious instance of foreshadowing provided by the Witches is when they give Macbeth his prophecy about him becoming king. Another instance of foreshadowing is found here:

"A sailor's wife had chestnuts in her lap,

And munch'd, and munch'd, and munch'd:--

'Give me,' quoth I:

'Aroint thee, witch!' the rump-fed ronyon cries.

Her husband's to Aleppo gone, master o' the Tiger:

But in a sieve I'll thither sail,

And, like a rat without a tail,

I'll do, I'll do, and I'll do."

Now, what the above text foreshadows is (very literally) that we will come across a woman who will somehow have control over a man, as apparent by the "chestnuts" on her lap, her munching and the appearance of a man (rat) without a tail, which can be interpreted as a phallic symbol. 

At the beginning of the play, Shakespeare introduces the theme without giving away the play. I'm referring to the Witches chant "fair is foul, and foul is fair." Through that chiasmus they are telling us that what to us appears as fair is actually foul and what to them appears as foul is actually fair. They are setting up a play in which things will never be good or bad, but a combination of the both. Things wont be black or white, rather shades of grey.

Shakespeare has thus far been very modest with his portrayal of Macbeth. The few bits of him he has given us have all been strictly indirect. Shakespeare creates a strong Macbeth in the battlefield but when he isn't in "warrior mode" he's actually very weak and gullible. When the Sergeant was describing Macbeth, Shakespeare used very precise language when describing the gory acts of violence perpetrated by Macbeth. Yet when Macbeth meets the Witches and they refer to him as king he is frightened. In this whole scene Shakespeare shows us a Macbeth that is easily frightened and convinced. These three random women told him he would be king and he believed it without much questioning. 

So far, Macbeth appears manipulated by women. The Witches told him something outrageous and he believed it. Right before this the Witches were talking about a man being manipulated by a woman through their interesting imagery of chestnuts and phallic symbols. So far, it appears as though this will be the story of yet another man manipulated by a woman.

Another shot at love with Shakespeare

In honor of our begun voyage into the world of Macbeth....

MY MACBETH RESOURCES

1. No Fear Shakespeare. This is what has gotten me through most of my English career when it comes to Shakespeare. Shakespeare is difficult. Shakespeare uses an English that is extremely hard to decipher so it makes the whole process of reading, analyzing and everything else so difficult. This website translates his English into a more modern American English that we are familiar with. I love this website because it takes care of the heavy duty work and gives you a good foundation to begin with.

2. This is the actual text. I like this website because of its simple design. It doesn't have too many things so scrolling is easy.

3. Macbeth Wikipedia page. I like learning the quick history about these sort of things before I actually read them and once I am immersed into the reading I look back on these websites. It allows me to better understand the text by putting it into some sort of context (historical, political, etc).

4. Full Macbeth play acted out. With this sort of literature we can often miss out because its meant to be a visual experience. I like watching plays just to help better understand the play in general.

5. This is a series of examinations, an in-depth analysis of the play and it contains a bit of history and background information. I have read bits and pieces and it all seems very logical and academic. I will periodically visit this as we move along the play.

IS THERE AN EXPERT IN THE HOUSE?

While the reaching out to Dr. Cornel West is in progress, I have been going to several online journalism websites and other news sites. I have compiled a list of writers and editors, along with their email addresses. I plan to reach out to them and get their input on the articles written for In Loco Politico, both by myself and Javi. I want to know if there's anything writing-wise we could do to improve or make our articles better and more interesting. After that I'd also like to reach out to someone (not necessarily a "professional") to get help with improving the visual aspect of the blog.

THIS IS ONLY A TEST

To me tests are a learning experience. It is an opportunity to take a subject and emphasize it with the purpose of doing good. Some people see them as a "bad" thing but I don't. They are a motivation to me. I don't want to do bad so that motivates me to do well and get work done. Using that concept, I applied it to In Loco Politico. After having some discussion, it was pointed out to me that we need to improve our mechanics so that we can give our blog a better appearance. For my test, I am going back through every article and editing for grammar and spelling.