MACBETH ACT 2

SCENE 1 Banquo and his son, Fleance, are at Macbeth's inner court at Glamis. They're both feeling a little twitchy. Macbeth then enters with a servant, and Banquo notes that Macbeth should be resting peacefully considering the good news he got today. They reminisce about those wacky witches they met the other day, and then everyone leaves Macbeth. Macbeth has a vision of a dagger that points him toward the room where Duncan sleeps. The dagger turns bloody and Macbeth says the bloody image is a natural result of his bloody thoughts. A bell rings, which is Lady Macbeth's signal that it's time to kill.

QUOTES MACBETH "Is this a dagger which I see before me, The handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch thee. I have thee not, and yet I see thee still.Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible To feeling as to sight? Or art thou butA dagger of the mind, a false creationProceeding from the heat-oppressèd brain? I see thee yet, in form as palpableAs this which now I draw.Thou marshal'st me the way that I was going, And such an instrument I was to use. Mine eyes are made the fools o' th' other senses, Or else worth all the rest." Well, is it? By opening with a question, Macbeth leaves us wondering whether he does really see a dagger—whether there's some supernatural force at work—or whether it's all just a figment of his treacherous brain."The dagger made me do it" isn't a defence we've heard before, but it seems to work for Macbeth. Look at that "Come, let me clutch thee": it sounds a lot like he doesn't have a choice.

SCENE 2 Lady Macbeth is alone on stage. She tells us that she drugged the King's guards and would've even killed Duncan herself, if he hadn't looked so much like her father in his sleep. Macbeth enters with bloody hands and a weird story: two people woke up while he was in the act. One cried, "Murder!" but they both went back to sleep after saying their prayers. Macbeth is disturbed that he couldn't say "Amen" when they said, "God bless us." He could have used the blessing, given how he recently damned his soul by killing the King. Lady Macbeth is of the "If you don't think about, it will go away" school of thought, but Macbeth is still clearly disturbed at having killed a sleeping old man for his own selfish gain. There's also a problem where he heard voices saying things like "Macbeth does murder sleep!" Lady Macbeth tries to get her husband to focus on the matter at hand, which is framing the King's attendants. He won't do it himself, so she takes the daggers from him, smears the attendants with Duncan's blood, and plants the weapons. As Macbeth philosophizes about his guilty hands, Lady Macbeth comes back, having done her part. She hears a knock at the door, and hurries Macbeth to bed so that they don't look suspicious, and they can do a little washing up before all the "Oh no! The king is dead" morning. Macbeth regrets killing Duncan —he says he wishes that all the knocking at the door would "wake Duncan" from his eternal sleep.

QUOTESLADY MACBETH"That hath made them drunk hath made me bold. What hath quenched them hath given me fire"The wine she drank has given her a sense of boldness, and has stirred her will to do the deed."LADY MACBETHIt was the owl that shrieked, the fatal bellman."Lady Macbeth hears an owl shrieking, which represents death. This is similar to the raven. She compares the owl to a crier."LADY MACBETHAlack, I am afraid they have awaked, And 'tis not done. Th'attempt and not the deed confounds us."Lady Macbeth worries that Macbeth did not kill Duncan and has been caught red handed."LADY MACBETHI laid their daggers ready; he could not miss 'em. Had he not resembled my father as he slept, I had done't."Duncan resembles Lady Macbeth's when he sleeps, therefore she couldn't kill him herself."MACBETHBut wherefore could not I pronounce 'Amen'? I had most need of blessing, and 'Amen' stuck in my throat."Macbeth can't say "amen" to the prayers because he feels guilty about the murder. He also feels he needs a blessing."MACBETHMethought I heard a voice cry 'Sleep no more! Macbeth does murder sleep' - the innocent sleep, sleep that knits up the raveled sleave of care, the death of each day's life, sore labor's bath, balm of hurt minds, great nature's second voice, chief nourisher in life's feast."Macbeth lists metaphors about sleep, a motif of the play."MacbethWill all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood clean from my hand? No, this my hand will rather the multitudinous seas incarnadine, making the green one red."This is a metaphor for his guilt. Uses apostrophe in the first line and alludes to Neptune. "seas incarnadine" is a hyperbole."MacbethTo know my deed 'twere best not know myself."Macbeth knows he is a murderer. He assumes a new persona: a cold-blooded killer. This is his turning point.

SCENE 3 There's knocking and the Porter jokes around about what it would be like to be a porter of "hellgate." -Apparently, a porter in hell would be a busy guy since there are so many evil and corrupt people in the world. The Porter says maybe there's an "equivocator" at the door. It's Macduff and Lennox, who have come to fetch the king. The Porter makes a bunch of jokes about how drinking an excessive amount of alcohol, like he's been doing, makes a man frisky -but it also detracts from his "performance" in the sack, not to mention turning his nose red and making him have to pee. Enter Macbeth, the picture of sleepy innocence while he makes small talk with Lennox and sends Macduff to wake Duncan. Lennox notes that some spooky things have been happening all night —he heard a bunch of screams, there was a little earthquake, and the fire in his chimney blew out. But not as rough as it was for Duncan, who Macduff has just found murdered. Everyone starts running around, Lady Macbeth and Banquo show up, and then Macbeth starts a way-too-eager eulogy about the King's great virtues. Lennox thinks that the drunken guards covered in the King's blood and holding their daggers killed him. Macbeth casually announces that he killed both of the guards in a fit of pious rage, out of his love for the King. Apparently, no one thinks it's weird that the guards went to sleep with the bloody daggers in hand. Lady Macbeth, upon hearing that Macbeth has done this, needs to be escorted out. Donalbain and Malcolm (heirs) privately decide that they probably shouldn't stay in the house where their dad was killed. Malcolm will go to England and Donalbain to Ireland, making it more difficult to murder them both.

QUOTESPORTER "Knock, knock! Who's there, in th'other devil's name? Faith, here's an equivocatorthat could swear in both the scales against either scale; who committed treason enough for God's sake, yet could not equivocate to heaven. O, come in,equivocator." All this talk about "equivocators" is a reference to the recent Gunpowder Plot, the treasonous Catholic plot to blow up Parliament. This little joke helps Shakespeare get away with dramatizing the murder of a king on stage: the reference to the Gunpowder Plot is a clear condemnation of the crime Macbeth has just committed. "MACDUFFO gentle lady, 'Tis not for you to hear what I can speak.The repetition in a woman's earWould murder as it fell. "He's so tied to a notion of female gentleness that he can't believe Lady Macbeth could even hear about murder, much less plot one. She must leave the room.

SCENE 4 Ross chats with a conveniently placed wise old man, who is disturbed by the night's strange events —both the King's murder and the weird things going on in nature. Ross says the heavens are clearly troubled by the unnatural regicide: even though it's the middle of the day, it's completely dark outside; an owl murder a hawk; Duncan's horses ate each other. Macduff, yet another Scottish nobleman, shows up to exposit a little for us: he says the dead guards "were bribed" to murder the king; that Malcolm and Donalbain look pretty suspicious, having left town so quickly; that Macbeth is on his way to Scone to be crowned King; and that Duncan is being put in a freshly dug grave.

QUOTES"ROSS 'Gainst nature still! Thriftless ambition, that will ravin up Thine own lives' means! Then 'tis most likeThe sovereignty will fall upon Macbeth. " Ross is right about one thing: ambition is to blame for Duncan's murder. He's wrong about the most important part, though. Here, he accuses Duncan's kids of going "'gainst nature" and killing their own father—but Macbeth is the one to watch out for. 'ROSS Ha, good father, Thou seest, the heavens, as troubled with man's act, Threaten his bloody stage. By th' clock, 'tis day, And yet dark night strangles the traveling lamp. Is't night's predominance or the day's shameThat darkness does the face of earth entombWhen living light should kiss it? OLD MAN 'Tis unnatural, Even like the deed that's done. ' It's the day after King Duncan's murder, and things are not looking good. Even though it's the middle of the day, darkness fills the sky, as though the sun ("the traveling lamp") has been "strangle[d]" by "dark night." Anyone else get the feeling that this is symbolic? Duncan's rule and his life have both been extinguished by Macbeth, who has committed the most "unnatural" act of all: upending the natural order of power. "MACDUFF Malcolm and Donalbain, the King's two sons, Are stol'n away and fled, which puts upon them Suspicion of the deed. " You may look guilty when you run—but you look a lot worse when you're dead. Malcolm and Donalbain are willing to put up with the appearance of guilt if it means that they'll be able to avenge their father in the end.