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Examples Of Figurative Language In Macbeth

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The scene takes place right after Macbeth kills Duncan in his sleep. Before the murder, Macbeth is a noble Thane of Scotland who is influenced by the three witches and his wife who fill him with dreams of power. Macbeth uses religious imagery, lists which reveal his preoccupation, repetition to highlight his realization, blood imagery and figurative devices to vividly display his panic, all of which help us understand the character’s state of mind. After Macbeth cold-bloodedly kills Duncan in his sleep (2.2.29-94), his language reveals a character who feels immense guilt and helpless doom.
Through religious imagery, Macbeth reveals his hopeless doom and damaged spirituality. Macbeth hallucinates, thinking one of the servant’s is speaking: …show more content…

The repeated use of the word murder is demonstrated: “Murder!” (2.2.32) and again very shortly, “…Macbeth does murder sleep” (2.2.48). In the previous scenes, Macbeth continually masks the word murder with euphemism to take its place because he cannot even imagine himself committing such a crime. Now that he has killed Duncan, he comes to the realization that he indeed has “murdered” Duncan and cannot run away from reality. The resignation of not being able to evade and attain forgiveness for his sins instills a sense of hopeless doom in …show more content…

Macbeth yells in despair, “[Knocking within] / Wake Duncan with thy knocking! I would thou couldst” (2.2.93-94). Macbeth is utterly guilty and remorseful of having killed Duncan to the point of paranoia. He shouts aloud even though he must be wary of not revealing his crime. Macbeth also requests the individual knocking to wake Duncan up from his forever slumber as a last resort to revoke his crime so he can rid himself of

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This scene features Lady Macbeth speaking to herself; expressing her thoughts out loud. She speaks of killing Duncan: “The raven himself is hoarse/ That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan” (45-46). She then calls upon the spirits to assist her in murder (47-51). Shakespeare uses words with negative connotations, such as “hoarse”, “croaks”, “cruelty”, and “blood” (45-50).

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1724 Words | 7 Pages

The voices he hears that threaten: “Macbeth shall sleep no more” indicate a relationship between guilt and madness. Therefore, the manifestation of the dagger suggests that he feels guilty because of his attempt to murder Duncan. There are three major transitions of thought. First, he contemplates about the dagger’s existence; the second is the invocations of dark images; finally, there is the bell that cuts off Macbeth’s contemplations. The transitions between topics indicate that while Macbeth feels guilty for the murder, his determination makes him ignore

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Macbeth’s fear is so intense that he does not know if he is touching the dagger or if it is a figment of his imagination. Alternately, he may wish what he is seeing is false because he knows his

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Shakespeare, in Act 5, Scene 5 of his play The Tragedy of Macbeth, portrays time as unfeeling. Shakespeare’s purpose is to make the audience ponder the nature of time and denounce ambition as a vain notion of humanity through repetition and personification. In the speech, Macbeth adopts a grim and weary tone in order to convey the meaninglessness of day to day life and the cyclical nature of time to the Elizabethan audience. In Macbeth’s speech in Act 5, Scene 5, Shakespeare uses repetition to create a grim tone which reflects the speech’s message surrounding the cyclical nature of life and time.

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