Hallucination In Macbeth

Macbeth murders King Duncan and runs to his wife, Lady Macbeth, telling her of what he heard after he killed the king -- a strange voice. Hearing a voice is another form of a hallucination called an auditory hallucination. It is not as common as a visual hallucination but still has the same effect. He tells his wife, “Methought I heard a voice cry, ‘Sleep no more!/Macbeth does murder sleep’” (2.2.43-44). This voice he hears mocks him, telling him that Macbeth “murdered” sleep. “Many people with schizophrenia experience auditory hallucinations (hearing voices or noises that are not real). Sometimes people with auditory hallucination hear voices that insult them or tell them what to do. Others might hear voices arguing with each other or might

In front of many important people he addresses a figure that only he can see: “Prithee, see there!/Behold! Look! Lo! How say you?/Why, what care I? If thou canst not, speak too./If charnel houses and our graves must send/Those that we bury back, our monuments/shall be the maws of kites.” (3.4.81-86) He addresses the people in the room asking if anyone else can see what he does. However Macbeth is at a loss, for no one can see what he is seeing. This marks his downward spiral into the mental illness. “A hallucination is a false perception. The person imagines something to be real, when it is not. The hallucination may be something the person sees, hears, or even smells. It involves a particular experience---an imagined experience---grounded in one of the senses.” (Harmon , 27) This hallucination has to do with the emotional guilt he feels toward the murder of his best and only friend. His guilt strikes him so deep that he can feel the disappointment that Banquo feels toward him. The sight of Banquo's bloody ghost coming back to haunt him strikes fear into his heart, causing him to become filled with guilt. This hallucination is taunting him and his mind can not take