Persuasive Lady Macbeth

Lady Macbeth: The Persuasive Mistress of the Dark “The Tragedy of Macbeth” wreaks of turmoil and corruption from the very first line of the screenplay. Macbeth, a fierce and formidable warrior who earns the title of Thane of Cawdor after successfully winning a battle for the Kingdom of Scotland, finds himself morally conflicted after a prophecy of his future as King of Scotland given by the Weird Sisters is threatened due to King Duncan passing on the throne to his son, Malcolm. Green with envy and unsure of who to believe, Macbeth contemplates murdering King Duncan on his visit to his home, risking his chances of good fortune in the afterlife simply to have a seat at the center of the Royal Scottish Monarchy. However, Macbeth’s plot to backstab

They have made themselves, and that their fitness now Does unmake you. I have given suck, and know

How tender ’tis to love the babe that milks me.

I would, while it was smiling in my face,

Have plucked my nipple from his boneless gums

And dashed the brains out, had I so sworn as you

Have done to this” (“Macbeth”, 1.7 , 47-60).

Lady Macbeth implements pathos into her persuasive techniques to basically tell of Macbeth, calling him a coward and saying that he was only a man when he declared his determination to go to the extremes to find success; however, she insults Macbeth by saying that he lost his manhood by refusing to go through with Duncan’s murder. She prompts Macbeth to mirror her ambition, and uses the example of bashing a baby’s head in simply because she declared to do so to show Macbeth that when she sets out to do something, she’s gonna accomplish it no matter what.

“Was the hope drunk

Wherein you dressed yourself? Hath it slept since?

And wakes it now, to look so green and pale

At what it did so freely? From this time

Such I account thy love. Art thou afeard

To be the same in thine own act and valor

As thou art in desire? Wouldst thou have that

Which thou esteem’st the ornament of

She taunts him and pokes fun at how he is soft-hearted, and pushes him even further to the edge by comparing his inability to do what it takes to be successful to his inability to love her properly and crawl to the edges of the earth for her. By doing so, she sets off a fire in Macbeth that motivates him to go through with the act of murder. Ultimately, she is successful in persuading Macbeth to murder Duncan, which shows that she is a very controlling, manipulative, and quick-witted woman who can get what she wants. If Lady Macbeth did not persuade Macbeth to kill King Duncan, he would have never gone through with it; her persuasion was essentially the nail in the coffin to sending Macbeth on a moral downward spiral. However, Macbeth goes through with the plan to murder King Duncan not because he fully agreed with Lady Macbeth’s points, but in order to not appear as a coward in front of his wife. Lady Macbeth basically threatened Macbeth that he would lose her love and respect had he not gone through with the murder and questioned his bravery, therefore causing him to commit the act to prove himself worthy to Lady