Comparing Serena and Lady Macbeth It is no secret that Ron Rash’s Serena is a very similar character in comparison to Shakespeare’s Lady Macbeth. These two women are very much alike and only slightly different. Though Rash does not claim to base his work off of Macbeth, the two characters resemble each other in a couple different ways. Serena and Lady Macbeth are alike in the fact that they are both ambitious, malicious, and cold-blooded women who are driven by their love for their husbands. Neither of these women exhibit typical female behaviors and it causes readers to be captivated by their motives and actions. In Rash’s Serena, the Pemberton’s are actively destroying land for their lumber business. When Serena joins Mr. …show more content…
Another prime way that these two characters resemble each other is in their acts of evil. Both Serena and Lady Macbeth are portrayed as wicked and malicious because they are so willing to do whatever it takes to reach their goals. Killing people is not a problem for either woman, innocent or not, as long as it fuels their own advancement. Readers might question why these women were so ruthless when it came to murder, but like their ambitious side, the desire to better themselves and their husbands was the driving factor. Serena wanted the business to expand and the cost of someone else’s life meant nothing to her; Macbeth wanted her husband to be King and she was also willing to get rid of anyone who could hinder that dream. Examples of this evil in Serena include her ruthlessness when it came to cutting down trees for lumber, her vicious attempts to find and murder Rachel, the murder of Widow Jenkins by slitting her throat, and the shocking finale of the murder of her own husband. In comparison, Lady Macbeth forces her husband to murder. Though these two women are obviously very similar characters, there are some differences between them as well. Serena is definitely more ruthless in Rash’s book than Macbeth is. She commits a much more considerable number of crimes than Lady Macbeth does by her own hands. Another example of this evil in Serena is her reaction to blood; it arouses her
Lady Macbeth is filled evil schemes, and knows how to achieve her goal of getting her husband into the kingly position. Lady Macbeth is very convincing in her ideas, and does not leave a lot of space to think otherwise. Macbeth is not left much choice but to conform himself to his wife’s mischievous strategy to get him to become king. He is very loyal, and wants to remain so to his king even knowing he would become king if Duncan, the present king, were to die. Lady Macbeth, however, has other plans for Macbeth, and she soon has him convinced to commit an act which will change their lives forever. Macbeth and his wife are truly opposite people, as Macbeth is laid back and easy going, while Lady Macbeth wants everything planned out and will go onward with plans no matter who they affect. She truly does make Macbeth a more interesting person through her evil schemes.
There are many differences between these two version of MacBeth, and each of them, I believe, serves it's own purpose to enhance and better the
his wife. In my opinion he does this so that Lady Macbeth is ready to
In the play Macbeth, ambition, strength, and insanity play major roles in how the characters Macbeth and Lady Macbeth behave and react. Both Macbeth and Lady Macbeth present all 3 of these behaviors at one time or another during the play. However, there behaviors progress in very different ways. While Macbeth gets stronger and more ambitious, Lady Macbeth does the opposite. She starts out strong and ambitious, but becomes weaker and more reserved.
People will say that she is just a good wife trying to go after happiness and joy with her husband. All she wanted was power and for him to be king. That did not work out well. Everything just turned against them. But, here is the weakness; Lady Macbeth and Macbeth both fell apart. After they did all that was wrong, they both felt guilt and did not stop thinking about it. Macbeth started having bad dreams and imagining things. Lady Macbeth started sleep walking and fell apart until she finally decided to take her own life. It did not turn out well for both of them. One can say she was trying to help and do well for her and her husband but that is not
You can control guilt or guilt will drive you into madness. In the novel, Macbeth, guilt has taken over two of the main characters, Macbeth and Lady Macbeth, but each one responds to it in a different way. Their similarities and differences are quite obvious and both are driven to their actions by this feeling. It will eventually cause both of them a breakdown, affecting their behaviors and resulting them into going through a psychological incapacity.
This is apparent when she deals with Macbeth leaving the gory daggers at the site of the murder, “Give me the daggers. The sleeping and the dead/ Are but as pictures; ‘tis the eye of childhood/ That fears a painted devil.”(scene 2 act 2 56-58). Macbeth is portrayed as emotionally unstable and soft as he is afraid to even go back into the room where the murder took place, “I’ll go no more/ I am afraid to think what I have done”(scene 2 act 2 54-55). This interaction between Macbeth and Lady Macbeth really shows the unusual roles one another play in there relationship because in a situation where someone is murdered or their is a serious crime, women aren’t usually the ones who are brave and strong minded about it, men are.
Lady Macbeth is far more evil than the witches; however Macbeth is more than just a dagger in her hand. Reasons for this statement are that the witches simply tell Macbeth the
In conclusion, Lady Macbeth’s ruthless drive is what makes her liable for causing the most evil in Macbeth. Her persuasive insults attribute Macbeth to commit a series of murders that leads to his downfall. Despite the fact that Macbeth is the one commits these actions, it is Lady Macbeth who motivates him. The witches are less evil, because they only place the idea
In the play, “Macbeth”, the character that stands out the most is Lady Macbeth. Her role in this story is significant, she is an evil, ruthless, and ambitious person. She is responsible for the murders that her husband commits because she was bloodthirsty for the crown. In fact, she then becomes more eager to get the crown than Macbeth himself and soon realizes that once you commit one violent act, there is almost no way of ever turning back. An analysis of Lady Macbeth reveals that she is a powerful character who adds complexity and depth to a play about murder, madness, and revenge.
Lady Macbeth is a complex and intriguing character in Shakespeare’s play, Macbeth. She is a difficult character to embody as her personality seems split between two sides, one that is pure evil, sly and conniving in contrast to her softer, vulnerable, weak and feminine side. In the play we see her in these two main ways. The reader may feel a certain animosity towards Lady Macbeth throughout the first few acts as her personality appears more and more distasteful, in spite of this towards the end she has a serious breakdown over the guilt that torments her, even in her sleep, regarding her hand in Duncan’s untimely death.
The relationship among Macbeth and Lady Macbeth alters throughout the play Macbeth as they both in turn take on the role of the more dominant character. Their attitude to each other constantly changes throughout the play, although events in the play certainly draw Macbeth and Lady Macbeth apart their love for one another is evident throughout the play. Macbeth shows his love by saying a few compassionate words in his letter to Lady Macbeth about the meeting with the three weird sisters. Lady Macbeth shows that she cares for him by planning the murder of King Duncan so Macbeth can become king. By the end of the play Macbeth doesn’t care about his wife’s health that much, when she dies his taught was she was bound to die one day.
Lady Macbeth is more power hungry and ambitious then Macbeth is. She, through ambition she gives the finial push to Macbeth to kill Duncan the king of Scotland. Her power however, is not driven by the sisters, hers is greed. She wants to be Queen, she wants the power of being Queen. Both Lady Macbeth and Macbeths ambition is tragic flaw. Her ambition drives her to her to go crazy which ultimately drives her to her death. There is an instance where she is sleep walking, eyes open. She goes to her vanity and sits down, she looks at her hands a sees blood. Then she sticks her hand in the water bowl and attempts to wash them. When she pulls them back out the blood did not wash away. Only she can see the blood her maid and doctor see this happening and they just think that she is going crazy. This is only the beginning of her insaneness. Just before her death she vilely reads a letter that Macbeth sent to her, telling her that he was to be King some how. It is her guilt that kills her.
Shakespeare’s Macbeth and Sophocles’s Antigone both used the strong and powerful women, Lady Macbeth and Antigone, to create guilt in the plays. In Macbeth, Lady Macbeth is a strong powerful woman, where as Macbeth is weak and a coward, Lady Macbeth guilt’s Macbeth about how much they have done to the king, and yet she has no sign of guilt, while Macbeth is giving in to pressure, so Lady Macbeth tells him he must not be or act guilty. Shakespeare uses guilt against Lady Macbeth so she can get what she wants but, she uses it so much it goes against her. In Antigone, Antigone is strong and fights for what she believes in; even if death is against her she does what she thinks is right. Antigone not only stud up to the king, but did not feel guilt toward the Creon, only the thought of not burring her brother. The women were both different by Lady Macbeth didn’t feel guilt for killing, but Antigone felt guilty for her brother not allowed to be buried.
“At the heart of William Shakespeare's Macbeth is an examination of the nature of evil and it's many faces and facets”(Cathell 119). The principal evil characters in the play, Macbeth and Lady Macbeth, are both evil, but the manifestation of evil is different in each.