Masculinity In Lady Macbeth

With social and cultural stereotypes in this era, men were viewed as more powerful while women were portrayed as weak. William Shakespeare tries to interpret the roles between genders by having characters of the opposite sex. In the play Macbeth, William Shakespeare uses rhetorical devices to demonstrate Macbeth’s and Lady Macbeth’s switch in traditional gender roles, which arise from the consequences for each character’s actions and speech.

In ‘Macbeth’, masculinity is presented as a driving force to Macbeth’s crimes, making it a vital theme. The essay’s focus is masculinity’s presentation through Macbeth and Lady Macbeth. Primarily, Shakespeare portrays Macbeth as “valiant”: a prized, respected masculine quality in their society. However, this trait becomes warped along the play. Furthermore, Lady Macbeth yearns for masculinity but she fails to acquire it. Shakespeare thus displays masculinity in two different lights.

Macbeth uses his manhood to portray his solider like qualities, but Lady Macbeth’s masculinity manipulates Macbeth’s actions, however, in the end it is Macbeth who uses his masculinity to do heinous actions.

A prominent and permeating theme in Macbeth is the roles and characteristics of masculinity and femininity. Throughout the play Shakespeare presents the audience with strong and sometimes conflicting views of these gender roles. What exactly defines being a man or a woman? How does an individual’s grasp of these roles effect their actions? Shakespeare shows that a clear and accurate understanding of the concept of masculinity is of critical importance in the success of a ruler. In particular, he illustrates how Macbeth’s acceptance of a perverted, violent view of masculinity leads his kingdom into chaos and turmoil, and leads Macbeth to his inevitable demise. Moral order can only be restored

Historically, roles of men and women were established to ensure the power of the head of the household. In the early centuries, the head of the household was always male. Shakespeare reflects and at times supports the English Renaissance stereotypes of women and men and their various roles and responsibilities in society. In Macbeth, Shakespeare supports this idea by developing the constant theme of power through masculinity. The idealistic role of men in society goes along with the idea that significant power results in higher ranking in the social hierarchy of this time period.

Manipulation, the act of controlling something or someone, is prevalent in all societies and drives the plot of Macbeth. Shakespeare’s play, Macbeth, is about a loyal soldier who commits horrible atrocities to become king, only to be defeated in the end. Throughout the play, male characters are influenced into doing awful acts, which they would not normally have thought to do, after having their manliness questioned. They strive to match the stereotype of an aggressive and dominant man. In Macbeth, Shakespeare reveals that men are manipulated into accomplishing violent deeds in an attempt to live up to the definition of masculinity through his portrayal of male character.

In Macbeth and The Mask You Live In, both Shakespeare and Newsom use the motif of masculinity to demonstrate the masks that men wear and its relation to violence.

Conclusively, the play simply presents a new and less crazed definition of manhood. Specifically the scene where Macduff finds out about his family's death, Malcolm comforts him by telling him to take the bad news in “manly” fashion, by getting his revenge on Macbeth. Macduff exemplifies to the young successor that it is obvious that he has the wrong understanding of masculinity. To Malcolm’s idea, “Dispute it like a man,” Macduff states, “I shall do so. But I must also feel it as a man” (4.3.221–223).

Blood stains his hands, Macbeth races into battle slaughtering every Norwegian in sight, selflessly risking his own life for the people of his country. Macbeth demonstrates these traits as he is a male in power; he must stop at nothing to prove his masculinity and serve his country. Furthermore, the play Macbeth by William Shakespeare is guided by how people perceive stereotypical masculinity, and how you must act as a male. Therefore, in Macbeth common masculine traits such as violence and selflessness is used to manipulate in order to feed one’s ambition to gain ultimate power.

Macbeth's primary wellspring of frailty was his better half Lady Macbeth questioning his grit. Indicated when she utilized her appealing approaches to inspire Macbeth to execute Duncan, "When you durst do it, then you were a man;/And be far beyond the man" (1.7.49-51). Macbeth turned into his own adversary when he attempted to demonstrate his masculinity to his significant other and executed Duncan. Subsequently of his weakness of his absence of masculinity, Macbeth's spirit couldn't be cleaned once more. Macbeth demonstrated to his significant other that he was a "man" however the consequence of killing the ruler was the start of the deceptive activity of Macbeth's spirit on account of the feeling of force he had. Macbeth saw his activities

In the extract, Lady macbeth exploits Macbeth's weaknesses to get hum to kill king Duncan. As Macbeth is thane of Cawdor and a soldier, he is meant to be someone of great valor and strength. Lady Macbeth targets his masculinity when she says "when you durst do it, then you were a man" , telling him that until he commits the crime he is not a man. This has a great effect on Macbeth as in 1606 when the play was written, men were seen as the dominant stronger more worthy gender and it would have insulted him very deeply to be told that he is not manly. She also uses the word "coward" to further insult his character.

Manliness is a quality in life not only for man, but for woman as well. Many tend to seek manliness in the male gender role, yet what one does not realize is women often play a large role just as much. Often defined as a set of attributes and behaviors constructed mainly with men, but often enough with women, manliness or masculinity can affect the inner personality of any human being. As we take a deeper look into the lines of William Shakespeare’s Macbeth, different qualities of manliness is widely spread across the board. From Lady Macbeth to King Duncan and the Witches to Macbeth, we see a very distinct value of manliness portrayed throughout all.

An Impetus for Devastation Various women can be essentially accounted the progenitors of the mass bedlam and miasma of iniquity that befalls the land of Scotland through the examination of their exploitation of the main protagonist, Macbeth, and how they equate manhood with dire cruelty and/or violence. This portrayal is vividly depicted throughout the entire play by both major and minor evil female characters who all serve to instigate a wave of interminable bloodshed. The play Macbeth in particular—composed by the unprecedented, preeminent English playwright William Shakespeare himself in approximately 1606—is a grisly tragedy that revolves around one man’s onerous battle with self-defeating ambition, which eventually leads him to his own

The masculine meets the feminine through a series of transformations since the beginning of the shipwreck of Viola. It is crucial to remember that female parts were traditionally played by male actors, therefore when Viola was cross-dressed and becomes the character Cesario, the actor would just need to quickly remove his costume. Feste says “four negatives makes two affirmatives” (5.1. 19). Not only does Viola amalgamate the two genders, she somewhat denies it as well and she pretends she is a man who has been castrated, which is Cesario. Viola’s original name is directly connected to her borrowed name which is Cesario. Even though Viola is symbolic for both males and females, she is neither a male or a female. However, she comes off as

THE ROLE OF GENDER IN MACBETH When thinking about the role of gender in Shakespeare’s plays, probably none of them is so explicit in expressing gender and dividing man and women as is Macbeth. Lady Macbeth is the focus of gender roles in Macbeth. When she convinces her husband to kill King Duncan, she indicates that she must take on masculine characteristics. Her desire is the best reflected in her most famous speech.