Dramatic Irony in Macbeth

Dramatic Irony in Macbeth

Kate Capitano

Lady Macbeth's Role

"But screw your courage to the sticking place" (I.VII.70)

Appearance vs. Reality as Dramatic Irony

Lady Macbeth's Soliloquy

Macbeth's Soliloquy

Hath borne his faculties so meek, hath been

So clear in his great office, that his virtues

Will plead like angels, trumpet-tongued, against

The deep damnation of his taking-off;

And pity, like a naked new-born babe,

Striding the blast, or heaven's cherubim, horsed

Upon the sightless couriers of the air,

Shall blow the horrid deed in every eye,

That tears shall drown the wind. I have no spur

To prick the sides of my intent, but only

Vaulting ambition, which o'erleaps itself

And falls on th' other

If it were done when 'tis done, then 'twere well

It were done quickly: if the assassination

Could trammel up the consequence, and catch,

With his surcease, success; that but this blow

Might be the be-all and the end-all here,

But here, upon this bank and shoal of time,

We'd jump the life to come. But in these cases

We still have judgment here; that we but teach

Bloody instructions, which, being taught, return

To plague the inventor: this even-handed justice

Commends th' ingredience of our poison'd chalice

To our own lips. He's here in double trust;

First, as I am his kinsman and his subject,

Strong both against the deed; then, as his host,

Who should against his murderer shut the door,

Not bear the knife myself. Besides, this Duncan

"The raven himself is hoarse

That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan 40

Under my battlements. Come, you spirits

That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,

And fill me from the crown to the toe top-full

Of direst cruelty! make thick my blood;

Stop up the access and passage to remorse,

That no compunctious visitings of nature

Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between

The effect and it! Come to my woman's breasts,

And take my milk for gall, you murdering ministers,

Wherever in your sightless substances 50

You wait on nature's mischief! Come, thick night,

And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell,

That my keen knife see not the wound it makes,

Nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark,

To cry 'Hold, hold!" (I.V.45-61)

"Look like th' innocent flower but be the serpent under't" (I.V.76-77)

Lack of Suspicion

Macbeth's Deception

"Malcolm and Donalbain, the King's two sons, are stol'n away and fled, which puts upon them suspicion of the deed" (II.I.36-38)

"Oh never shall sun that morrow see" (I.V.71-72)

"Banqou, thy soul's flight, if it find heaven, must find it out tonight" (III.I.161-162)