wait and id love to hear your thoughts about my favorite shakespeare character, the one and only lady macbeth
I think I've mentioned this to you before, but I had to do this excruciating video project for macbeth in AP lit, which low-key ruined the play for me :CCCC (I am SORRY I was devastated because I knew you loved it) BUT don't worry, all is not lost. Positive opinions are coming. The reason I couldn't wrap my head around it initially was because I wasn't convinced by anyone's motivations. I was super intrigued by the idea of this female, power-hungry villain character, and I genuinely really appreciated the fact that she existed, because female characters were generally never allowed to be so ambitious and so, so flawed. So yes I have always known that the world needed her in it, and been very grateful for her existence <3
my thing was that I couldn't fully appreciate it bc it felt like Shakespeare was trying to tell us that a woman becomes evil when she attempts to act like a man (Act I "unsex me" monologue and whatnot). [in retrospect, I can def appreciate this more if I interpret it as social commentary]
When I first read the play I just wanted the entire cast of characters to feel more HUMAN. Only because I feel like we got glimpses of this humanity and they were so BEAUTIFUL! the one that comes to mind is the scene between Lady Macduff, her son and a murderer. Another is of course Lady Macbeth's: "I have given suck, and know how tender tis to love the babe that milks me." I read that and immediately wanted more. like wdym they had a child/children??? what happened??? why is she the way that she is??? and then we just...didn't get anything more :/
the same thing with the macduff family. I would've loved them sm more if I didn't detest the way that shakespeare pulled off his no-man-born-of-a-woman-can-kill-me plotline with macduff being a c-section baby. my opinion was definitely influenced by my lit teacher, who said "Tolkien did it better" (don't know if you've read/watched LOTR, but there's basically a prophecy saying that no man can slay the witch king of angmar, and then a woman kills him).so yeah !! tolkien ate way too hard with that I fear. in a better world, lady macduff would've killed macbeth and acted as a direct foil to lady macbeth but alas! it wasn't meant to be [don't take this tangent too seriously, this is mostly wishful thinking lmao]
but !!! this was a few months ago, and things have changed since then. I haven't been able to stop wondering about the Macbeth baby/babies, and how vastly different the play becomes in my mind when I let the narrative have more sympathy towards lady Macbeth. because maybe shakespeare's intentions about painting her has a villain because she wasn't "like a woman" don't matter, or maybe that was the point. I can't go as far as to say it was social commentary on period-typical norms, because I don't know that for a fact. anyway, all that matters it this: I love a lady Macbeth who's allowed to be a person, not just an unmotivated caricature. when the production allows itself to focus on parental grief, I actually LOVEEE it (and lady macbeth)!!!! tbh, I might be an idiot because i've recently seen people online saying that they always assumed it was about grief, but in my defense our teacher sped over this unit so quickly; we were too busy speed-reading to digest unfortunately
but SADIE. if you haven't already, you need to read this post I found about a production of Macbeth in which their child died immediately before the beginning of the play. it literally begins with the funeral and it changes the tone of the entire story. I love it sm; nothing is interesting to me unless it's about love, or a poignant lack thereof. it really got me thinking about the importance of directing and actors' interpretations, not to mention the effects of grief, depression, mania, etc.
in short, i LOVE it when productions tell me why lady macbeth is the way that she is !!!
also not sure if you've read this, but ava reid wrote a novel, Lady Macbeth, that i've been meaning to read!! I was obsessed with a study in drowning by her :))
